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By law, the council should respond to Freedom of Information (FOI) requests within 20 working days and if it fails, complaints can be raised with the Information Commissioner (ICO).

The council received 1,586 requests for information that year – slightly less than the year before – but answered only 82.1 per cent in time – a slight improvement on the year before. This missed the Information Governance Board’s target of 95 per cent and the ICO’s target of 90 per cent.

Council officers said the six percent improvement in the compliance rate was in line with the return to normal working after Covid-19, according to a performance report which will be discussed at an audit and standards committee meeting on October 19.

Sheffield Town Hall. Sheffield Council failed to hit the Information Commissioner’s target for responding to information requests from the public last year.

Complaints to the Information Commissioner

If a requester is unhappy with the council’s handling of a request they can complain by first asking for an internal review.

The authority completed 37 internal reviews last year, some of which were from a backlog. There are still 16 internal reviews outstanding.

Review of Sheffield Council’s FOI service

Council leader Tom Hunt confirmed the authority was reviewing its system and process for responding to FOIs and subject access requests in a full council meeting last week.

He said: “I am fully focussed on improving the council’s performance to make sure we can be the best council we can be.

“A full review of our system and process for responding to FOIs and subject access requests is under way. This includes looking at the underpinning IT systems that are being used to track them. We will continue to record our performance and report that to the audit committee.”

Since then, a report was published detailing changes in the service.

It followed a review by the ICO in May.

The ICO’s overall opinion was that there was a “reasonable level of assurance” that processes and procedures were in place to deliver FOI compliance and made 13 recommendations.

These included being better prepared for spikes in demand to avoid future backlogs, proactively publishing more information to reduce demand and ensuring internal reviews are formally logged and improving its procedure to ensure the outcomes are impartial.

Timelines for the changes range from autumn 2023 to summer 2024.

Sheffield Council makes slight improvement on Freedom of Information compliance