of sensitive personal data (eg. health, criminality). Data which should be safeguarded but which would not cause ongoing worry to the public if lost.’
Extract taken from document entitled – ‘The Government Protective Marking System’
‘COMMERCIAL: A commercial company's undertakings, processes or affairs.’
These terms are part of the Government protective marking system which are used to mark the sensitivity and class respectively of a particular document or piece of information.
You also asked for information about the costs of the training being provided; I am writing to advise you that the time limit for responding to this part of your request, which the Agency received on 7 November 2012 needs to be extended.
In accordance with section 10(2) of FOIA I am extending the 20 working day time limit for issuing a response by a further 20 working days. The information is exempt from disclosure under section 43 of the Act, a full explanation of this exemption can be found at Annex A. However, the exemption may be set aside if it is decided that the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in withholding it. The extension is to enable us to consider this public interest test.
I hope to let you have a response by 4 January 2013. If you do not receive my response or further information by then, please contact me and I will investigate the matter.
If you have any queries about this letter, please do not hesitate to contact me on the details as above. Please remember to quote the reference number above in any future communications.
Yours sincerely
Sara Mitchell
Knowledge and Information Management Team
The reply I received about the ‘conflict of interest’;
5 December 2012
Dear *******
Thank you for your email of 8 November about the Highways Agency’s B+E training at our training and development centre in Cardington.
I can assure you there is no conflict of interest with the provision of B+E training. The Highways Agency is part of the Department for Transport the same we are; therefore, it is not subject to a commercial contract.
To further ensure there is no conflict of interest, the B+E test is conducted by an examiner who has had no involvement with the training of the same candidate.
Yours sincerely
Melanie Young