This report provides an update on the actions in progress to improve the Council’s policies, systems and processes around Information Governance. 

Michael Graham, Assistant Director of Legal & Democratic Services, presented a report outlining the action underway to improve the Council’s policies, systems and processes for Information Governance following several limited assurance reports in this area.

The report provided an update on: recruitment to key posts in the Information Governance Team and the interim arrangements in place to cover the backlog of Subject Access Requests; the Central Management of FOI requests through the Customer Relations Team, which was aiming to increase responses within the required timescale to 90%, as expected by the Information Commissioner’s Office; data transparencyhad been improved with the relevant information and sources of data now being identified and a Transparency Code page added to the Council’s website; the work of the Information Governance (IG) Board; and the adoption of the Information Management Strategy by Policy Committee on 7 March 2022 (Minute 83 refers).  In relation to the Strategy, the next step would be to train the Information Asset Owners (IAO), identified as the Assistant Directors and then to recruit an Information Champion (IC) from each service area to work with the Information Governance Team to roll out the further actions identified.  The Committee would receive quarterly progress reports on implementation of the Action Plan, which would be overseen by the IG Board.

The report also outlined the progress made on training being undertaken on Cyber Security and Information Governance, which had continued to improve since the last meeting in April 2022.

Resolved:     That the progress being made to improve the Council’s Information Governance be noted and the future action outlined in the report be endorsed.