external legal services and costs

Summary

The requester asked for details on external legal service payments made by the Office of the Clerk of Tynwald since January 2020. The authority confirmed that no new payments were made between June 2021 and August 2022, and referenced previous requests covering earlier periods which also found no payments.

Key Facts

• The Office of the Clerk of Tynwald confirmed no external legal costs were recorded since the response to request #1446386.
• Request #1815433 covered the period from September 2020 to June 2021 and found no payments.
• The current request (#2562465) covered records from June 2021 to 4 August 2022 and found no payments.
• The authority closed the request on 9 August 2022.
• The response references a prior search of six years of financial records prior to September 2020.

Data Disclosed

• 2562465
• 1446386
• 1815433
• 2022-08-03
• 2022-08-11
• 2022-08-09
• January 2020
• September 2020
• June 2021
• 4 August 2022
• six years

Original Request

Further to request #1446386 in August 2020, what payments in relation to external legal services were made to what law firm (or self- employed lawyer etc) in each month since January 2020 with reference to unique engagement references in order to aggregate related payments and what was the nature of engagement with adequate information to discern different types and sub-types of engagement without reference to personal data?

Data Tables (1)

Full Response Text

Freedom of Information Co-Ordinator Office of the Clerk of Tynwald Legislative Buildings Douglas Isle of Man IM1 3PW Telephone: 01624 685500

Our ref: 2562465 9 August 2022

Dear ###

We write further to your request which was received on 3 August 2022 and which states:

"Further to request #1446386 in August 2020, what payments in relation to external legal services were made to what law firm (or self- employed lawyer etc) in each month since January 2020 with reference to unique engagement references in order to aggregate related payments and what was the nature of engagement with adequate information to discern different types and sub-types of engagement without reference to personal data?"

Our response to your request You refer to request case ID #1446386. We can confirm there have been no new external legal costs recorded since that response was issued. • FOI request case ID #1446386 asked the Office of the Clerk of Tynwald to search six years of financial records prior to September 2020. In our response to that request we provided information relating to the payments made in relation to external legal services. • FOI request case ID #1815433 asked the Office of the Clerk of Tynwald to search the financial records from September 2020 to June 2021. In our response we confirmed no payments were made during that time period in relation to external legal services.

• Under this FOI request - FOI request case ID #2562465 - we have searched our records from June 2021 to date (4 August 2022) and we can confirm no payments were made during that time period in relation to external legal services.

Your right to request a review If you are unhappy with this response to your freedom of information request, you may ask us to carry out an internal review of the response, by completing a complaint form and submitting it electronically or by delivery/post.

An electronic version of our complaint form can be found by going to our website at https://services.gov.im/freedom-of-information/Review . If you would like a paper version of our complaint form to be sent to you by post, please contact me and I will be happy to arrange for this. Your review request should explain why you are dissatisfied with this response, and should be made as soon as practicable. We will respond as soon as the review has been concluded.

If you are not satisfied with the result of the review, you then have the right to appeal to the Information Commissioner for a decision on; 1. Whether we have responded to your request for information in accordance with Part 2 of the Freedom of Information Act 2015; or 2. Whether we are justified in refusing to give you the information requested.
In response to an application for review, the Information Commissioner may, at any time, attempt to resolve a matter by negotiation, conciliation, mediation or another form of alternative dispute resolution and will have regard to any outcome of this in making any subsequent decision. More detailed information on your right to a review can be found on the Information Commissioner’s website at www.inforights.im. Should you have any queries concerning this letter, please do not hesitate to contact me. Further information about freedom of information requests can be found at www.gov.im/foi.

I will now close your request as of this date.

FOI Co-Ordinator foi@tynwald.org.im