FOI- 496/25

REQUEST

 am writing to ask for data on the number of men who took Paternity leave (or Ordinary & Additional Maternity Support Leave) in 2024/5 financial year.

I would like to know the number of Police Officers and Police Staff who took:

Week 1 paid at normal rate of pay

Week 2 paid at Statutory Paternity Pay rate

Please break this down by Officer and Staff, and by Week 1 and Week 2. For example:

RESPONSE

Your request for information has now been considered and I am not obliged to supply the information you have requested.       

In relation to your request, the following exemption applies:

Section 12 – Exemption where cost of compliance exceeds appropriate limit.

We consulted with our HR department who have confirmed that the requested information is not routinely collated in the format that would easily answer your query. When an individual takes paternity leave our HR department will send them a letter that’s recorded as an attachment on their file. We’ve conducted a search on our shared drives and there are close to 600 records under paternity leave for 24/25 financial year. In order to comply with your request, we would have to manually download and then interrogate each letter to retrieve the requested information.

Whilst I cannot quantify exactly how long this would take it would most certainly exceed the 18 hours stipulated by the regulations.

It is estimated that the cost of providing you with the information is above the amount to which we are legally required to respond i.e. the cost of locating and retrieving the information exceeds the "appropriate level" as stated in the Freedom of Information (Fees and Appropriate Limit) Regulations 2004.

In the case of the police service, the appropriate limit is £450 which has been calculated to equate to a total of 18 hours of work.

If any part of the request exceeds the fees limit then Section 12 applies to the whole request.

In accordance with the Freedom of Information Act 2000, this letter acts as a refusal notice.

Excess cost removes the forces obligation under the Freedom of Information Act, however under Section 16 – Duty to provide advice and assistance, an authority is required to offer an applicant the opportunity to redefine their request within the cost limit. Unfortunately, due to the way in which data is recorded, we can see no feasible way in which you could refine your request.