https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="🚨" title="Polizeiautos mit drehendem Licht" aria-label="Emoji: Polizeiautos mit drehendem Licht"> Freedom of Information statistics klaxon https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="🚨" title="Polizeiautos mit drehendem Licht" aria-label="Emoji: Polizeiautos mit drehendem Licht">

Yesterday, Cabinet Office published the latest round of FoI stats, from Q2 2020.

Government departments received 6,770 FoI requests in Apr-Jun, a significant drop from Q1 and 2019 average.

More cool charts in thread below https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="⬇️" title="Pfeil nach unten" aria-label="Emoji: Pfeil nach unten">https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="📊" title="Balkendiagramm" aria-label="Emoji: Balkendiagramm">

All of the main departments which regularly receive the most FoI requests (HO, MoD, MoJ) all saw significant drops in request numbers in Q2 2020.

Attention and focus elsewhere due to Coronavirus? Apr-Jun was the height of the UK& #39;s pandemic experience.

The proportion of FoI requests which are withheld by government depts in whole or part continues to rise.

In Q2 2020, 57.5% of FoI requests made to main government departments were withheld in some way.

13 of the 20 main government departments granted lower than 50% of their FoI requests in full.

This includes Cabinet Office, the FCO and DHSC. Other departments are also in decline in this area.

(This is one of my favourite IfG charts)

11 of the main departments were below timeliness target (to respond to 90% of requests within 20 days).

Worst offenders - DWP (55% on time), FCO (64% on time).

Perhaps understandable due to need for COVID focus, but timeliness of FoI responses should be a major future target.