Decision
Ms S and Health Services Executive
From Office of the Information Commissioner (OIC)
Case number: 130296, 130297, 130323
Published on
From Office of the Information Commissioner (OIC)
Case number: 130296, 130297, 130323
Published on
Whether the Department was justified in refusing the applicant's request for certain records relating to the National Ambulance Service (NAS) under section 10(1)(c) of the FOI Act.
19 February 2014
In case number 130296 , the applicant submitted an FOI request, on 24 September 2013, for records pertaining to staff feedback reports and to calls made to the ambulance service in a specified period. This request sought the following information:
"1. All monthly 'NL Local Staff Feedback Reports -- HIQA Response Times and Daily Performance' for each month and each of the three NAS areas for the period from September 2012 to September 2013.
2. All records of calls made for an ambulance to the NAS across each regional area in the period September 2012 to Sept 2013 and all associated performance time stamps.
For each call this includes
(a) The incident numbers
(b) The date and time of the call
(c) Details of the Chief Complaint
(d) Location of the incident, ie the town or city: excluding the first line of the address field which details a house number/name of company name.
(e) The clinical status code of an incident
(f) If first a responder attended the incident.
(g) The first responder type
(h) Time the call was assigned to first responder
(i) Arrival at the scene of the first responder.
(j) Patient-carrying vehicle type
(k) The time the patient-carrying vehicle was assigned to the incident
(l) Mobilisation time for patient-carrying vehicle
(m) Arrival at scene time of the patient carrying vehicle.
(n) Arrival at hospital of the patient carrying vehicle
(o) What hospital patient was brought to.
To reiterate, please can you provide this data in electronic form in an excel spreadsheet."
In its original decision dated 23 October 2013, the NAS granted partial access to the records sought. The applicant then sought an internal review of the decision to refuse her full access to the records sought, on 24 October 2013. The outcome of that review, dated 12 November 2013, was a decision to vary the original decision, and to release records, in response to part 1 of the request, which had been refused in response to the original request.
The applicant then applied to the Information Commissioner, on 19 November 2013, for a review of her FOI application, in relation to the records which remained refused to her, following the NAS's internal review.
In case number 130297 , the applicant submitted an FOI request, on 1 October 2013, for records pertaining to a range of matters pertaining to the work of the NAS. The request sought the following records, in electronic format where available:
"All documents , records, emails, memos from phone calls. etc. " regarding
"1. All complaints made to the HSE and /or the National Ambulance Service (NAS) about the ambulance service by members of the public in the past three years, ie from September 2010 to September 30th 2013.
2. All complaints made by operational staff in the NAS against ambulance officers and managers in the past five [sic] years, i.e. from September 2010 to Sept 30th 2013.
3. All complaints made by officers about their superiors in management, including the Chief Ambulance Officer and the Assistant Chief Ambulance Officer, in the past five [sic] year, ie from September 1st 2010 to Sept 30th 2013.
4. The number of operational staff who have left the NAS before retirement in the past three years, providing the total figure and the numbers per year. Please provide the grade of the operational staff member and the area he/she worked in, i.e. the administrative area: North Leinster, South or West.
5. Details of the cases taken by NAS staff against NAS management at the Employment Appeals Tribunal in the last three years, providing the total figure and the numbers per year.
6. Details of the cases taken by NAS staff against NAS management at the Labour Court in the last three years, providing the total figure and the numbers per year.
7. The number of operational staff on sick leave in the past three years, providing the total figure and the numbers per year.
8. The number of operational staff on administrative leave in the past three years, providing the total figure and the numbers per year.
I also wish to get the following information in electronic format:
9. All daily Shift Incident Reports (SIRs) produced for all areas of the NAS from September 2012 to the present.
10. All electronic Patient Care Reports (ePCRS) for the North East held in the past three years, i.e. from September 2010 to Sept 30th 2013. Please delete the fields on Surname and Date of Birth for data protection reasons. Please also delete the top line of the Address field, so that the house number/name or company name is deleted thereby providing the address in terms of the nearest town/area of city/city.
11. Thew number of (a) ambulances and (b) rapid response vehicles and motor bikes in operation in the service in the past five years. Please provide a county by county break down for each year."
In its original decision dated 30 October 2013, the HSE granted partial access to the records sought. The applicant immediately appealed this decision, also on 30 October 2013. The NAS carried out the internal review on 13 November 2013, and this review affirmed the original decision. The applicant then appealed to the Information Commissioner, on 19 November 2013, in relation to the records which were not released following the internal review.
In case number 130323 , the applicant submitted an FOI request, on 3 October 2013, for records pertaining to ambulance response times and patient outcomes for hospital cardiac cases, relating specifically to information gathered by the NAS for a project, known as the OHCAR project, carried out by the National University of Ireland (NUI) in Galway. OHCAR is the national Out-of-Hospital Cardiac Arrest Register, and the project collects data on Out-of-Hospital Cardiac Arrest events that are attended by ambulance services where resuscitation is attempted. The purpose of the project is to improve survival rates from Out-of-Hospital Cardiac Arrest.
