Letter: Congratulations on Lifting the Lid on Internal Councillor Discussions

Published on: 28 Apr, 2023
Updated on: 28 Apr, 2023

From: Mike Truman

In response to: Leaked Email Shows Tories Were Debating Building Height in 2018

Congratulations to The Dragon for a great scoop in the best traditions of local journalism, lifting the lid on the discussions within the then-ruling party. To state the obvious, the public interest in knowing what was being discussed should clearly outweigh any concerns about the source.

We should be more concerned with the Freedom of Information Act implications of discussions such as this taking place on private emails. If the only record on council emails is a sanitised version of what has previously been agreed in private, then FoI [Freedom of Information] searches need to cover private emails as well.