WIGAN Council is being monitored by the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) for being too slow to respond to freedom of information (FOI) requests.

It is one of four councils being told that it needs to improve its practices after the ICO received a ‘significant’ amount of complaints about delays in their response times.

The others are the London Borough of Lambeth, the London Borough of Tower Hamlets andWarwick District Council.

ICO deputy commissioner, Graham Smith, said: “The four councils we have named should see their inclusion on the latest monitoring list as a clear signal that they need to improve their practices.

“Responding to FOI requests within the permitted time frame is one of the cornerstones of ensuring transparent local governance.

“We will be happy to work with the councils in their efforts to turn their performances around.”

Under the Freedom of Information Act, public bodies must respond to a request within 20 working days.

Donna Hall, chief executive of Wigan Council, said: “The number of FOI requests sent to Wigan Council has more than doubled in the past four years and dealing with them now costs more than £120,000. This comes at a time when the council is making cuts of £110m.

“By law, public bodies have to respond to requests within 20 working days, which with reduced resources can prove a difficult and time consuming task. We are working hard to make sure most of our information is made available online via our website, which should reduce the number of enquiries we have to process.

“We’re also working to improve our handling of these requests. In June, we recruited a new information officer to manage the FOI process. Since this appointment, there has been a 15 per cent increase in response times.

“We’ve changed processes and structures within the council to speed up the response times and have been raising awareness among our staff of the importance of responding quickly.

“I’d like to stress we aim to be an open and transparent organisation and this issue is being taken seriously throughout the council.”

  •  Have you experienced a delay waiting for an FOI response from Wigan Council? Tell us about your experience by emailing newsdesk@leighjournal.co.uk.