'Culture of non-transparency' at city council

Dan Ackroyd says freedom of information requests are vital to hold local councils to account

Campaigners have criticised a "culture of non-transparency" at a city council, amid a lack of improvement in answering information requests on time.

In March 2024, Bristol City Council was handed an enforcement notice by the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) due to "consistently poor level of performance" in answering freedom of information (FOI) requests within the legal timeframe.

And new figures have revealed that since then the council's record has barely improved.

Council leader Tony Dyer said that "good progress" had been made to streamlining the FOI process, but admitted there was "much more work to do" on improving response times.

Local councils are legally required to respond to FOI requests within 20 working days. Commonly used by local journalists and campaigners to request information, they play an important role in local transparency.

FOI requests often uncover important information, for example the future of Bristol tower block Barton House, complaints against councillors never being upheld, and the council's use of bailiffs to collect unpaid council tax.

In March 2024, the ICO gave the council the enforcement notice, ordering the authority to reduce the backlog of unanswered requests.

At the time, the regulator said it had received more complaints about Bristol City Council than any other.

The council has managed to reduce the backlog in requests from 147 in March 2024 to 77 as of September 2025.

But new figures show 72% of requests were answered on time in the three months up to September 2025, compared to 75% between January and March 2024.

In August, the ICO issued the council with another enforcement notice, this time for its failure to respond to subject access requests (SARs) – where people ask for information the council has on them.

Helen Powell (right) is part of the 'We Love Stoke Lodge' campaign

Local campaigner Helen Powell said: "A culture of non-transparency - delays or refusals in responding to FOI requests, or calling individuals 'vexatious' because the council doesn't want to have to disclose information - just makes people suspicious about what is going on behind the scenes."

She said residents were still waiting for the greater transparency promised when the council moved to a committee model in 2024.

Dan Ackroyd, another local citizen who regularly uses FOI, said: "It's important because politicians aren't going to publish details of their failures. It is meant to give us access to records so we can see what actually happened."

He gave an example of an FOI request asking for the communications between those in charge of the emergency evacuation of Barton House in 2023.

His said his request was refused on the grounds that the council planned to publish the information, but in the end the email accounts involved were deleted 30 days after his request was refused.

"This really looks like they have something to hide," he said.

'More to do'

Councillor Rob Logan, chair of the council's audit committee, called for urgent improvements to the council's "unacceptable" record in responding to FOI and SARs, and asked for an update about the council's plans at the next meeting of its audit committee.

The council said it has created an action plan to improve its FOI performance, which includes reviewing staff, making sure FOI requirements are seen as a core function, and exploring short-term increases in staff resources to clear the backlog.

Council leader Tony Dyer said: "Since the issuing of the ICO's enforcement notice last month, we have made good progress towards tackling the backlog of Subject Access Requests and streamlining our FOI processes.

"This has resulted in us meeting the requirements for compliance set out in the FOI notice," he said.

"We appreciate that there is still much more work to do to improve, particularly in relation to our response times."