§ Mr. BakerTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will review his proposal not to include a test of substantial harm in the draft Freedom of Information Bill. [90726]
§ Mr. StrawWe are currently consulting widely on the content of the draft Freedom of Information Bill. It is also subject to pre-legislative scrutiny by the Select Committee on Public Administration and an ad hoc Select Committee in another place, and also of public consultation.
I look forward to receiving their recommendations and other comments, which I will consider fully before introducing the Bill into the House.
§ Mr. BakerTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will list the countries within the European Union(a) which have freedom of information legislation and (b) where such legislation contains a public interest test. [90718]
§ Mr. StrawThe European Union Green Paper on Public Sector Information in the Information Society, published in January this year, identified the following European Union countries as having national freedom of information legislation: Austria; Belgium; Denmark; Finland; France; Greece; Ireland; Italy; Netherlands; Portugal; Spain and Sweden. Ireland's legislation contains a public interest test, as does the United Kingdom draft Bill. We have not analysed other European legislation.
Our analysis has focused on countries with common law jurisdictions, e.g. Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United States of America. The legislation for each of these countries contains a public interest test.
A copy of the Green Paper is available in the Library.
§ Mr. BakerTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what steps he took to establish the views of MI5 before deciding they should be exempt from the disclosure tests applied in the draft Freedom of Information Bill. [90720]
§ Mr. StrawThe Security Service has been fully consulted over the provisions of the Freedom of Information Bill.