A freelance journalist is to go to court on Monday in a bid to enforce his right to see the 2003-4 accounts of Lincolnshire County Council.

Richard Orange, of Orchard News Bureau, is taking the council to judicial review over difficulties he has had in seeing the accounts, which should be available for public inspection.

An oral application hearing at the High Court in London is due to he held on Monday.

The Audit Commission Act 1998, and the Accounts and Audit Regulations 2003 provide that local authorities must open their accounts to inspection by any local government elector in its area.

The information should be made available for 20 days a year, but Richard, a former Western Daily Press and Lincolnshrie Echo journalist, said he encountered problems seeing the accounts, with information which the council claimed was confidential being held back.

In addition, Lincolnshire County Council had handed the operation of its accounts to HBS, a contractor, and did not keep the accounts in one place.

Richard said: “You don’t get hundreds of filing cabinets stuffed full of invoices where you can walk in and say you want to go through them from A to Z – Lincolnshire County Council’s accounts are stored in 851 locations.

“Journalists and members of the public may have the right to access accounts, but if they are not in paper form and they are all over the place, how do you do that?”

He said there was also an argument about whether the council had the right to refuse to disclose what it considered to be confidential information which appeared in the accounts to the public or journalists.

Lincolnshire County Council treasurer Pete Moore said: “We are meeting our obligations in relation to the disclosure of information under the Audit Commission Act, including those detailed requests from the Orchard News Bureau, whilst at the same time balancing the council’s legal obligation to protect the rights of individuals including service users to privacy under the Human Rights Act and Data Protection Act.

“This is a real issue as the documents supporting the accounts can contain sensitive and personal information on individuals.

“In this instance after discussion with Mr Orange we provided him with further copies of the requested documentation so that the names of the council’s contractors, doctors and barristers were not obscured.

“The county council wishes to help all individuals seeking information and continues to offer Mr Orange every assistance whilst ensuring that it properly protects the legal rights of individuals to privacy.”