[2023] UKUT 130 (AAC)

The first request was made by Mr Pereira on 27 December 2019 and asked the Insolvency Service about the steps it had taken to verify the information provided by the third party prior to the Insolvency Service granting that third party a Debt Relief Order on 19 November 2019. Mr Pereira said he was making the request because he was concerned that others in his position may have lost because of the Insolvency Service’s promptness in issuing Debt Relief Orders “without having made essential checks”. He also requested, at the same time, to be informed of what further investigations the Insolvency Service performed after Mr Pereira’s objection and complaint.

The Insolvency Service is not itself a ‘public authority’ for the purposes of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (“FOIA”), but it is an executive agency of the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and the latter is a FOIA public authority. I use ‘Insolvency Service’ to refer to the public authority for ease of reference in this decision.

As the First-tier Tribunal rightly summarised in its decision, Mr Pereira was (and remains) aggrieved by the grant of a Debt Relief Order (“DRO”) given to a particular individual with whom Mr Pereira had a dispute about money owed. The information provided by Mr Pereira led to the DRO being revoked.

The Insolvency Service responded to Mr Pereira’s requests of 27 December 2019 by saying that it held information falling within the scope of the requests but it considered the information was exempt from disclosure under section 40(2) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (“FOIA”).

This led Mr Pereira to, in his words, rephrase the request to ask what steps the Insolvency Service takes, in general, to ensure that claims for a DRO have merit. By its response to this request, the Insolvency Service said that it held the requested information, and it provided Mr Pereira with a description of the process followed and a link to the DRO process.

In asking the Insolvency Service to conduct an internal review of this response Mr Pereira further asked it to (i) inform him of the name of the debt adviser/authorised intermediary involved in his case, and (ii) notify him of “what checks are performed in these circumstances (before granting a DRO or if your circumstances change during a DRO)…and, if the info is allowable, were performed in this case, particularly after my objection where [an Insolvency Service employee in a letter dated 22 November 2019 had stated] ‘extensive investigations’ were performed”. I will term these the “further requests”.

In its response to the internal review, the Insolvency Service said that it did not hold any further information about the general steps that are taken to ensure a DRO application has merit. As for the further requests, it said, in respect of (i) in the further requests, that it held the name of the debt adviser but considered this was exempt from disclosure under section 40(2) of FOIA. As to part (ii) of the further requests, the Insolvency Service said that the checks that are performed in the circumstances had already been provided to Mr Pereira, in response to his ‘rephrased’ request. This was therefore considered a repeat request and was refused under section 14(2) of FOIA. The remainder of part (ii) of the further requests was refused under section 40(2) of FOIA because it was specific to the third party’s case.

It is apparent from the above summary of Mr Pereira’s requests that, broadly, they fell into three categories. First, he wanted general information about how a DRO is awarded. Second, he wanted the name of the debt adviser, that is the authorised intermediary, who had assisted the third party to obtain a DRO. Third, Mr Pereira was seeking information about the specific actions the Insolvency Service took in relation to the DRO applied for and obtained by the third party.