Over the past six months has TfL held meetings or had correspondence and phone calls with representatives from the following companies: Lyft, Grab, Go-jek or Didi Chuxing? If so, please could I receive any meeting notes/minutes regarding the aforementioned companies?

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TfL Ref: FOI-1634-1920

Thank you for your email received by Transport for London (TfL) on 2 September 2019.

Your request has been considered in accordance with the requirements of the Freedom of Information Act and our information access policy. I can confirm we hold some of the information you require. You asked:

Over the past six months has TfL held meetings or had correspondence and phone calls with representatives from the following companies: Lyft, Grab, Go-jek or Didi Chuxing? If so, please could I receive any meeting notes/minutes regarding the aforementioned companies?

A meeting took place with Lyft on 18 July 2019, attendees were:

Michael Hurwitz – TfL

Danny Price – TfL

Gareth Powell – TfL

Jake Reeder – Lyft

Julia Haywood – Lyft

Teresa Dye – Lyft

There are no meeting notes or minutes from this meeting.

The meeting involved a general exchange of information which covered the Mayor’s Transport Strategy, current trends and status of the transport market in London and an update on the range of Lyft’s business activities, from ride-hailing to bike-rental.

In addition, there have been a number of calls with Lyft, relating to Cycle Hire back office operations and GDPR matters. This is because Lyft owns 8D, which is contracted by Cubic (on TfL’s behalf) to provide the existing cycle hire system. The calls were held on 22 May, 24 May, 29 May, 5 June, 12 June and 19 June. The action points/notes from these calls are attached.

We have had no meetings with the other mentioned companies over the last 6 months.

Please note that in accordance with TfL’s obligations under Data Protection legislation some personal data has been removed, as required by section 40(2) of the FOI Act. This is because disclosure of this personal data would be a breach of the legislation, specifically the first principle which requires all processing of personal data to be fair and lawful. It would not be fair to disclose this personal information when the individuals have no expectation it would be disclosed and TfL has not satisfied one of the conditions which would make the processing ‘fair’.

This exemption to the right of access to information is an absolute exemption and not subject to an assessment of whether the public interest favours use of the exemption.

Furthermore, section 43(2) exemption has also been applied to cost and pricing information contained within the documents as disclosure would be likely to prejudice our commercial interests, as well as Lyft/8D’s. Some of the negotiations with Lyft/8D are still ongoing and refer to the variations to contract and costs.

Prejudice would be likely to occur when we go out to tender for this and similar services in the future. Disclosing this information could also be prejudicial to Lyft’s ability to compete for tendering opportunities with TfL and other companies in the future, as their competitive edge would inevitably be prejudiced by disclosure of their pricing.

The use of this exemption is subject to an assessment of the public interest in relation to the disclosure of the information concerned. TfL recognises the need for openness and transparency by public authorities but in this instance the public interest in ensuring that TfL is able to obtain the best value for public money outweighs the general public interest in increasing transparency of our processes.

If this is not the information you are looking for, or if you are unable to access it for some reason, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Please see the attached information sheet for details of your right to appeal as well as information on copyright and what to do if you would like to re-use any of the information we have disclosed.

Yours sincerely

Eva Hextall

FOI Case Officer

FOI Case Management Team

General Counsel

Transport for London

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