Publication scheme

1 - About the Council

We have around 6,000 employees, headed by a Chief Executive and Strategic Management Board who manages the day to day running of the Council and who are responsible for their own areas within the Council.

1.1 How the Council works

The Council is made up of 54 councillors who are elected every four years.

Councillors are accountable to all Coventry people and their main duty is to the whole community, with a special duty to their constituents - including those who did not vote for them. Following public consultation, the Council adopted a Cabinet and Leader form of Executive.

All councillors meet together as the Council where they decide overall policies and set the budget each year. The Council appoints the Cabinet whose main role is to develop and bring in policy on behalf of the Council. It is made up of 10 councillors, including the Council Leader, who are appointed by the Council to those positions.

A number of Scrutiny Committees monitor the decisions of the Cabinet and how policy is introduced. They can also recommend policies to the Cabinet and Council. They allow citizens to have a greater say in Council matters and they are consulted with by the Cabinet on developing policies.

Scrutiny councillors can "call-in" a decision that has been made by the Executive but not yet put into practice to consider whether the decision is the right one. Scrutiny Committees may recommend that the Cabinet reconsider the decision.

The Council also appoints Regulatory Committees to perform the Council's regulatory functions such as development-control and licensing. Other specialist committees are appointed by the Council when needed.

The Council has established a Standards Committee to advise on the adoption and implementation of a Code of Conduct and Political Conventions for elected and co-opted Members. All Members have agreed to follow these so as to ensure high standards in the way they carry out their duties.

1.2 How decisions are made

The Cabinet has to make decisions that are in line with the Council's overall policies and budget. Decisions outside the budget or policy framework are referred to the full Council.

Meetings of the Cabinet are open for the public, except where personal or confidential matters are being discussed.

1.3 Who provides the services?

The Chief Executive is the Head of Operations at the Council along with members of the Strategic Management Board;  Deputy Chief Executive, Director of HR, Director of Finance & Corporate Resources (Section 151 Officer) and Director of Legal & Governance Services (Statutory Monitoring Officer. They are responsible for the day-to-day running of the Council and its provision of services. 

1.4 Your rights under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 ("FOI")

You already have the right of access to information about yourself under the Data Protection Act 2018. In addition the Freedom of Information Act also gives you the right to access all the information the Council holds.

In broad terms, FOI gives you two related rights:

• To be told if the Council holds the information you want; and
• To receive a copy of the information you have requested, where possible in the manner you requested, e.g. as a copy or summary.
• There are some exceptions to these rights. FOI calls them "exemptions" and the Council does not have to release information that any of the exemptions apply to. The Council has also provided details of the exemptions it will use and their scope as part of this scheme.

1.5 The Publication Scheme ("The scheme")

Under FOI, the Council must maintain a "Publication Scheme. EIR also encourages wide publication of information.

The scheme aims to provide you with details on how to get information the Council publishes. It tells you:

• What information the Council routinely publishes or intends to publish;
• How it is published;
• When it is available;
• Where it is located on our website; or if not
• Kept within the Council and available from;
• How you can access it; and
• What it costs you, if anything, to access it.

Information detailed in the Scheme will either be information the Council feels is of specific interest or information that has been proven to be of special public interest, for example information requested on a regular basis.

The Council reviews the Scheme on a regular basis and adds information to it. It will only remove information from the Scheme where there are both good reasons for this and the Information Commissioner agrees to the removal.

How to obtain a document on the Publication Scheme

If you know the type of information you are looking for, try looking through the Classes List for electronically-available information.

If a copy is already available on our website or a linked website, such as The Coventry Partnership, they may help you locate the document on the web.

How we make information in the Scheme available

Information listed in the scheme can be made available in a number of ways:

• Telephone - Many of our web links contain a telephone number for you to call if you need copies of documents.
• Website - Many documents are currently available electronically on the website for you to access and download. Please note though that when the link is to another organisation's website, provision of the information is the responsibility of the organisation and not of the Council.
• By post - information will be posted on request, following receipt of any fee applicable. Please send your request, clearly stating which document you require on the downloadable or electronic forms available.
• By e-mail - to: infogov@coventry.gov.uk
• Other languages: some documents contained in the publication scheme can be requested in languages other than English, large print and Braille.

If you have any complaints about the Publication Scheme, you have a right to make an appeal to the Council's Information Governance Team.

If you are still dissatisfied, you have the right to apply directly to the Information Commissioner for a decision. The Information Commissioner can be contacted at:

Information Commissioner's Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire
SK9 5AF

1.6 Information not covered by the Scheme

Not all the information the Council produces will be detailed in the Scheme. You can ask for any other information the Council holds. Details of how you can get copies of this information follow below and at the end of the scheme.

1.7 Deletion of information

The Council is neither allowed to withhold information requested properly nor to amend or destroy information to avoid its release. The Council is, however, allowed to destroy information in accordance with its document retention and disposal plan.

A lot of information the Council produces is only needed for a limited period. It costs a lot to keep information once it is no longer needed so the Council will destroy information that it no longer needs in accordance with its Record Retention and Disposal Schedules (R & D Schedules).

Re-use of Council information

The information provided may be reused for your personal use. This means that brief extracts of any of the material may be reproduced without permission, under the fair dealing provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 (sections 29 and 30) for the purposes of research for non-commercial purposes, private study, criticism, review and news reporting, subject to an acknowledgement of the Council as the copyright owner.

Copyright law does not give you a right to re-use them in a way that would infringe or breach that copyright, by making copies, publishing and issuing copies to the public or to any other person. This means that wider re-use needs express permission in writing.

Please note that most of the information that you request or download is owned by the Council and subject to copyright protection. Where information can be reused, this and any terms that apply are indicated in the scheme.

Under the Re-use of Public Sector Information 2015 Regulations you are free to use this information for your own use or for the purposes of news reporting. However, any other type of re-use under the regulations, for example; publication of the information or circulation to the public, will need permission and may be subject to terms and conditions.

For documents where the copyright does not belong to the Council you will need to apply separately to the copyright holder.