The High Court has dismissed an appeal by John O’Grady over access to records concerning his childhood detention and that of his late sister in four industrial and reformatory schools.
The appeal challenged an Information Commissioner decision of 9 January 2002. The Commissioner had directed the Department of Education and Science to release records it held, but upheld its refusal to release records held independently by the religious orders that ran the schools.
O’Grady argued that the Department’s relationship with the orders amounted to a contract for services. He said section 6(9) of the Freedom of Information Act 1997 therefore required the Department to obtain relevant records from the orders and treat them as records held by the Department.
The Commissioner had concluded that there was no such contract. In a High Court appeal limited to a point of law, Mr Justice Barry White considered the material that had been before the Commissioner, rather than additional documents O’Grady later presented to the court.
The judge found that the Commissioner had not drawn erroneous inferences or made an error of law in deciding that no contract for services existed. He noted that the schools operated within a statutory framework, and that the Department had regulatory functions and a role in funding placements. Although the religious orders provided a service and received payment, the level of remuneration was set by the Department without negotiation, and local authorities also made payments.
The court concluded that those features, considered alongside the statutory framework, were inconsistent with a contract for services between the Department and the school managers.
The dismissal left the Commissioner’s decision in place. The appeal concerned whether the Department had to account for records held by the religious orders under the Act; the judgment did not order those orders to release records.