Information is the currency of democracy – and secrecy its enemy

WHEN the 1911 Official Secrets Act held sway, it was an offence to reveal the whereabouts of the Post Office Tower in London, or for the Head Gardener in the Royal Botanic Gardens to disclose, without authorisation, the order in which plants were watered.

The Act meant everything was secret except those things expressly allowed not to be, and created a culture of secrecy in government.

Does secrecy matter? Is it something we should be concerned about? Of course it is.

I believe that information is the currency of democracy.

Information can be used by MSPs, the Press and the public to hold ministers and public officials to account; to get behind the spin and evaluate the effectiveness of policy decisions; to assess if public money is being spent efficiently; to challenge environmental abuses; to shine lights on dark arts and unacceptable or unfair practices.

Thirty-five years ago, fighting the Orkney and Shetland seat for the first time, I was asked what kind of legislation I wanted to bring in if successful in the ballot for Private Member’s Bills.

I had no hesitation in saying freedom of information.

Legislation

I believed then, as I believe now, that it was not just a change in legislation that was needed – it was a change of culture.

Those were the days when, in an early episode of Yes Minister, Sir Humphrey could record a conversation in his diary: ‘Sir Arnold pointed out, with great clarity, that open government is a contradiction in terms. You can be open – or you can have government.

‘Bernard claims the citizens of a democracy have a right to know. We explained that they have a right to be ignorant. Knowledge only means complicity and guilt. Ignorance has a certain dignity.’

So I relished the opportunity, as Deputy First Minister, to bring in a much-needed Freedom of Information Act for Scotland. I never had any illusions of the scale of the challenge in trying to change such a deep-seated culture.

Secrecy was so entrenched that it wasn’t going to alter overnight when the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act passed. But I believed the Act was essential to promote and underpin a culture of greater openness in government.

Some early developments were encouraging. The then Lord Advocate, Colin Boyd, decided to release documentation on the Dunblane public inquiry, suitably redacted only to avoid identifying individuals.

Technically, these documents would not have been publicly available for 100 years. The letter of the new legislation did not make release any more possible, but the spirit of the new Act and a new culture prompted such a welcome move.

The early decision by the Scottish parliament to publish MSPs’ expenses quarterly saved politicians much of the grief visited on their Westminster colleagues who had resisted such openness.

At much the same time, the Scottish coalition government took the initiative in publishing ministers’ engagements and travel information.

By contrast, and despite the lofty commitments of Nicola Sturgeon, as both Deputy First Minister and First Minister to ‘openness and transparency’, the record now looks as if she and her team have been dusting down Sir Humphrey’s Secrecy Manual.

Only days after the 2014 referendum, the Scottish Information Commissioner delivered a damning indictment of the approach taken by Scottish ministers to a request for details of the former First Minister’s travel and subsistence expenses.

The commissioner said in that case: ‘The ministers’ handling of this request cannot be considered to reflect what the commissioner would regard as good (or even remotely acceptable) practice in responding to an information request.’

What in the world was the great secret about which hotel abroad the First Minister stayed in on public business, and the cost of that accommodation? A shrinking violet Alex Salmond was not. It is hard to imagine that when staying in a hotel, he went incognito.

And in a remarkable number of cases the previous commissioner found ‘ministers failed to respond to the request within the timescale allowed’ and ‘ministers failed to comply with the applicant’s requirement for a review in the timescale set down’.

Shocking

It was quite shocking, but sadly not surprising, that just over a year ago, 23 online, broadcast and newspaper journalists signed a letter of concern to MSPs, claiming the Scottish Government’s boast of openness and transparency was under great doubt.

They speculated ‘whether information requests by journalists are being treated and managed differently, even though the legislation requires all requests to be handled equally and without favour or prejudice’.

Last week, their speculation proved well founded when the commissioner published a report which found: ‘Journalists, together with MSPs and political researchers, are expressly made subject to a different process for clearance than other requester groups. This is inconsistent with the applicant-blind principle of FOI legislation.’

Delay and special vetting of answers by special advisers are not the only ploys used by Scottish ministers to undermine the spirit of Freedom of Information. A Get-It-Minuted campaign earlier this year challenged the Scottish Government’s practice of holding top-level meetings where no minutes are taken or where no agendas are issued.

High-profile meetings with no minutes available included a meeting between Justice Secretary Michael Matheson and former SPA chairman Andrew Flanagan about the prospective return from leave of former Chief Constable Phil Gormley. Similarly, no minutes or notes were available following a meeting between three Scottish Government ministers, including the First Minister and representatives of Teach First.

Despite the SNP’s claims of openness, its record in government is surely one which takes its lead from Tony Blair, who confessed to having been ‘a naive, foolish, irresponsible nincompoop’ in allowing the ‘dangerous mistake’ of FOI legislation to go forward.

But just as I believed that action was needed to change culture, and to bring about more openness in government, so the reverse process is promoted by officials and public bodies taking their lead from the top.

If ministers can hold unminuted meetings with Scottish Police Authority chiefs, was it any surprise that the SPA thought it could hold meetings in secret – a practice which, thankfully, has changed following pressure from MSPs.

But a culture of secrecy can seep through a whole organisation, and so Scottish Daily Mail reporters cannot get official police confirmation of the fact of a road closure (let alone an explanation) when there is photographic evidence of a Police Scotland Road Closed sign.

Nor should the police be singled out for a culture of secrecy and refusal to disclose information. Excuses of ‘data protection’ or ‘too costly to look it up’ are the routine experience of many making even routine inquiries of public bodies.

Of course, there are matters where confidentiality should be respected, but the Act makes proper provision for these.

We need to revive the spirit of Freedom of Information. We need to extend its reach to private bodies spending public money, such as Scot Rail. We must challenge a culture which believes that officialdom should tell as little as it can get away with.

We must consign Sir Humphrey’s Secrecy Manual to history, and breathe new life into a culture of openness.

It’s our right to know.