Enacted in 2000 and in operation in the UK since 2005, the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act has revealed information which has generated calls for constitutional reform. A massive 'information jurisprudence' has developed through the decisions of the Information Commissioner, the Information Tribunal and the courts. Governments' responses to the war on terror have involved increased resort to claims of national security and accompanying secrecy, but these developments have to exist alongside demands for FOI and transparency. FOI has to balance access to and protection of personal information, and major amendments have been made to the Data Protection Act in order to balance the competing demands of transparency and privacy. This detailed discussion of FOI laws and personal data laws examines the historical development of secrecy, national security and government, and their modern context.

Enacted in 2000 and in operation in the UK since 2005, the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act has revealed information which has generated calls for constitutional reform. A massive 'information jurisprudence' has developed through the decisions of the Information Commissioner, the Information Tribunal and the courts. Governments' responses to the war on terror have involved increased resort to claims of national security and accompanying secrecy, but these developments have to exist alongside demands for FOI and transparency. FOI has to balance access to and protection of personal information, and major amendments have been made to the Data Protection Act in order to balance the competing demands of transparency and privacy. This detailed discussion of FOI laws and personal data laws examines the historical development of secrecy, national security and government, and their modern context.

Government and Information: The Law Relating to Access, Disclosure and their Regulation is the leading text offering comprehensive and practical advice on the access, disclosure and retention of government records under UK, EU and ECHR requirements. It is essential reading for all those dealing with public authority information. The fifth edition is extensively revised following numerous developments in both UK and EU law as well as the ever expanding case law on information rights under statutory, Convention and common law provisions. Legislation: Justice and Security Act 2013; Crime and Courts Act 2013 (s 34 in relation to press standards following Leveson); Re-use of Public Sector Information Regulations 2015 Investigatory Powers Bill 2016; Environmental Information Regulations 2004; General Data Protection Regulation 2016; Key cases since the last edition include: Evans v Attorney General [2015] UKSC 21 - the SC ruled that the Attorney General had acted unlawfully in issuing a veto preventing disclosure Kennedy v Charities Commission [2014] UKSC 20 - Supreme Court extended the ambit of the common law in relation to access to information and transparency Case 362/14 Schrems [2015]) - involving data transfer to the USA PJS v Newsgroup Newspapers ltd [2016] UKSC 26 - developing the law of personal privacy

After a variety of stumbling blocks and false starts, the Treaty of Lisbon is now in force, despite the widespread instability let loose in the last two years as protectionism reared its terrified head in many EU Member States and nationalisation and massive state support for the national banking sector became panaceas for the global financial drama. Nonetheless, forces are still at large that seem to threaten the basic freedoms of the Union and to undermine the future of the common market. Given these circumstances, in June 2009 the Institute of European Public Law of the University of Hull assembled a range of experts in relevant fields to offer papers and reach some consensus on what has been achieved in the EU legal order and what the future holds for that order given local tensions and global uncertainty. This remarkable volume reprints those papers. Sixteen well-known scholars in European law and politics present insightful (and sometimes provocative) studies in such areas as the following: * the future of European Public Law and its limits; * the future of the European order; * the EU and global administrative law; * European law between constitutionalism and governance; * legal control of regulatory bodies; * reforms in financial and banking regulation; * competition and public services; * regulating media markets; * the EU human rights regime; * citizenship and European democracy; * asylum policy; * EU transparency and access to documents; * accountability in a separation of powers context; * the role of European judges; * constitutional pluralism in the EU. An authoritative appraisal of challenges facing the process of 'Europeanization' at a time of considerable uncertainty for the European Union and its legal order, this volume examines the present state of development of different areas of European law and reflects on the future for these areas in the light of the impasse on constitutional and legal reform and their eventual resolution. As such it will prove to be highly relevant to current and future debates in this area and should be of considerable interest to scholars in European law, politics and allied fields.