Edwin Alcock was an explosives expert who was employed by
Derbyshire Health and Safety Executive (HSE). An informant told
Staffordshire Police that he believed that a bailiff who had tried
to serve papers on Alcock was threatened with a brick and chased
off Alcock's premises, that he had threatened a judge in court and
that he had threatened to blow someone up.
When the HSE was told of the claims Alcock lost his job, his
explosives licence and his home. Staffordshire Police shared the
information with Derbyshire Police, who passed it on to the HSE,
but took no further action. The Information Tribunal said that
"evidence has been provided to us that would indicate that there
was some basis of truth to some of the allegations and that they
were not entirely foundless (sic)".
Alcock asked Staffordshire Police to give him the details of the
informer and they refused, saying that the details of that person
were exempt from the Freedom of Information Act under five
different clauses of the Act.
Those exemptions allow a body to refuse to disclose information
if it was obtained in an investigation into whether someone should
be charged with an offence and it came from confidential sources.
They also allow an absolute exemption in relation to personal
information relating to a person who is not the information
requester.
Alcock referred the case to the Information Commissioner, who
backed Staffordshire Police's decision that the information did not
have to be handed over because of the confidentiality exemption and
because the information related to a third party.
Alcock then appealed the Information Commissioner's decision to
the Information Tribunal, which assessed the reasoning behind the
application of the two exemptions. The Tribunal found that the
exemption relating to the disclosure of another person's
information did apply.
When it came to assessing the decision on the confidentiality
exemption, the Tribunal assessed the public interest arguments in
favour and against disclosure of the informant's identity.
Though Tribunal chairman John Angel found that there was some
argument in favour of disclosure in order to make police dealings
transparent, he said that the balance lay in favour of
non-disclosure because if a confidential informant's details were
made public it would jeopardise the gathering of information by
police from other informants.
"This is a most unfortunate case, the background circumstances
of which have caused great hardship to Mr Alcock," said Angel in
his ruling. "He has attempted to pursue his grievance through this
Tribunal, but we cannot help him for the reasons given above. We
uphold the decision notice dated 6th April 2006 and dismiss the
appeal."
