Rishi Sunak under fire for government’s record low in freedom of information

Rishi Sunak has been accused of presiding over the least transparent government for 25 years, after it emerged the rate of freedom of information (FoI) requests granted in full dropped to a record low last year.

The prime minister’s government allowed information to be released fully for only 34% of requests in 2023.

This compared with 41% during Boris Johnson’s first full year as prime minister, 46% under Theresa May in 2017, 56% under David Cameron in 2011, and 60% in the first full year of Gordon Brown’s premiership in 2008.

Recent refusals include the Foreign Office declining to release information on whether Cameron is recused from any work because of any previous business interests working for foreign states. The grounds for refusing to release the information included an argument that the foreign secretary was entitled to privacy over his past business links.

Labour’s Pat McFadden, the shadow Cabinet Office minister, said: “When Rishi Sunak entered No 10, he promised integrity, accountability and professionalism at every level. According to the government’s own figures, his premiership is now officially the least transparent we have seen in the last 25 years.

“During his time as chancellor, we saw him desperately attempting to cover up the evidence of his incompetent management of the economy and his flagrant waste of public money. And now as prime minister, this report shows it is the failures of the whole government he is trying to hide.”

Figures from last year show that during Sunak’s time as chancellor, the Treasury plunged from the middle of the Whitehall rankings for the percentage of information requests granted to the bottom. In 2019, the Treasury granted 36% of requests in full, but by 2022 that figure had fallen to just 17%.

This year’s departmental league table showed the Wales Office at the top, granting 84% of requests in full, while the departments for the environment and levelling up were at the bottom with just 19%, the Foreign Office on 20% and the Cabinet Office on 24%.

The first annual report on FoI compliance was published in 2005, and showed that there were 29,271 requests received across all the monitored public bodies, of which 66% were granted in full.

In the 2023 report the number of requests had risen to 46,769, of which only 34% were granted in full.

In 2022 more than 100 journalists, politicians and campaigners signed an open letter warning that the UK’s freedom of information laws were being undermined by a lack of resources and government departments obstructing lawful requests.

The signatories included the editor-in-chief of the Guardian, Katharine Viner, the editor of the Observer, Paul Webster, the then shadow solicitor general, Andy Slaughter, the former Brexit secretary David Davis and the former Green party leader Caroline Lucas.

A government spokesperson said: “This government is committed to
transparency. Despite receiving more requests than ever before, we
responded to the vast majority on time.

“We also proactively publish more information outside the Freedom of
Information Act than ever before, amounting to thousands of documents
each year.

“We have a responsibility and duty to balance the need to make
information available while also protecting sensitive information and
national security.”