How and why to make a Freedom of Information Request

Building a case for change involves creating an evidence base that shows why the current situation shouldn't continue. But it can be difficult to get the information on a particular site or in relation to a particular council. This is where is may be useful to use the Freedom of Information Act. These requests can be useful to find out whether your council has complied with the Public Sector Equality Duty, and how they have thought about the needs of teenage girls in their planning. The good things about using the Freedom of Information Act are:

• councils are legally required to respond to request under the Freedom of Information Act – this stops your request simply getting side tracked by a council official who just has too much on their plate;
• councils must have procedures for responding to these requests and follow a Code of Conduct;
• there is a 20 working day time frame for responding; so requests for information cant keep getting pushed to the bottom of the “to do” list.

We have produced some downloadable resources to do this: a simple explanation about the Freedom of Information Act; and a sample letter making a request, based on one that we used early on in our work. You can find these documents at the bottom of this page. If you make a request, you should get some information and we would hope that this will focus their minds on the fact that they need to make parks more welcoming to teenage girls. and we wold love to hear from you about what you find out.