Description

The DPAS advanced practitioner certificate, includes an in-depth deep dive into common FOI issues experienced by practitioners over the past 2 years. The course includes a look into a significant number of exemptions that can be used across public sector organisations. This is a 4-day course aimed at those with a practitioner level certificate (or experience) or above.  

This course can be tailored to your organisation. Units can be added or removed depending on the level of training required. 

There is a huge need to provide adequate training on the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA) and its implications for public and private sector organisations, as well as to individuals. The Act contains requirements for the publication of information held by, or held on behalf of, public authorities. These requirements include the publication and maintenance of publication schemes, the need to respond to requests for information and disclose information requested subject to the appropriate application of legal exemptions.

Course Content

The aim of the syllabus is to give practitioners up-to-date knowledge of the Act, review case studies using ICO decision notices and to show delegates why cases may have been dealt with under EIR and not FOI or vise versa. The course covers ‘deep dives’ into the following sections of the Act. 

Unit 1 - Section 40 - Personal Data. 

• Reach intuitive understanding of what the new definition of personal is

• Understanding the importance and seriousness of an improper release of personal data

• Understanding how to read S40 (updated because of UK GDPR)

• Understanding how to apply fist data protection principle to releases

• Doing a legitimate interest balancing test

Unit 2 – Section 39 – EIR

• Understand how the ICO separates EIR from FOI, with worked examples

• to come up with a list of factors

Unit 3 – Section 14 – Vexaxious Requests

• Understand what the ICO accepts as vexatious

• Learn to gather and present evidence

• How to be impartial and to undertake a balancing test

• Application of S14 to burdensome requests

Unit 4 – Section 12 – Cost Limits

• Calculating cost limits

• How the ICO and Tribunal think and what makes good evidence of cost limits

• How to gather evidence when aggregating

Unit 5 – Section 8 – Valid Requests

• What technical requirements are there for a valid FOI

• When these can be ignored in the name of the Equality Act and when good customer service might be more important

Unit 6 – Section 22 – Future Publication 

• Understand the exemption 

• Understand new developments in how a public interest test is being written

• Understand examples of success and failure with ICO and Tribunal

Unit 7 – Section 30 – Investigations

• Understand the exemption 

• Understand new developments in how a public interest test is being written

• Understand examples of success and failure with ICO and Tribunal

Unit 8 – Section 31 – Law Enforcement 

• Understand the exemption 

• Understand new developments in how a public interest test is being written

• Understand examples of success and failure with ICO and Tribunal

Unit 9 – Section 36 – Effective Conduct of Public Affairs 

• Understand the exemption 

• Understand new developments in how a public interest test is being written

• Understand examples of success and failure with ICO and Tribunal

Unit 10 – Section 38 – Health and Safety 

• Understand the exemption 

• Understand new developments in how a public interest test is being written

• Understand examples of success and failure with ICO and Tribunal

Unit 11 – Section 41 – Confidence

•  Understand the exemption 

• Understand new developments in how a public interest test is being written

• Understand examples of success and failure with ICO and Tribunal

Unit 12 – Section 42 – Legel Privilege 

• Understand the exemption 

• Understand new developments in how a public interest test is being written

• Understand examples of success and failure with ICO and Tribunal

Unit 13 – Section 43 – Commercial 

• Understand the exemption 

• Understand new developments in how a public interest test is being written

• Understand examples of success and failure with ICO and Tribunal

Unit 14 – Data sets 

• What long term change did the PoFA give us?

• What is the ICO itself doing with datasets?

• Updating datasets

Unit 15 – Publication Scheme 

• What are the risks and benefits? 

• To access whether compliance is appropriate 

Contact us for the full syllabus. 

What's Included:

The course takes 4 days to complete and will be held virtually.  

You will need access to Microsoft Teams and OneDrive throughout the course. All documents will be shared via OneDrive and sessions will be held via Teams.

The course will start at 9:00 am and finish at 4:30 pm.

Our course is great for

This qualification is primarily aimed at those who are managing or responding to requests for information from the public or working in this subject area, for instance Information Managers. 

This qualification is likely to be of particular benefit to those working in the following areas:

• Solicitors advising on Information Law issues

• Data Protection Officers

• FOI Practitioners

• Information Governance Leads

• Data Protection and Privacy

• Information Governance, risk and compliance

• Data Management

• Project Management

• Directors/Senior Managers with Data Protection responsibilities

• Legal and procurement