FOI 220980

FREEDOM OF INFORMATION REQUEST REFERENCE NO: 220980

I write in connection with your request for information which was received on 9^th January 2023.  Please find below the response to your request:

Please provide the following information:

1) The total number of Disclosure Requests made under the Domestic Violence Disclosure Scheme (also known as “Clare’s Law”)" during the period 1st January 2022 to 31st December 2022 inclusive by Gender, Age, & Ethnicity.

For your ease of reference, please provide the details for the “Person at Risk” i.e. the person for whom the enquiry has been made by directly and/or on behalf of.

2) During the period 1st January 2022 to 31st December 2022 inclusive, please provide the Gender of the person making the enquiry regarding their current partner and/or the person making the enquiry directly on behalf of the “Person at Risk”.  

Reply

1) The total number of Disclosure Requests made under the Domestic Violence Disclosure Scheme (also known as “Clare’s Law”)" during the period 1st January 2022 to 31st December 2022 inclusive by Gender, Age, & Ethnicity.

For your ease of reference, please provide the details for the “Person at Risk” i.e. the person for whom the enquiry has been made by directly and/or on behalf of.

2) During the period 1st January 2022 to 31st December 2022 inclusive, please provide the Gender of the person making the enquiry regarding their current partner and/or the person making the enquiry directly on behalf of the “Person at Risk”.  

Your request for information has been considered in accordance with the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (“the Act”), and I am not obliged to provide the information requested.

S.12(1) of the Act states that a public authority is not obliged to comply with a request for information if the authority estimates that the cost of complying with the request would exceed the “appropriate limit”.  For police forces in England and Wales, the "appropriate limit" is £450 or 18 hours of work as set by the Freedom of Information (Fees and Appropriate Limit) Regulations 2004.

The information you have requested is not available in a readily retrievable format.  The way in which these matters are recorded on the system mean that the gender and age of the person at risk cannot be extracted and each investigation has to be manually reviewed to obtain this information There are over  800 records.  In order to ascertain whether the information you have requested is held would take in excess of 18 hours as each record would have to be checked individually.

In accordance with s.17(5) of the Act, this acts as a Refusal Notice.

Under s.16 of the Act I have a duty to provide advice and assistance in relation to your request.  I have a duty to provide advice and assistance in relation to your request and can provide the information requested for part of question 1 and 2 as this was retrieved during our initial research. This should not be taken as a precedent that additional information would be supplied outside of the time/fees legislation for any subsequent requests

Total number of Disclosure Requests: 821

Gender : Male – 18, Female – 803

Age:

Ethnicity:

The information has been separated to ensure the personal identity of individuals is protected.