Please can I have copies of any email or letter exchanges between Lewisham Council and any part of Transport for London (including any written response to statutory consultation or engagement activity) specifically about the Lewisham and Lee Green so-called 'Healthy Neighborhood Scheme' trial. The time period I would like access to is between 01 May 2019 until 14 February 2020.

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TfL Ref: FOI-3537-1920

Thank you for your email received by Transport for London (TfL) on 15 February 2020.

Your request has been considered under the requirements of the Environmental Information Regulations and our information access policy. I can confirm that we do hold the information you require. You asked:

Please can I have copies of any email or letter exchanges between Lewisham Council and any part of Transport for London (including any written response to statutory consultation or engagement activity) specifically about the Lewisham and Lee Green so-called 'Healthy Neighborhood Scheme' trial.

The time period I would like access to is between 01 May 2019 until 14 February 2020.

However, given the extent of the work involved in processing your request, we are applying Regulation 12(4)(b) as we believe that the request is ‘manifestly unreasonable’ because providing the information you have requested would impose unreasonable costs on us and require an unreasonable diversion of resources.

We have identified in excess of 200 emails between TfL and the London Borough of Lewisham which would need to be manually checked to see if they were relevant to your request and suitable for release. Some of the emails would likely to be not relevant or duplicates, due to emails being repeated within email chains. Whilst the actual number of emails covered by your request might be a sub-set of the numbers the email search captured, it is the excessive work involved in having to locate and extract those that are relevant and meet your request, that would be very burdensome.

In addition, the emails contain a large number of attachments, a total of 53 files, each of which would have to be reviewed and considered for disclosure. Some of the files have been produced by the London borough of Lewisham or their consultants and we would have to engage in discussions with the borough and their agents about the content of the files and whether they contain information that should be exempt from disclosure. This would of course increase the processing time required to complete your request and impose a burden on the borough’s staff time and resources.

The use of this exception is subject to a public interest test, which requires us to consider whether the public interest in applying the exception outweighs the public interest in disclosure. We recognise that the release of information would promote accountability and transparency in public services and also help address your particular concerns about this issue. However, the time it would take to provide the information you have requested would divert a disproportionate amount of our resources from its core functions and on balance we consider that the public interest currently favours the use of the exception.

Please note the Government has announced a series of measures to tackle the Coronavirus. It is essential for London, and in particular for all critical workers, that we continue to provide a safe transport network that enables them to make the journeys they need to. In current circumstances, we are not able to answer FOI and EIR requests readily and we ask that you please do not make a request to us at present.

Answering requests will require the use of limited resources and the attention of staff who could be supporting other essential activity. In any event, please note that our response time will be affected by the current situation.

If you are not satisfied with this response please see the attached information sheet for details of your right to appeal.

Yours sincerely

Eva Hextall

FOI Case Officer

FOI Case Management Team

General Counsel

Transport for London

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