Freedom Of Information (FOI)

The Freedom of Information Act gives a general right of access to all types of recorded information held by public authorities. It sets out exemptions from that right and places a number of obligations on public authorities.

The Environmental Information Regulations were created to support and work with the Freedom of Information Act and provide public access to environmental information held in public authorities.

Registration Service & Freedom of Information

Registration Officers and anyone who acts on their behalf in carrying out statutory registration duties are outside the provisions of the FOI Act 2000. Superintendent registrars and registrars are not a public authority as defined in the Act and, therefore, are not subject to its provisions. Data held by them including information held in birth/ death / ​marriage registers – is thus not subject to disclosure under the FOI Act.

The Information Commissioner’s Office maintains a Data Protection Public Register. You can search this to find out what personal data is being processed by a particular controller.

Publication Scheme

Every public authority is required to adopt and maintain a publication scheme setting out the classes of information it holds, the manner in which it intends to publish the information, and whether a charge will be made for the information.  Please check the publication scheme , or search the website, before you submit a request for information as you may find what you are looking for in the scheme.  You may also find what you are looking for in open data.

Can't find it? »

Requests by email should be sent to: hdl@halton.gov.uk

Requests by post should be sent to Information Governance Service, Compliance and Data Management Division, Halton Borough Council, PO Box 317, Runcorn WA7 9BZ​.

Copyright

The Freedom of Information Act and the Environmental Information Regulations give you wide-ranging rights to obtain information from us.  They do not automatically give you the right to make any further use of that information. You can read the information we provide, quote it or make reference to it. Most of the information we can give you is covered by our copyright, and some of it may be covered by other people's copyright. If you copy, publish or re-use it without permission you are breaching copyright.

If you wish to copy, publish or re-use it for commercial purposes, you must obtain our permission.