Disclosure Log

Staff Networks (FOI/8215)

Message from Nottinghamshire County Council - 08 July 2026

Subject: Freedom of Information Act 2000 – Refusal Notice (Section 12)

Dear Requester,

Request FOI/8215

Further to your request received on 6th July 2026, I confirm that the Council has now considered your request under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA).

Questions)

"Please provide details of any external speakers, awareness sessions, talks, workshops, webinars, conferences, or events organised, hosted, promoted or supported by staff networks since 2 May 2025..."

Answer)

Having considered your request, the Council is refusing it under Section 12(1) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA).

Section 12 exempts public authorities from complying with requests where the cost of determining whether the requested information is held, and locating, retrieving and extracting that information, would exceed the appropriate limit prescribed by the Freedom of Information and Data Protection (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004.

The information requested is not held centrally in a single recorded source. To identify all external speakers, awareness sessions, talks, workshops, webinars, conferences, and events organised, hosted, promoted or supported by staff networks since 2 May 2025, the Council would be required to contact officers involved in each staff network and request information from them regarding events held during the specified period.

In particular, several elements of your request, including attendance figures, speaker details, event formats, costs, and associated documentation, would require enquiries to be made of numerous individual officers across multiple staff networks. The Council does not hold a consolidated record containing all of the information requested.

Furthermore, responding to the request would require information to be gathered, compiled and collated from individual officers in order to create records and summaries which do not currently exist. The FOIA provides a right of access to recorded information held by a public authority at the time a request is received; it does not require a public authority to create new information, generate reports, or conduct surveys of staff in order to answer a request.

Accordingly, we estimate that the work required to identify, locate, retrieve and extract the information falling within the scope of your request would exceed the appropriate limit and, therefore, the request is refused under Section 12(1) of the FOIA.

Advice and Assistance – Section 16 FOIA

To assist you in refining your request, we may be able to consider a narrower request which focuses on information likely to be held in a recorded and readily retrievable format.

Examples include:

Information relating to a specific staff network (for example, the Disability Staff Network, Women"s Staff Network, LGBTQ+ Staff Network, etc.).
Information relating to a specific event or series of events.
Information relating to events held within a shorter time period (for example, a single month or quarter).
Information concerning external speakers only, excluding attendance data and cost information.

Should you wish to submit a refined request, we would be pleased to consider it.

The Council publishes Access to Information requests and responses on its online Disclosure Log. Only requests deemed to be in the public interest will be included and any request included within this log will be de-personalised accordingly.

To view the Council’s Disclosure Log, please visit our website.

Your privacy: we use your personal information such as name and address so that we can comply with our legal obligations to respond to FOI requests. For further details about the use of information about you, please see the information handling privacy notice on our website at:
https://www.nottinghamshire.gov.uk/media/4323566/informationgovernanceandinformationrightsprivacynotice.pdf

If you are dissatisfied with the handling of your request, you have the right to ask for an internal review. Requests should be submitted within 40 working days of the date of receipt of the response to your original request and should be addressed to: Complaints and Information Team, Nottinghamshire County Council, County Hall, Loughborough Road, West Bridgford, NOTTINGHAM, NG2 7QP or [email protected].

Please remember to quote the reference number above in any future communications.

If you are not content with the outcome of the internal review, you have the right to apply directly to the Information Commissioner for a decision. The Information Commissioner can be contacted at: Information Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, WILMSLOW, SK9 5AF or https://ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint/foi-and-eir-complaints/.

Yours sincerely,

Freedom of Information
Complaints and Information Team
Chief Executives Department
Nottinghamshire County Council
The Council is committed to protecting your privacy and ensuring all personal information is kept confidential and safe. For more details see our general and service specific privacy notices at: https://www.nottinghamshire.gov.uk/global-content/privacy