Original request
Summary of request
Full request
I understand that the meeting of Council of 14 December 2016 Council was presented with a paper which outlined two main options:
- To instruct Presenting Officers to apply to have certain Fitness to Teach cases cancelled and provide guidance to Investigating Panels that any such cases arising at the investigating stage should be considered not to satisfy the “case to answer” test.
- To take no action on the matter until the new Fitness to Teach Rules were implemented; accepting the reputational risk that this may present.
I understand that Council opted for the first option.
Please could you let me know how many cases were cancelled or considered not to satisfy the “case to answer” test as a result of this decision of Council. Please provide a breakdown of numbers according to the following categories under the Fitness to Teach Rules in place at the time:
- Total number of cases that were cancelled or considered not to satisfy the “case to answer” test as a result of this decision of Council.
- Of those cases covered by (a), the number of cases that on 14 December 2016 had not yet reached the initial consideration stage
- Of those cases covered by (a), the number of cases that on 14 December 2016 had passed the Initial Consideration stage but not yet reached an Investigating Panel
- Of those cases covered by (a), the number of cases that on 14 December 2016 had passed the Investigating Panel stage and been referred for a Hearing but for which the Hearing had not started
- Of those cases covered by (a), the number of cases that on 14 December 2016 a Hearing had started but had not yet concluded
- Of those cases covered by (a) the number of cases that do not fit into any of the categories covered by (b) (c) (d) or (e)
- For those cases covered by (b) for how many had the referral been made within five years of the most recent alleged misconduct
- For those cases covered by (c) for how many had the referral been made within five years of the most recent alleged misconduct
- For those cases covered by (d) for how many had the referral been made within five years of the most recent alleged misconduct
- For those cases covered by (e) for how many had the referral been made within five years of the most recent alleged misconduct
- For those cases covered by (f) for how many had the referral been made within five years of the most recent alleged misconduct
- For each of the cases covered by (a), please provide the dates of the panel or hearing where the cancellation was confirmed
- For each of the cases covered by (a), please provide any information about the panel or hearing were the cancellation was confirmed that has previously been published on your website.
Response
I refer to your request for information dated 18 December 2024 (FOI 24-25/79) in which you asked various queries related to a response on our Disclosure (FOI 22-23/60) which we have handled under the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act (FOISA).
I have referred your request for information to our Regulatory Investigations team who have considered it. To locate and retrieve the information we would need to interrogate 840 records, being referrals dating back to prior 14 December 2016, to determine if they fit the criteria of your request. Due to the significant amount of time and resources it would take to interrogate the records we have determined that section 12(1) of FOISA would apply due to the excessive cost of compliance. Please see our detailed Fees Notice below:
The number of records to be interrogated: 840
Actual cost of staff time at hourly rate of member of staff: £15.00 as the search would need to be undertaken by a Regulatory Case Manager who has the required knowledge of these records.
Number of hours required to complete the search: 840 records at an average of 20 minutes per record for a total of 210 hours.
Total cost: 280 hours multiplied by £15.00 per hour = £4200
We should also advise you that to respond to this request would require we interrogate a historic spreadsheet which we hold that is no longer in use, relating to cases from prior to December 2016 (9 years ago). As a result, this spreadsheet provides records that we can use for providing a response, however, given the passage of time and the way in which these were recorded, we cannot guarantee that the spreadsheet is all encompassing and provides every case relevant to your request.
However, given the changes to the way in which we recorded this type of information, which changed at the time of the implementation of the new rules, I can advise that if you were to request information from 2017, which may include cases which were cancelled in 2016 but not closed until a later date and therefore recorded in our current database, then we may be better able to assist in your request.
You may contact informationgovernance@gtcs.org.uk if you are dissatisfied with this response, to request GTC Scotland conduct a review of this decision. You should describe the original request and explain your grounds of review. You have 40 working days from receipt of this decision to submit a review request. When the review process has been completed, if you are still dissatisfied, you may use the Scottish Information Commissioner’s guidance on making an appeal to do so.
Response file
Internal Review request
Summary of request
Full request
Contained within review response.
Response
I refer to your request dated 06 February 2025 for a review of a request submitted to GTC Scotland (FOI 24- 25/79), dated 18 December 2024.
