Tagged: Brighton Argus
FOI Friday: Driving test interpreters, hospital inspection reports, school bus cuts … and getting more from police numbers
We’ve seen a few FOI success stories out of the Driving Standards Agency, which runs driving test centres. The latest one, though, from the Brighton Argus, could demonstrate that the agency is the gift which keeps on giving. The Argus reports on the number of people taking their test who required an interpreter to get through their driving tests.
2. Millions spent on patient taxis
More than £4million has been spent hiring taxis to ferry patients around in the last four years, according to an FOI request reported in the Weston Mercury from Great Western Ambulance Service (GWAS).
3. Getting access to hospital inspection reports
The Care Quality Commission is a public body, tasked with inspecting, among other things, hospitals. So on one hand, it’s a poor do to hear that the Hull Daily Mail had to use FOI to get hold of a report carried out about a maternity ward – but, on the other hand, it’s proof FOI works – with findings revealed which perhaps explain why the hospital wasn’t more open with it in the first place.
FOI Friday: The cost of unions, the cost of dying, the cost of parking … and escaping prisoners
The Scotsman used FOI to find out how much cremation and burial charges had risen as a result of recent spending cuts – in some places it has doubled, while overall the amount raised from such services has gone from £8million to £16million.
The cost of residents permits goes up
Spotting a theme here yet? Maybe. The BBC’s Inside Out programme – ie the programme the BBC bigwigs want to slash the budget of, despite being the only regional current affairs progeamme the BBC currently produces which breaks stories – used FOI to ask councils how much they’d made from residents parking permits in recent years. No surprise, the figure has rised rapidly.
PCTs blocking drugs to save cash
An investigation by GP magazine has revealed that dozens of primary care trusts are blocking access to drugs which have been approved by NICE, the government’s drug approval/rationing (depending on your point of view) agency. The NHS constitution says that any drug approved by NICE should be made available, so this could be an FOI for local newsapers to follow up.
FOI Friday: Council employee compo, eating disorders, gypsy education and spying
1. Employer liability claims against councils
Lancahsire County Council paid out £1,250 to a member of staff who got a bad back from carrying a heavy refreshments tray while on duty. That was one of 179 claims made against LCC, reported by the Lancashire Evening Post, over the past four years – payouts have totalled more than £2million. Perhaps the most surprising one was this one:
£5,500 to a worker who fell out of bed responding to a phone call
A handy reminder of the value of returning to FOIs which may have been done elsewhere in the past. The Sunday Sun asked councils to reveal details of when they had used Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA) powers to investigate members of the public.
The act means authorities can follow residents suspected of crime, trawl their internet browsing history and recruit informants and private investigators to monitor their movements. Some councils in the North even use it to snoop on their own staff.
3. Children with eating disorders
Bedfordshire on Sunday carried a worrying report on how eating disorders among young children was on the rise. It obtained the information by asking the South Essex Partnership Trust – the mental health trust for the area – for details of the numbers of cases, the sex of each case, and the age. The youngest were six and seven.
FOI: Can a journalist overuse FOI?
I posted the other week on a good use of FOI by the Brighton Argus, which uncovered an investigation into an alleged manslaughter at one of its local hospitals after submitting an FOI request.
It demonstrated succinctly the secretive tendencies of both police forces and hospital trusts, and as a result proves just how valuable a tool FOI has become.
Hold The Front Page covered the paper’s success too, but the comment from Argus editor Michael Beard struck me as peculiar. While praising the story as an example of ‘FOI at its best’, he added:
“Newspapers need to be careful not to overuse the Act, but this story proves that it is vitally important and useful in uncovering important issues and holding public authorities to account.”
Like this:
FOI Friday: Tonsils, waiting in ambulances, thefts from courts and some interesting emails
Courts were told to push for tougher sentences
When doing FOI Friday, I try and pick FOI stories which can be replicated elsewhere. Based on that criteria, including this story from The Guardian seems a bit odd. Basically, the Guardian got hold of court emails which encouraged magistrates to direct riot-related offences to crown court for sentence. The reason I’ve included it is because it demonstrates just how powerful FOI can be if you go beyond numbers and ask for documents. Emails can be a rich source of stories – from memos directing traffic wardens where to target for parking through to stuff like this.
There’s something particularly good about this use of FOI. Yes, it’s about hospital admissions relating to drink, but it’s just so thorough. The Sunday Sun reveals how the number of admissions to hospital for alcohol-related matters have rocketed in five years. But they also asked for age-group breakdown – those in their 40s and 50s are the biggest group – the youngest admissions, and a breakout for cases treated in A&E alone. Good stuff.
The FOI which uncovered a manslaughter investigation at a hospital
I’m not sure whether this demonstrates the power of FOI or just how secretive public sector organisations have become.
