Last week, Elizabeth Denham, the UK Information Commissioner, stated her commitment to improving transparency in outsourced public services. Remarks made at an event to mark 250 years of freedom of information confirmed her aspiration to make ‘the right to know about public services … independent of the [identity] of the service provider’. ICO plans to submit a report to Parliament next year on outsourcing and transparency.
It will be interesting to see the content of the report as well as the response of Parliament. This is particularly so in light of discussions in recent years about the extension of FOIA to contractors (including both the ICO Roadmap (March 2015) and the Independent FOI Commission Report (March 2016).
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