In terms of the Freedom of Information Act of 2000, and subject to section 40(2) on personal data, could you please provide me with your local authority’s complete and most-recently updated list of all business (non-residential) property rates data, including the following fields:
- Billing Authority Property Reference Code (linking the property to the public VOA database reference)
- Firm's Trading Name (i.e. property occupant or ratepayer)
- Full Property Address (Number, Street, Postal Code, Town)
- Occupation / Vacancy status
- Date of Occupation / Vacancy
- Reliefs and / or exemption categories (classifications) granted or applied
- Date that reliefs and / or exemption categories granted or applied
- Value of reliefs and / or exemption categories granted or applied (in Pounds)
- Actual annual rates charged (in Pounds)
If you are unable to provide an absolute “Occupation / Vacancy” status, please provide the balance of the information requested.
Let me state this clearly: I recognise that you ordinarily refuse to release these data, and that you do so in full knowledge of the scope and scale of the research data that I produce, and have produced since 2016, based on the near 80% of local authorities which do publish data in response to my requests.
It has taken time, but the Upper Tier Tribunal has now ruled on this class of information request in UA-2024-000544 and 000546-GIA [2025] UKUT 054&055 (AAC) EDWARD CARTER V INFORMATION COMMISSIONER, WESTMINSTER CITY COUNCIL AND THE CITY OF LONDON CORPORATION (https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/67c7275c16dc9038974dbe67/UA-2024-000544-GIA___UA-2024-000546-GIA.pdf).
There are two specific rulings that are germane to my request:
1. The Upper Tribunal confirmed that local authorities should not rely on the Lower Tribunal’s decisions in future cases: “This decision is not binding on any other public authority, nor does it mean that any request for similar information in the future should be refused by these two authorities. Each request should be assessed based on the public interest in disclosure of the particular information requested at that particular time.”
This means that you cannot simply state that a request we have made to another authority, that was refused, has any weight or influence on your decision. You have to make a new, and independent, decision.
2. The Upper Tribunal ruled that the Section 31 balancing exercise under section 2(2)(b) (public interest) was only necessary if section 31 was engaged at all. But they declared explicitly that treating Section 31 as if it is automatically engaged is an error of law: “So, there was evidence from the experience of Westminster and the City before their change of policy and from the other local authorities in London. The tribunal had three options. It could have accepted the evidence and decided that section 31 was not engaged. Or it could have rejected it and decided that the section was engaged. Or it could have assessed its predictive value and decided that the section was nonetheless engaged. It was not entitled to ignore it, because on its face it was potentially relevant. The tribunal should have said what it made of that evidence in making its prediction under section 31. It did not do so and that was an error of law.”
This means that the fact that the vast majority of local authorities publish the data we request, and that you yourselves have historically done so, and that none of this has ever resulted in any criminal activity strongly implies that there is no basis in relying on Section 31, and I insist you not do so unless you have specific evidence that publishing these data has resulted in incidents of crime in your authority.
Finally, while the Upper Tribunal did not rule specifically on Section 41, they did state as follows: “If we had to consider section 41, we would not have been satisfied that the link between the company name and necessary hereditament had the necessary quality of confidence as a class.”
This means that the Upper Tribunal was convinced that - while time-consuming - it is relatively straightforward to use Google or the phone book to explicitly link VOA addresses to companies, and so there is no protection from disclosure in providing this information.
Your continued refusal wastes both your and my time and money. Any delay or refusal on your part will be referred to ICO for a decision, and ICO is now functioning under this revised Upper Tribunal guidance.
Please provide these data as machine-readable as either a CSV or Microsoft Excel file, capable of re-use, and under terms of the Open Government Licence (meaning reuse for any and all purposes, including commercial).
