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Why we’re taking the UK government to court to protect Freedom of Information
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The department, headed up by Cabinet Office secretary Michael Gove, released a limited number of documents related to the Clearing House to openDemocracy in September last year, following the ICO judgement, and handed over more documents in March, just weeks before the tribunal case was due to be heard. But it has still to release full details about how the Clearing House operation functions – which is why openDemocracy is taking action.

“I shouldn’t have to go to a tribunal to get transparency,” said Corderoy. “This has taken almost three years of legal battle. Though the Information Commissioner’s Office told the Cabinet Office to hand over full details of the Clearing House operation, we are having to go to court to get them.”

Erin Alcock, from the Human Rights department at Leigh Day, said: “Our client is seeking disclosure of information from the Cabinet Office to better understand and analyse how the Freedom of Information [unit], Clearing House, is being operated by the department.

“Our client has serious and legitimate concerns that the operation of this Clearing House could present barriers to transparency and access to information the public should be entitled to, and may not accord with the spirit of the Freedom of Information Act.”

openDemocracy’s cause has also been backed by former Labour chancellor John McDonnell, who believes FOI reform is badly needed.

“The weaknesses and undermining of the FOI system prevent the necessary sunlight being shone on government decision making and is critical to upholding democratic accountability,” he told openDemocracy.

“I will be raising the FOI question as part of the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee inquiry into Greensill and probity in government.”

The National Union of Journalists’ general secretary, Michelle Stanistreet, said: "The NUJ is fully supportive of the journalists determined to get to the bottom of the existence and operation of a secret Clearing House operated by the Cabinet Office.

“Freedom of Information underpins our democracy and the ability of journalists to properly hold power to account and uphold the public’s right to know. Wasting public resources on attempts to stymie and thwart legitimate requests is outrageous and has to stop.”

Art of Darkness

The Clearing House, which was housed in the Ministry of Justice until 2015, gives advice to government departments “to protect sensitive information”. As openDemocracy has shown, this has included blocking the release of files about the contaminated blood scandal to a campaigner whose father died after being infected with HIV by the National Health Service.

The Clearing House has also signed off on FOI responses from other Whitehall departments – effectively centralising control within Gove’s office over what information is released to the public – and collating lists of journalists with details about their work.

Freedom of Information requests are supposed to be ‘applicant-blind’: meaning who makes the request should not matter. But privately government departments commented that “Corderoy is from OpenDemocracy”.

Cabinet office minister Michael Gove maintains that “all FOI requests are treated exactly the same” – he said as much in Parliament this week – but a journalist at The Times, George Greenwood, recently reported on how his FOIs had been targeted by the Clearing House, too, with one official describing him as the “ever-active Mr Greenwood”.

The Cabinet Office has dismissed openDemocracy’s coverage as “tendentious” – but last month, in a rare show of transparency, the Cabinet Office publicly published details about the Clearing House, including that the unit’s remit covers the Supreme Court and the Crown Prosecution Service.

[1] Url: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/freedom-of-information/why-were-taking-the-uk-government-to-court-to-protect-freedom-of-information/