FOI 0801-2024/25- Public liability claims

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Request:

Clarification

- Could you just provide public liability claims rather than employer liability claims.

- For the date range, I mean April 1 – March 31 for the last 5 financial years.

- The file type that has been opened for each claim would suffice, thank you.

- For Q2. by 'number', I mean the number of claims where damages were paid during the relevant period.

- For 'cost', could you please just provide the damages payment for each settled claim during the relevant period?

Original request

Q1. In the past 5 years, how many claims have been made against the police force? (Between March 31 - April 1) Broken down by years 2019/2020, 2020/21, 2021/22, 2022/23, 2023/24.

1a. Can this be broken down by reason for the claim (i.e. traffic accident, assault, wrongful arrest, sexual misconduct, property damage etc.)

Q2. Can you provide the number and cost of such claims closed (or settled with a periodical payment order) between financial years 2019/20, 2020/21, 2021/22, 2022/23, 2023/24 with a damages payment?

Response:

Extent and Result of Searches to Locate Information

To locate the information relevant to your request searches were conducted within North Yorkshire Police. I can confirm that the information you have requested is held by North Yorkshire Police.

Decision

I have today decided to disclose the following information to you.

Q1 & Q2. Please see the table below showing the number of claims where compensation was paid, broken down by file type the claim was opened under for each tax year. I am exempting figures below 5 and replaced them with <5 pursuant to Section 40(2) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (the Act). Please see the exemption explanation below.

Tax Year 2019/2020
File Type	Number of Claims paid during this period
Property – Personal	14
Property – Building	<5
Negligence	<5
Public Liability - Other	<5
Harassment	<5
Assault/Battery	<5
False Imprisonment	<5
Total number of claims paid	24
Total amount of damages paid	£40,396.34

Tax Year 2020/2021
File Type	Number of Claims paid during this period
Property – Personal	13
Property – Building	<5
False Imprisonment	<5
Total number of claims paid	18
Total amount of damages paid	£17,528.52

Tax Year 2021/2022
File Type	Number of Claims paid during this period
Property – Personal	9
Property – Building	<5
Assault/Battery	<5
False Imprisonment	<5
Public Liability - other	<5
Total number of claims paid	20
Total amount of damages paid	£75,792.85

Tax Year 2022/2023
File Type	Number of Claims paid during this period
Property – Personal	8
Property – Building	6
Public Liability - Other	<5
Human Rights	<5
Assault/Battery	<5
False Imprisonment	<5
Total number of claims paid	24
Total amount of damages paid	£58,823.40

Tax Year 2023/2024
File Type	Number of Claims paid during this period
Property – Personal	7
Property – Building	7
Negligence	<5
Public Liability - Other	<5
Human Rights	6
Assault/Battery	<5
False Imprisonment	7
Total number of claims paid	30
Total amount of damages paid	£63,833.15

Tax Year 2024 to date (16/12/2024)
File Type	Number of Claims paid during this period
Property – Personal	12
Property – Building	<5
Negligence	<5
Public Liability - Other	<5
Assault/Battery	<5
False Imprisonment	<5
Total number of claims paid	22
Total amount of damages paid	£58,030.34

*Please note the above information relates to public liability claims only and does not include anything else, such as ex-gratia. Also there are often multiple head of claim/reasons for the claim and the file type is the main head of claim. The file type is also not necessarily the reason that the compensation has been paid.

Exemption Explanation

Section 40 – Personal Information

Where an individual can be identified by such data, releasing it would clearly breach the first data protection principle of being ‘fair’ to the data subject.

Section 17 of the Act requires North Yorkshire Police, when refusing to provide such information (because the information is exempt) to provide you the applicant with a notice which: (a) states that fact, (b) specifies the exemption in question and (c) states (if that would not otherwise be apparent) why the exemption applies.

Section 40(2) is an absolute class based exemption, which does not require a public interest test, but requires the balancing of the legitimate interests of the public against the interests of the individual under the first Data Protection Principle; in that processing of personal data must be lawful and fair (DPA 2018 35(1), EUGDPR Article 5(1)).

This exemption applies because the right given under the FOI Act to request official information held by public authorities does not apply to the personal data of third parties where disclosure of that information would not be fair to the individual, and where there is no legitimate public interest in disclosure.

In all the circumstances of the case it has been determined that the duty to the individual under the Data Protection Act 2018 & EU General Data Protection Regulations, and the public interest in maintaining the exemption from disclosure of personal information held by the force in such instances, outweighs the public interest in disclosure. In this instance, personal information can only be disclosed to the individual concerned.

Releasing personal details to a person other than the data subject would not only breach the data subject’s Data Protection rights it may also breach the obligations placed on an authority under the European Convention on Human Rights

Pursuant to Section 17(1) of the Act this letter acts as a refusal notice under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 in relation to your request.

Please note that systems used for recording information are not generic, nor are the procedures used locally in capturing the data. It should be noted therefore that this force’s response to your questions should not be used for comparison purposes with any other responses you may receive.

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FOI 0801-2024/25- Public liability claims