§ Mr. SandersTo ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if his Department operates a monitoring exercise of persistent inquirers for information. [42639]
§ Mr. Tony Lloyd[holding answer 19 May 1998]: The FCO does not operate a policy of monitoring persistent inquirers. The FC0's Open Government Unit routinely logs and monitors all formal requests for information received under the Code of Practice on Access to Government Information. This is to ensure that each inquiry is correctly answered on a case by case basis within the twenty working day target. These statistics (which do not include names) are also required for inclusion in the annual Report on the working of the Code of Practice, which is co-ordinated and published by the Cabinet Office. In 1997 the FCO dealt with 55 formal requests, 48 of which (87.3%) were answered within the deadline.