Decisions

The Commissioner found that Coillte was justified in refusing part of the request because it did not hold certain information but was not justified in refusing other parts of the request on that ground. He found that some of the withheld information is out of scope. He found that the information at issue is environmental information. He found that Coillte had not properly made out a case for withholding that information but he decided, in circumstances where additional records within the scope of the request have yet to be considered by Coillte, that it was not appropriate for him to require the release of the information until the necessary consideration and weighing of the competing interests in relation to all of the information had taken place. The Commissioner expressed the expectation that Coillte will reprocess the request, taking account of his findings and of the additional records that Coillte has since located, and give the appellants a new decision.

The Commissioner found that it was reasonable to conclude that information requested was not held by the Department following its carrying out of adequate searches and thus article 7(5) of the AIE Regulations applied

The Commissioner found that the requested correspondence was held in the professor’s personal capacity and not by or for UCD and thus article 7(5) of the AIE Regulations applied

The Commissioner found that the information is environmental information and he required the Department to make it available to the appellant

The Commissioner found that NAMA was justified in refusing access to the information sought under article 8(a)(iv) of the AIE Regulations and affirmed its decision accordingly.

The Commissioner accepted EirGrid's assurance that it did not hold certain information at the relevant time. He found that EirGrid's refusal to provide further information was justified in relation to all parts of the request except one. He found that EirGrid had not properly addressed one part because it had not properly had regard to the appellant's clarification of the scope of that part. Accordingly, he varied EirGrid's decision by annulling its decision on that part while affirming its decision on the other parts. He expressed his expectation that EirGrid will make a fresh decision on the annulled part in accordance with the AIE Regulations, if the appellant so wishes.

The Commissioner found that IFI's search for information was adequate. He found that, in the circumstances, IFI was not obliged, when processing this AIE request, to ask a retired member of staff if they held relevant information in a private email account (if any) or on a privately-owned mobile phone on IFI's behalf. Accordingly, the Commissioner affirmed IFI's decision and did not require it to take any action

The Commissioner found that EirGrid did not make any decision on much of the information captured by part 1 of the request. Given the close relationship between the information captured by parts 1 and 2, the Commissioner considered that both of those parts must be considered together. Accordingly, he annulled EirGrid’s decision on those parts of the request and required EirGrid to make a fresh decision in accordance with the Regulations.

The Commissioner found that while article 9(1)(c) applied to the information, the public interest in disclosure outweighed the interests served by refusal. Accordingly, he annulled the Council's decision and required it to make the withheld environmental information available to the appellant.