You have expressed dissatisfaction with our response to your information request. To enable your review request to be considered afresh and by someone who has not responded to your original request, I have been appointed to undertake the internal review on behalf of GTC Scotland.
Your original request
In your original request you asked for the following:
I understand that the meeting of Council of 14 December 201C Council was presented with a paper which outlined two main options:
1) To instruct Presenting Officers to apply to have certain Fitness to Teach cases cancelled and provide guidance to Investigating Panels that any such cases arising at the investigating stage should be considered not to satisfy the “case to answer” test.
2) To take no action on the matter until the new Fitness to Teach Rules were implemented; accepting the reputational risk that this may present.
Please could you let me know how many cases were cancelled or considered not to satisfy the “case to answer” test as a result of this decision of Council. Please provide a breakdown of numbers according to the following categories under the Fitness to Teach Rules in place at the time:
- Total number of cases that were cancelled or considered not to satisfy the “case to answer” test as a result of this decision of Council.
- Of those cases covered by (a), the number of cases that on 14 December 2016 had not yet reached the initial consideration stage
- Of those cases covered by (a), the number of cases that on 14 December 2016 had passed the Initial Consideration stage but not yet reached an Investigating Panel
- Of those cases covered by (a), the number of cases that on 14 December 2016 had passed the Investigating Panel stage and been referred for a Hearing but for which the Hearing had not started
- Of those cases covered by (a), the number of cases that on 14 December 2016 a Hearing had started but had not yet concluded
- Of those cases covered by (a) the number of cases that do not fit into any of the categories covered by (b) (c) (d) or (e)
- For those cases covered by (b) for how many had the referral been made within five years of the most recent alleged misconduct
- For those cases covered by (c) for how many had the referral been made within five years of the most recent alleged misconduct
- For those cases covered by (d) for how many had the referral been made within five years of the most recent alleged misconduct
- For those cases covered by (e) for how many had the referral been made within five years of the most recent alleged misconduct
- For those cases covered by (f) for how many had the referral been made within five years of the most recent alleged misconduct
- For each of the cases covered by (a), please provide the dates of the panel or hearing where the cancellation was confirmed
- For each of the cases covered by (a), please provide any information about the panel or hearing were the cancellation was confirmed that has previously been published on your website.
On 21 January 2025, we provided an explanation as to our response and applied section 12(1) as responding to this request would generate excessive fees. On 06 February 2025, you sent an email requesting we review our decision in FOI 24-25/79 under section 20(1) of FOISA.
Your internal review request
In your review request of 06 February, you state:
I believe that your cost estimates are incorrect both in the number of cases that you would need to examined, and the time it would take to determine if each case was relevant to my request.
Our response
Having considered your request for a review I have decided that the response for should be upheld without modification. As the anticipated fee is above £600, based on an estimated 840 cases to be interrogated on the information available to us, we are not obliged to comply with the request under FOISA.
To properly answer your request would require interrogating hundreds of records. As explained in our initial response, to respond to this request we would be required to interrogate a historic spreadsheet which we hold that is no longer in use, relating to historic cases in line with your request in order to determine the number of cases meeting the criteria you have set out. This spreadsheet identifies cases dealt with within a period of time around which your request relates.
You refer to previous responses from the year 2022-23. As an organisation, we hold records for certain periods and for certain reasons. Information that we once may have held in a certain format may no longer be held 2-3 years later. We do have, however, a historic spreadsheet that enables us to identify relevant cases from the requested period of time and assists us in limiting the number of cases that would require to be reviewed in order to provide a response. We are therefore able to utilise this historic record to extract certain information however there are various reasons why the information contained within it may not be comprehensive. It is for this reason we consider each case within the relevant available records would require to be interrogated to provide as full and accurate a response as possible. That is the basis of the fee applied.
If you are dissatisfied with this response to your review request, you have a right of appeal to the Scottish Information Commissioner within 6 months of this review response. The Scottish Information Commissioner’s guidance on making an appeal describes the process, including the application form. Further information, including relevant contact details is available on the website. If you are dissatisfied with the decision of the Commissioner, following an appeal to the Commissioner, you have a right of appeal to the Court of Session on a point of law.
