Alun Cairns MP's staffing arrangements

Request

I am making this Freedom of Information request on the Payments to Staffing made by Mr Cairns during the period 2014/15.

  1. Could you please advise me of the number of staff Mr Cairns employed in his constituency, the names of the staff.

  2. Were his staff employed in the constituency during the month of March 2015, the times they were employed, and did they work during the evenings.


Response

I will take your requests for information in turn.

  • Could you please advise me of the number of staff Mr Cairns employed in his constituency, the names of the staff.

Alongside details of all claims made by MPs since 2010, we have also just published information on staff employed by MPs, including the number of staff employed each financial year and their job titles. This information can be found on our publication website at the following address: http://www.parliamentary-standards.org.uk/AnnualisedData.aspxThe following information may assist you in locating this information.

  1. Select the 2014-15 financial year.

  2. Click the link for ‘Other data for 2014-15’, which will prompt you to open a spreadsheet.

  3. This spreadsheet will, amongst other data, contain information relating to each MP’s staffing arrangements.

This information relates to staff employed by each MP in both the constituency and Westminster. Their exact working location, and the names of the staff themselves, are personal data under the terms of the Data Protection Act (DPA). Section 40(2) of the FOIA provides that personal information about third parties is exempt information if one of the conditions set out in section 40(3) is satisfied. Under the FOI Act disclosure of this information would breach the fair processing principle (Principle 1) of the Data Protection Act 1998 (DPA), where it would be unfair to those persons or is confidential. As such, we are unable to provide this information.

  • Were his staff employed in the constituency during the month of March 2015, the times they were employed, and did they work during the evenings.

The number of total staff employed by Mr Cairns across Westminster and the constituency can be found within the information published on our website, provided above. Some of these staff were employed in the constituency in March 2015.

The information we hold relating to staff members includes whether they were full-time, part-time, fixed-term or casual. We hold information relating to staff members total weekly hours, but we do not hold information relating to the specific hours they worked – including whether or not they worked in the evening.

Ref:
CAS-28899
Disclosure:
22 September 2015
Categories:
MPs' STAFFING
Exemptions Applied:
Section 21