NALC to respond to a new consultation on the data-sharing code of practice

The National Association of Local Councils (NALC) will be responding to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) new consultation on the data-sharing code of practice.

NALC is minded to reiterate the main points from its March 2019 response to the most recent ICO consultation on freedom of information (key to data sharing). These were that ICO need to continue to work closely with NALC and the wider local council sector over the next three years to ensure that freedom of information (FOI) guidance and regulations are fit for purpose, as well as data sharing guidance; that there are still too many vexatious FOI requests being made to England’s local (parish and town) councils who are not resourced to deal with them; and that NALC agrees in principle with transparency but that ICO needs to be aware that FOI pushes the capacity envelope for local councils in terms of their ability to respond to requests which are not deemed reasonable.

The original data-sharing code of practice was published in 2011 and an update is required to align with the Data Protection Act 2018. The draft version of the data-sharing code of practice will explain and advise on changes to data protection legislation where these changes are relevant to data sharing and are the overall result of ICO consultation with stakeholders in August 2018.

NALC will be specifically responding to the main consultation questions regarding new aspects of data protection legislation, data protection issues, and protection and benefits of sharing data, and is interested in the sector’s views.

Local councils and county associations are asked to send their responses to NALC at  by 16 August 2019.