The consultation paper was issued in October 2002 by the Lord Chancellor's Department – now the Department for Constitutional Affairs (DCA) – and sought views on how requests by individuals for access to information held on them were being handled. Changes in technology, and the introduction of new legislation such as the Freedom of Information Act 2000 had made a review of procedures necessary.
According to the DCA, the majority of the respondents to the consultation were companies. The results of the consultation therefore reflect the bias towards data controllers, rather than data subjects (the individuals about whom information is held).
The DCA could confirm that more requests have been made under the new system than under the old, but stated that there were still areas of concern. These are, in summary:
- The subject access fee – this is currently £10. In general a modest maximum fee was thought acceptable, perhaps to the same value as under the Freedom of Information Act (£55).
- Inevitably, views on cost recovery were mixed: individuals did not want to be charged for the costs of collecting the data, while companies wanted to be recompensed.
- The response time – the current time limit of 40 days was thought acceptable in general, but there was some support for aligning it with the FOI Act time limit (not later than 20 days). A majority thought that a longer time limit was necessary for complex cases.
- Finding the information – practically all respondents thought it was acceptable for data controllers to ask data subjects to help find the data. A standard subject access application form was proposed.
- Providing the information – almost half the respondents were in favour of using a hard copy, but it was recognised that there had to be flexibility in this area.
- Frequent requests – a time period of 12 or 6 months was proposed within which the same application need not be processed, or only processed on payment of a full fee. The need for flexibility was recognised however – particularly in cases where the information held had changed.
- Exemptions – around half of the respondents felt that wider exemptions were necessary, perhaps along the line of the Freedom of Information Act.
