Economic Crime

Request Number: FOI/14875

Category: Policing Themes, Operations and Investigations – Investigations and Operations

Subject: Economic Crime

Request and Answer: 
Your request for information below has now been considered. In respect of Section 1(1)(a) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA) We can confirm that the Police Service of Northern Ireland does hold the information you have requested however it is estimated that the cost of complying with your request for information would exceed the “appropriate costs limit” under Section 12(1) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 and this will be further explained below. PSNI have followed the Information Commissioner’s Office guidance ‘Requests where the cost of compliance exceeds the appropriate limit’ in relation to this request, which also provides further detail on the application of Section 12 (1) of the FOIA. This guidance is available on the ICO website at the following link:
https://ico.org.uk/media/for-organisations/documents/1199/costs_of_compliance_exceeds_appropriate_limit.pdf

Request 1
How many Police Officers are trained and commissioned to investigate Economic Crime (EC)?

Request 2
Do the commissioned EC police officers liaise with Northern Ireland local Government counter fraud officers in investigating corporate public works fraud or help with fraud risk?

Request 3
How many charged individuals or legal entities have the police successful prosecuted involving corporate public works fraud?

Request 4
Do the police share detected threats and fraud intelligence with public works authorities?

Request 5
Do the police have a tactical response and enforcement plan in place which partners with Government authority counter fraud officers?

Request 6 
Do the police offer training courses to Government authority counter fraud officers involving the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984?

Request 7
Do the police offer training courses to Government authority counter fraud officers involving the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000?

Request 8
What training (if any) can the PSNI offer to Government authority counter fraud officers in relation to corporate public works fraud risk?

Request 9
Have corporate public works fraud investigations in the last 15 years been successful in uncovering procurer and bidder collusion through the discovery of inappropriate gifts or monetary kickbacks or has discovery been made through whistle-blower disclosure?

Request 10
Have corporate public works fraud investigations in the last 15 years been successful in uncovering procurer and bidder collusion through contract specification manipulation and/or lack of performance auditing?

Request 11
Have corporate public works fraud investigations in the last 15 years been successful in uncovering procurer and bidder collusion by a contractor been awarded frequent multiple contracts unlawfully or has discovery been made through whistle-blower disclosure?

You have no request numbered 12

Request 13
Have corporate public works fraud investigations in the last 15 years been successful in uncovering bid and tender manipulation between contractors for tendered works?

Request 14
Have corporate public works fraud investigations in the last 15 years procurement been successful in uncovering duplicated tender submissions involving duplicated rates, duplicated schedules and duplicated worksheets records?

Request 15
Have corporate public works fraud investigations in the last 15 years uncovered any section 2 fraud act offences involving public authority officers?

Request 16
Have corporate public works fraud investigations in the last 15 years uncovered any section 3 Fraud Act offences involving public authority officers?

Request 17
Have corporate public works fraud investigations in the last 15 years uncovered any section 4 Fraud Act offences involving public authority officers?

Answer 
Section 17(5) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 requires the Police Service of Northern Ireland, when refusing to provide such information (because the cost of compliance exceeds the appropriate limit) to provide you the applicant with a notice which states that fact.

It is estimated that the cost of complying with your request for information would exceed the “appropriate costs limit” under Section 12(1) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000. Section 12 of FOIA allows a public authority to refuse to deal with a request where it estimates that it would exceed the appropriate limit to either comply with the request in its entirety or confirm or deny whether the requested information is held. The estimate must be reasonable in the circumstances of the case. The ‘appropriate limit’ is currently £600 for central government and £450 for all other public authorities including PSNI.  The relevant Regulations which define the appropriate limit for section 12 purposes are The Freedom of Information and Data Protection (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulation 2004 SI 2004 No 3244. These are known as the ‘Fees Regulations’ for brevity. 

Regulation 4(3) of the Fees Regulations states that a public authority can take into account the costs it reasonably expects to incur in carrying out the following permitted activities in complying with the request: 

(i) determining whether the information is held; 

(ii) locating the information, or a document containing it; 

(iii) retrieving the information, or a document containing it; and 

(iv) extracting the information from a document containing it. 

Under those regulations PSNI can calculate the time spent on each of these permitted activities at £25 per hour (thus if the activity(s) takes more than 18 hours PSNI will be in excess of the ‘appropriate limit’).

• When a public authority is estimating whether the appropriate limit is likely to be exceeded, it can include the costs of complying with two or more requests if the conditions laid out in Regulation 5 of the Fees Regulations can be satisfied. Those conditions require the requests to be: 
  made by one person, or by different persons who appear to the public authority to be acting in concert or in pursuance of a campaign;
• made for the same or similar information; and
• received by the public authority within any period of 60 consecutive working days. 

Regulation 5(2) of the Fees Regulations requires that the requests which are to be aggregated relate “to any extent” to the same or similar information. This is quite a wide test but public authorities should still ensure that the requests meet this requirement.

PSNI can advise that to answer Requests – 3, 9, 10, 11, 13, 14, 15, 16 and 17 will require a manual search on each fraud occurrence. Based on a rough average of 5,500 incidents per year x 10 minutes it will take approximately 916 hours to check 1 year alone, placing this request grossly over the 18 hour cost limit.

In accordance with the Freedom of Information Act 2000, this letter should be considered as a Refusal Notice, and the request has therefore been closed. 

Advice and Assistance
You may wish to submit a refined request in order that the cost of complying with your request may be facilitated within the ‘appropriate limit’. In compliance with Section 16 of the Act, we have considered how your request may be refined to bring it under the appropriate limit. 

Subject to a new request PSNI can:

Provide a response to Requests – 1, 2, 4, 5, 6 and 7.

• Re Request 8 - What training (if any) can the PSNI offer to Government authority counter fraud officers in relation to corporate public works fraud risk? – If requesting a new request in this subject matter can you clarify in that new request if this question is asking – what courses PSNI run (i.e. currently) or what courses it has the capability to run (i.e. future)