Over the summer, the Brighton Argus submitted a Freedom of Information request which many of you will be familiar with – asking the police for details of crimes reported at local hospitals.
Other journalists who have made this request have ended up with stories about thefts in hospital wards, or maybe hospital equipment pinched.
Via FOI, Sussex Police revealed that it was currently investigating an allegation of manslaughter. Yes, that’s right. Manslaughter. And what’s more, the Argus says it’s the first time it’s ever come to light.
A trawl through Google seems to back that up. Not surprisingly, the story was picked up around the globe – although the cut and paste nature of some news sites does perhaps reduce the impact of such a statement.
The Argus reports: Continue reading
FOI Friday: Investigating business grants, frisky Welsh folk and the 104-year-old criminal
1. Spending money to talk about cuts
The Waltham Forest Guardian reports on an interesting spending choice at the local council – an £18,000 advertising campaign to tell people the council would protect local services which people care about. The campaign follows on from another £27,000 campaign to find out which services people wanted protecting.
2. Complaints against social workers
An interesting story from the Coventry Telegraph, which quotes a report obtained using FOI to reveal who makes complaints against social workers in the area. The most interesting fact is that 10% of complaints are made by young people about their care.
3. Partying on the university budget
I’m never sure whether the active use of FOI by politicians in Wales is a good thing or not – largely because I believe politicians only turn to FOI when they are being denied access to information through other channels which they perhaps have a right to request information through. Either way, an Assembly member in Wales used FOI to find out how much universities were spending on hospitality – four in South Wales clocked up £6.4million over three years. One to chew over?
FOI Friday: Cops on desk duty, idle ambulances, data losses, council refurbishments and schoolchild crimes
'Ello, 'Ello, 'Ello - are you on the frontline or not?
The debate rages on about whether government cuts are going to hit frontline services or the just the fabled bloated back offices and the Manchester Evening News came up with a new angle into the discussion this week: the number of frontline police officers on the desk duties through illness. In total, 7per cent of the force’s police officers are on restrictive duties. (Source: Manchester Evening News)
There’s a newish offence of extreme pornography – and the Brighton Argus was quick off the mark to report on an FOI about the first arrests made under the law. According to their FOI request, three men were arrested on possession of extreme pornography. (Source: Brighton Argus)
Ambulances in Gwent, in South Wales, spent 20,000 hours over the last two years hanging around due to delays at hospitals, or 868 days. The cost is about £1.5million. Lost time is defined as anything above 20 minutes, and this information has to be recorded by ambulance trusts. Asking for the number of occasions an ambulance was delayed could also pay dividends. (Source: South Wales Argus)
FOI FRIDAY: Maternity problems, schools failing fire checks, polluted rivers and cats stuck up trees
The dash to hospital - but will it be open?
1. Closed maternity units
It must be every new parent’s worst nightmare. Route to hospital carefully planned when contractions start, overnight bag packed, journey completed – only to be told the maternity unit is full. More worrying still is how common this scenario is, something the Western Mail revealed when it asked hospitals for the number of times it had had to announce maternity units were full. (Source: Western Mail)
Stories about schoolchildren misbehaving on the school bus are quite common, but how big is the problem overall? The Carlisle News and Star used Cumbria County Council to get statistics through FOI which show 14 children have been banned from buses for bad behaviour. (Source: Carlisle News and Star)
When the fire service carries out inspections of public buildings and workplaces, it can issue enforcement notices to get improvements done. The Lancashire Telegraph asked how many schools had been issued with enforcement notices and for what reasons. Answer: 7. Quite worrying if your school is involved. (Source: Lancashire Telegraph)
FOI FRIDAY: Secret dossiers, missing prisoners, hate crimes and council redundancies
There’s a lot of focus on FOI as a tool to get data out of authorities at the moment, so I thought it was worth kicking off this week with a great example of what you get when you ask councils for full documents on things.
Using FOI, the Leicester Mercury got hold of a dossier compiled by council officials who were worried about the behaviour of the Lord Mayor of Leicester – council officers even went as far as to take discreet photographs of him.
2. Hate crimes against disabled people
When you think of ‘hate crimes’ you tend to think of crimes based on race or sexuality. The East Anglian Daily Times reports on a rise in hate crimes committed against the disabled – using figures obtained under FOI.
The value of FOI as a tool for keeping tabs on places long after things have gone wrong is demonstrated in this FOI from the Manchester Evening News. In 2006, a convicted killer who was being treated in a mental hospital went on the run and subsequently committed a rape.
In 2007, the hospital’s security was described as lax. The MEN, through FOI, has discovered a further 31 prisoners held under the Mental Health Act have subsequently escaped.
