Public sector information is information produced by council staff as part of their job.
The Re-use of Public Sector Information Regulations 2015 (RPSI) allow you to ask for permission to use information for a different purpose from that originally intended.
Read this page carefully before applying.
How we will respond to your request
We will respond in 20 days from the date we receive your request. We will let you know if we need more time to respond to your request.
The response will provide the information requested, indicate where you can access it, tell you what the charge will be or let you know if we need more time to provide the information. If we cannot provide the information we will tell you why.
If we need to make a charge for supplying the information because of the amount of work involved or the way it is supplied we will advise you of the amount before we supply the information.
What the regulations mean
The Re-use of Public Sector Information Regulations 2015 (RPSI) are about allowing you to reuse information and how we make that information available. They are not used to provide information. Provision of information is dealt with under the Freedom of Information Act and the Environmental Information Regulations 2004: see Freedom of Information.
These laws do not automatically give you the right to re-use the information.
Information covered
All information that the council holds in any format within its 'public task' is covered by the regulations, except anything which for which we do not hold the copyright, crests logos and insignia, personal data, anything else restricted by legislation and information which is not accessible. The phrase 'public task' means our core responsibility, and would exclude for example documents having a value-added or commercial nature.
Definition of re-use
Re-use means the use by a person or company of a document which the council holds, for a purpose other than the initial purpose for which it was produced. The transfer of documents from one public sector body to another in pursuit of their public task does not constitute re-use.
Check if you need to ask permission
You do not need to make a request under the RPSI regulations if the information is already available on our Open Data or Publication Scheme pages, as we have provided that information under the Open Government Licence (OGL), which allows you to re-use the information. There is more information about the OGL below.
Complaints
If you are unhappy with our response you have the right to complain. Your complaint must be in writing and say which aspects(s) of the regulations are at issue. You must supply your full contact details and say what you would like us to do to resolve the issue. We will handle your complaint within the terms of our Complaints Policy. If your complaint is not resolved through this process, you may escalate it to the Information Commissioner's Office.
Open Government Licence
Unless otherwise stated, Merton Council owns the copyright of all material affected by the RPSI regulations. Where we provide it to you under the Open Government Licence (OGL) you:
- may copy, distribute and display the material, and where appropriate perform it, adapt it to your needs and make commercial use of it.
- must give the original author credit, make the information freely available, and clearly and visibly state the date you obtained the information from us. It must be completely clear to anyone obtaining the information that it has come from Merton Council.
- must, if you incur additional costs to make this information available to a third party, make it clear that the information is freely available on request from the Merton Council.
More information about the Open Government Licence is available on the National Archives web site.