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For Immediate Release
Contact: Reprieve's London office can be contacted on: communications [at] reprieve.org.uk / +44 (0) 207 553 8140.,Reprieve US,, based in New York City, can be contacted on Katherine [dot] oshea [at] reprieve.org

Freedom of Information Changes Scrapped - Reprieve Comment

WASHINGTON

The commission set up by the government to examine the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act has found that FOI is "working well", and that in some areas, access to information should be increased.

In its report, published today, the cross-party Commission on Freedom of Information found that there is "no evidence" in favour of changing the Act substantially. In some areas, the commission said, "the right of access should be increased." In a written statement published today, the government said that it agreed with several of the commission's key recommendations, and that it would "carefully consider" others.

The commission was set up last year, with the government saying at the time that it would examine whether FOI should be scaled back in order to protect "policy development."

Human rights organization Reprieve - which has previously used FOI to uncover information relating to UK involvement in covert drone strikes, and the CIA's torture programme - had expressed concern that any watering down of the Act would restrict the public's ability to hold the government accountable for human rights abuses.

Commenting, Maya Foa, a director at Reprieve, said: "Freedom of Information plays a vital role in uncovering government wrongdoing - from waste and incompetence to complicity in human rights abuses. The government's plans to dilute FOI should never have been introduced, so the Commission's findings today are welcome. Let's hope this will make ministers think twice before attempting to undermine the British public's right to know."

Reprieve is a UK-based human rights organization that uses the law to enforce the human rights of prisoners, from death row to Guantanamo Bay.