The number of cases currently under review by the Commissioner for Standards and the expense claims and costs for the Commissioner

Information Standards Freedom of Information Response

Our Ref: FOI 33-22

29 June 2022

Freedom of Information Act 2000 (“FOIA”)

I am writing to confirm that the Northern Ireland Assembly Commission (Assembly Commission) has processed your request dated 16 June 2022 in line with the Freedom of Information Act 2000. In your request, you asked:

“Pursuant to the FOI Act 2000 and any other relevant statutory provisions please provide me with all information on the expense claims and costs for the Commissioner for Standards, Dr Melissa McCullough  since 7th September 2020.

The Assembly Commission is not required to provide this information as it is exempt as per section 21 ‘Information Accessible by Other Means’

However, in order to provide advice and assistance under section 16 of the FOIA
2000, the Assembly Commission has provided a link to information that may be relevant to your request. You can find this published information contained within the Annual Reports on the Commissioner for Standards’ website.

In your request, you also asked:

Can you also provide me with the number of cases which are currently being reviewed by the Commissioner including the date of submission for each case/complaint?”

The information requested is not held by the Northern Ireland Assembly under section 3(2) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

The Northern Ireland Assembly Commissioner for Standards is a separate legal entity from the Northern Ireland Assembly.

The Northern Ireland Assembly Commission provides administrative support to the Commissioner for Standards as required by paragraph 3 of Schedule 4 to the Assembly Members (Independent Financial Review and Standards) Act (Northern Ireland) 2011.  

Requests for information held by the Commissioner for Standards should be directed to the Northern Ireland Assembly Commissioner for Standards.

You have the right to request a formal review by the Assembly Commission and if you wish to do so, please write to me at the above address. If after such an internal review you are still unhappy with the response, you have the right to appeal to the Information Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire SK9 5AF who will undertake an independent review.

The Assembly Commission may publish details of your FOI request and our official response within the organisational disclosure log. The request will be completely anonymised and you will not be identified in any way. This is to meet the requirements as laid out by in the agreed publication scheme with the Information Commissioners’ Office.

Yours sincerely

INFORMATION STANDARDS