Specifically, in relation to each case on which data was gathered, the applicant sought the following:
"
•The Incident numbers
•The time and date of the call
•Details of the Chief Complaint
•Location of the incident, ie the town or city: excluding the first line of the address field which details a house number/name of company name.
•The clinical status code of an incident
•If first a responded attended the incident.
•The first responder type
•Time the call was assigned to first responder
•Arrival at the scene of the first responder.
•Patient-carrying vehicle type
•The time the patient-carrying vehicle was assigned to the incident
•Mobilisation time for patient-carrying vehicle
•Arrival at scene time of the patient carrying vehicle.
•Arrival at hospital of the patient carrying vehicle
•What hospital patient was brought to.
I wish to have the data gathered from the first OHCAR study of 200 cases along with the most recently gathered data which will be reported on later this year.
I wish to have it in electronic format (exported to cvs or xls) or in its existing format SPSS.
I request that any information giving rise to data protection issues be electronically removed."
In its decision dated 7 November 2013, the NAS refused the records sought. The applicant sought an internal review on 11 November 2013. The internal reviewer issued his findings on 3 December 2013, and decided to vary the original decision by releasing some of the records sought. The applicant then appealed to the Information Commissioner on 12 December 2013, in relation to the records which were not released, following the internal review. In conjunction with this appeal, she requested that her three FOI appeals relating to the NAS be dealt with together.
In carrying out this review, I have had regard to the correspondence between the NAS and the applicant, as set out above. I have had regard also to communications between this Office and the applicant, and between the Office and the NAS. Finally, I have had regard to the relevant provisions of the FOI Act.
The scope of this review is confined to examining whether the NAS has justified its refusal to release certain records documents to the applicant, in accordance with section 10(1)(c)of the FOI Act.
As indicated above, and in accordance with a request from the applicant, I am examining these three FOI applications together.
The NAS justified the refusal of records to the applicant on the basis of various provisions of the FOI Act, mainly based on sections 28(1) and 10(1)(c) of the Act. Section 28(1) provides that access to a record shall be refused if access would involve the disclosure of personal information (including personal information relating to a deceased individual). However, in the course of correspondence between this Office and the NAS in relation to these applications, it became clear that the fundamental contention made by the NAS, in all of the cases, is that granting the requests would involve an excessive and unreasonable volume of work on its part. Section 10(1)(c) of the FOI Act allows heads of public bodies to refuse FOI requests where granting the requests would involve a volume of work that would "cause a substantial and unreasonable interference with or disruption of the work of the public body concerned. "
In invoking section 28(1), the NAS sought to prevent the release of any records of a medical nature relating to any patient. However, it is clear that it has not considered releasing the relevant records in redacted form, with all personally-identifiable information removed, because to do so would have involved a manual examination of each record which, it contends, would involve a very large volume of work for NAS staff. The NAS has confirmed that the overriding issue, from the its perspective was the volume of the work that granting these FOI requests would have involved, and therefore I am examining these cases on the basis of the exemption provided by section 10(1)(c).
However, section 10(2) of the FOI Act requires that a request shall not be refused under section 10(1)(c) unless the body assisted, or offered to assist, the requester in amending the request so that it no longer falls within the parameters of section 10(1)(c). It is clear from the correspondence between this Office and the parties in this case that no such assistance, or offer of assistance, was made in these cases. Therefore, it is my view that the decisions of the NAS in each of these cases should be annulled, and I find accordingly. The effect of this is that the Department is required to make a new, first instance, decision in respect of the applicant's original request.
Although I am pleased to note that the NAS not only accepted the views put to it by this Office, but also offered to reconsider the requests in the light of the full requirements of section 10 of the FOI Act, it is nonetheless necessary for me to annul its original decisions. This is so that the applicant may avail of the usual rights of internal review as well as external review by the Information Commissioner in respect of the NAS's new, first instance decisions on the applicant's original requests. In making those new decisions, the NAS is required to offer assistance to the applicant in accordance with the provisions of section 10(2), if the decision of the NAS is to again invoke section 10(1)(c) in any of the cases.
Having carried out a review under section 34(2) of the FOI Act, I hereby annul the Department's refusals of the requests. I direct that it undertake a fresh decision making process in respect of each of the requests, and inform the applicant of the outcome in accordance with the requirements of the FOI Act.
A party to a review, or any other person affected by a decision of the Information Commissioner following a review, may appeal to the High Court on a point of law arising from the decision. Such an appeal must be initiated not later than eight weeks from the date on which notice of the decision was given to the person bringing the appeal.
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Sean Garvey
Senior Investigator