FOI 55-22: Correspondence between Emma Little-Pengelly and the Japan Karate Association

Information Standards Freedom of Information Response

Our Ref: FOI 55-22

20 October 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 9 October 2022 in line with the Freedom of Information Act 2000. In your request, you asked:

“In late 2018 or early 2019 Emma Little Pengelly of Democratic Unionist Party sent correspondence to the Tokyo based headquarters of the Japan Karate Association. This correspondence was sent on behalf of United Kingdom Traditional Karate Association led by Mr Masao Kawasoe.

The nature of the correspondence was to campaign to have Northern Ireland classed as a separate region from the Republic of Ireland for the purposes of country representation of a karate association.

I am formally making a Freedom of Information request to have sight of this correspondence.”

The Assembly Commission does not hold this information.

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 may appeal to the Information Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire SK9 5AF which will undertake an independent review.

The Assembly Commission may publish details of your FOI request and its 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