>From the BHIA list.

Ahmad

Forwarded by Ahmad Risk <[log in to unmask]>
---------------- Original message follows ----------------
 From: Rod Ward <[log in to unmask]>
 To: "[log in to unmask]" <[log in to unmask]>, nurse-uk
<[log in to unmask]>, Andy Reed <[log in to unmask]>,
[log in to unmask]
 Date: Thu, 22 Jan 1998 10:57:11 +0000
 Subject: [bhia-g] Freedom of Information - white paper
--

Hi all,

I have recently obtained a copy of the Freedom of Information (FOI)
white paper released in December 1997 from;
http://www.national-publishing.co.uk/document/caboff/foi/foi.htm

I feel this is an important issue for all of us & would urge you all to
make comments - we have until the end of Feb. 98 to make our comments
known.

This white paper when it becomes an act will have implications for us as
individual citizens, but also as healthcare practitioners and members of
healthcare educational institutions.

I welcome the general tone of increasing public access to information
held by publicly funded (and other) bodies and feel this is long
overdue. It should also be seen in the context of changes to the "Data
Protection Act" and "Crown Copyright in the Information Age". These
should act as empowering legislation increasing democracy and public
accountability, however...

NHS trusts are specifically mentioned in the white paper several times,
and records which will be covered relate to those "in connection with
their public functions" - this needs to be clarified. I agree that
individual patient records must be excluded of personal privacy grounds,
however will the information supporting (or otherwise) the closure of
particular hospital departments, specialist units etc. be considered "in
connection with their public functions"? Will decisions about closing
certain numbers of beds be exposed to public scrutiny in this way?

Part of paragraph 2.18 says "operational information about how public
services are run, how much they cost, targets set, expected standards
and results, and complaints procedures" are included. How many NHS
organisations, universities and other bodies actually have this
information themselves, will this require the collection and collation
of this information for the first time.

Will these be exempted under commercially sensitive information clauses
(3.11 section 4) - this area needs to be clarified and made more
explicit.

It will be retrospective legislation applying to records created before
enactment. It will be interesting to see if the grounds on which trust
boards were chosen will be released, this could also be used to make
public the grounds on which contracts for nursing and other health care
education was placed with certain universities? Will the nature of
records created be changed in the future once it is realised that these
documents will later be made public, as medical records have been since
patients have had (limited) rights of access to their own records?

Presumably this legislation will also mean that the royal colleges (RCN,
RCP, RCS etc.) and bodies such as the English National Board will have
to be a lot more open in their dealings with professions and the public.

It seems likely that because of cost considerations a lot of the
publication of the required information will be via the Internet, rather
than paper, this makes in increasingly important that all health
professionals (and the general public) have the skills to find, analyse
and use information available via the web. Will this be the death knell
for NHSweb, which can't be considered public with firewalls etc. and
mean that all NHS organisations have to make their information available
on the public Internet?

para 2.20 - It is not intended as an aspect of public sector employment
law  thereby excluding recruitment & appointment information - this
could be an opportunity missed to enhance equity and equal opportunities
rights of all public sector employees. The Public Interest Disclosure
Bill (to aid whistleblowing in cases of organisational abuse) could have
been included in this legislation rather than leaving it as a private
members bill, which would have enhanced it's chance of becoming law.

Generally I welcome this proposed legislation and the likely powers of
the information commissioner, however I have concerns that it does not
go far enough, in that important information which should rightly be in
the public domain will be excluded.

I would encourage everyone to consider this impending legislation and
make their thoughts known.


--
Cheers
Rod
[log in to unmask]
Lecturer, School of Nursing & Midwifery, University of Sheffield
Professional home page - http://www.shef.ac.uk/~nr1rw
Nursing & Health Care Resources on the Net -
http://www.shef.ac.uk/~nhcon
ICQ UIN: 4234064




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