What the FOI Act covers

The FOI Act 2000 covers:

• a general right of access to information held by Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust subject to certain conditions and exemptions
• a duty on us to inform any person who requests information whether we hold the information, and to communicate that information to the applicant unless one or more exemptions apply

You can seek any recorded information that you think Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust may hold. If the information is environmental, we will respond according to the Environmental Information Regulations (EIR) 2004.

You do not have to know if the information you want is covered by the EIR or the FOI Act. When you make a request, we will decide which law applies.

Our duty to you

The FOI Act requires us to:

• provide information to you about Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust through a publication scheme,
• provide a guide to this information,
• respond appropriately to requests for information.

Our obligations

As a public authority we are obliged under the FOI Act to provide details of our routinely available information.

The Information Commissioner’s Office defines how this information should be published in the Model Publication Scheme.

If you make a request and are not satisfied with the way in which we deal with it, you may ask us to review any decision we make. If you wish us to carry out a review, you should write to us as soon as possible and within 2 months of receiving the response.

Before you make a request

You might not need to make an FOI request if we have:

• previously responded to a FOI request,
• already published the information.