In line with the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002, public authorities in Scotland must provide recorded information they hold to a requester unless the requested information is covered by a freedom of information exemption.
Environmental Information Requests (EIRs) apply a similar system to environmental information held by an organisation.
Information provided by organisations in reply to requests under FOI(S)A and EIRs is regulated by the Office of the Scottish Information Commissioner.
Find the legislation here:
Before making an FOI request, you may wish to look at our disclosure log to see how we have responded to previous requests on similar subjects.
The Scottish Parliament and Scottish Government are separate organisations. If you want information from the Scottish Government, please make a request via their website:
You can use FOI rights to ask for a wide range of information held by the Scottish Parliament and the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body, including:
Complete an information request form
FOI(S)A does not apply to environmental information but the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2002 gives you very similar rights.
You can use EIRs to ask for:
When you send us an FOI or EIR request, you must include:
You don’t need to mention FOI when making your request but it’s helpful if you do.
When you make an FOI request, or an EIR request, we will provide:
We must reply within 20 working days from the day after your request is made.
If we’re unsure what information you require, we’ll ask you to clarify your request. When this happens the time for replying to the request will begin once we receive your response.
For EIR requests additional time may be required for reply in certain circumstances.
To make your request, complete an information request form
Email: foi.officer@parliament.scot
Phone: 0131 348 5281
By post:
The Information Management and Governance Team
The Scottish Parliament
Holyrood
Edinburgh
EH99 1SP
You can contact us using:
British Sign Language (BSL) through the BSL video relay service on the contactSCOTLAND-BSL website
We’re happy to translate. Email us in any language: info@parliament.scot
You can ask us to consider our reply again by asking for a review of your freedom of information (FOI) or environmental information request (EIR).
You can do this by replying to our email or letter or by using the same contact details as when you made your request.
We will:
You can make an appeal to the Office of the Scottish Information Commissioner to ask them to decide if we handled your request correctly.
We welcome feedback on how we’ve handled your request. Contact us at foi.officer@parliament.scot if you have comments or feedback on how we’ve handled your request.
The Disclosure Log and Publication Scheme provide quick and easy access to information already available for you to use. Both give ways of finding information about the Scottish Parliament and the Scottish Parliament Corporate Body (SPCB).
The Scottish Parliament and the SPCB have adopted the Model Publication Scheme developed and approved by the Scottish Information Commissioner to create a Guide to Information.
The current version of our Guide to Information was last updated in April 2021. It includes information held by both the Scottish Parliament and the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body (SPCB).
Our FOI Disclosure Log shows replies to previous FOI and EIR requests. These are published in an anonymised way.
We publish information about the number of FOI and EIR requests we receive.
FOI requests per year (last updated 21 July 2023)
Please contact foi.officer@parliament.scot if you would like a breakdown of requests by month.