When I wrote to you on 10 June, I said that I was aiming to let you have the Government's considered response to your Committee's report within the guideline two-month timescale. It was not in the event possible to finalise the response as early as 6 July in time for the Debate on the Estimates, although by that stage I was able to give the House an indication of our likely approach in certain key areas. I am now pleased however to be able to let you have, within the two-month period, the Government's response in the form of the attached self-standing Memorandum.

Your Committee's report was a substantial piece of work, and the response to individual recommendations is as full as possible. A few of the conclusions and recommendations focus on highly complex areas—the precise statutory co-ordination between FOI and data protection being one—where our thinking is still in the process of being developed as part of the overall preparation of the FOI Bill. In these cases it is not yet possible to give a comprehensive reply, but we will be taking the Committee's views into account as work proceeds, building on the progress already made, and which is set out in the individual responses. Obviously, there will be a further, substantive opportunity for your Committee to scrutinise, take evidence and comment on the next stage of the process, when we publish the FOI Bill. As you know, I aim to be able to do this by the end of September. Our views on the importance of this next stage in the process are set out particularly in our response to Recommendation 3.

More generally, I would like to extend my thanks to you and your Committee for undertaking such a thorough, thoughtful and helpful examination of the proposals for a Freedom of Information (FOI) Act set out in our White Paper Your Right to Know. The White Paper itself emphasised the importance of our proposals being the subject of wide consultation and thorough and informed debate. Your report is an important contribution to that debate, and to our further work.

I would like to make one further point in this context. The Memorandum deals with the full range of the Committee's recommendations, but does not contain a separate introductory section. I do not think there is a need for one on this particular subject. The Government's commitment to a radical Freedom of Information Act is clear, and has already been set out in Your Right to Know. As I said in the debate in the House of 6 July, FOI is a key part—and in my view a central part—of the Government's programme to modernise British politics through radical constitutional change. The Prime Minister has said that freedom of information is not some isolated constitutional reform, but a change that is absolutely fundamental to how we see politics developing in this country. I know you share that view and I look forward to continuing to work with your Committee as we progress towards this shared objective.

21 July 1998