The Information Commissioner’s Office has published a charter to help people and organisations make what it calls responsible requests under the Freedom of Information Act.
The charter follows the row over the Government’s attempts to change the fees regime for making requests under the Act and under the 2004 Environment Information Regulations.
The Government argued that its proposals – which critics said would greatly reduce the number of requests which public authorities had to answer – were needed because of the number of requests which were frivolous, vexatious, or “not in the spirit of the Act”, although it was able to produce only six or seven examples of such requests.

Former politician and journalist Professor John Horgan is to take up the role of Ireland’s first Press Ombudsman.
Professor Horgan’s office, which is being supported by the print media and National Union of Journalists, will investigate and adjudicate on complaints from the public.

Esther Roberton is to join the Press Complaints Commission for a three year term as a lay member, replacing Adam Phillips, who has left the commission following the end of his term of office.
Esther, a director of the Scottish Council for Development and Industry, is also a former chairman of the Scottish Further Education Funding Council and former chairman of NHS Fife.

A woman who found scraps of an ancient Express & Echo in her bathroom wall decided to return the favour of a former occupant.
She removed the January 27, 1919, edition that had been hidden in the wall, replacing it with one dated Thursday, July 26, 2007, and then covered it up again, “…my own little time capsule for future generations,” she said.

More than £8,600 has been donated by readers and businesses for the Birmingham Mail’s <><>Give A Little, Save A Life campaign, which wants to raise funds for eight life-saving machines for Birmingham Children’s Hospital, which supply a measured drugs dose throughout the day to sick children.