COUNCIL LOSES FOI ROW

CRUMBRIA: 8.4.2026

AFTER spending £105,000 of Taxpayers’ money on a consultants’ report about Appleby Horse Fair, Wokemoreland & Farcical Council then tried to swat away awkward questions about it.

Unfortunately, the Information Commissioner’s Office — a secrecy watchdog with powers to intervene — did not agree.

The FOI was put in by the tireless Appleby Fair Communities Group. It represents residents in the town who are not exactly thrilled to bits about ‘hosting’ the rootin’ tootin’ wild west show every June.

(It’s the biggest of its kind in Europe and has somewhat outgrown the resident population which is a mere 3,200.)

The ICO has ruled that Council officers were wrong to dismiss the FOI as “vexatious” and has ordered them to answer again properly.

The residents’ group had the temerity to ask questions of the Council about a report it commissioned into whether the fair could be formalised and licensed like most others in the 21st century.

The 64-page fair report – which the Council sat on for months – cost the Council £105,000 and noted that the fair is, well, “unusual, unique and not formally organised.”

It found that unlike major festivals elsewhere, it cannot be ticketed to recoup some of the enormous policing and clean-up costs which fall on W&F council tax payers.

Nobody is fully in charge, much of the event cannot be controlled, and nobody in ‘officialdumb’ seems especially keen to change that.

The residents’ group – already denied a draft copy of the report by the Council – then submitted an FOI probing the “independence” of it.

In particular, it asked who had seen draft versions, whether certain, er, influential cultural representatives or named individuals had sight of them, and what edits were requested by whom.

Wokemoreland Council refused this request citing Section 14(1) of the Freedom of Information Act.

That allows public bodies to refuse requests they consider “vexatious” (e.g, those causing or intending to cause annoyance, frustration or worry).

The group appealed but at an “internal review”, the Council reviewed its own refusal and found that it had been right all along and dismissed their appeal.

Refusing to be beaten, the group went off to the Information Commissioner’s Office for a ruling.

The ICO has now ruled that the group’s request was not vexatious and ordered the Council to issue a fresh response.

With the saga now having rumbled on since February 2025, the Council has coughed up some answers in a reply sent, appropriately, on 1 April 2026.

The Council has told residents it has:

No recorded list of who saw the report
No recorded information on whether certain groups or named individuals saw it
No recorded list of edits
No recorded list of who requested amendments

Which rather invites the obvious question: why the frig didn’t it just say this on day one?

As the residents’ group told the Chronic this week, it finds the Council’s response “very difficult” to accept.

We do too. It looks like some Herbert in authority is playing silly buggers.

If drafts existed, edits were discussed and meetings with consultants took place, then somebody, somewhere, ought to have written something down.

It’s another terrible example of how Taxpayers have to spend months wrecking their nervous systems trying to get blood out of a stone.

Still, respect where it’s due.

For services to making taxpayer-funded bodies explain themselves, Appleby Fair Communities Group receives the Cumbria Chronic’s first-ever Pain In The Arse Gold Award!

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