Location: Aylesbury
Overview
Are you motivated by transparency, fairness, and the responsible use of information? This is an excellent opportunity to join a supportive and specialist team where your work will directly support the Council’s commitment to openness and accountability.
As an Information Governance Practitioner (FOI), you will play a key role in ensuring the Council meets its statutory obligations under the Freedom of Information Act and Environmental Information Regulations, delivering high-quality, timely and well-reasoned responses to information requests.
This role is well suited to someone who enjoys analytical thinking, problem-solving and working collaboratively across services, and who is confident applying legislation to real-world situations.
About us
Buckinghamshire Council is a relatively new organisation that combines the strengths and expertise of the previous five councils in the county to create positive change for local people, communities, and businesses. We are firmly focused on the future and have made a clear commitment to serve residents better and to provide stronger representation for Buckinghamshire, both locally and nationally.
About the role
This is a dedicated FOI practitioner role, focused on the end-to-end delivery of FOI and EIR casework. You will manage your own caseload, making sound and defensible decisions, and ensuring statutory timescales and quality standards are consistently met.
You’ll work closely with services across the Council to locate and review information, provide clear advice, and support improvements in how information is recorded, retrieved and disclosed. A key aspect of the role is communicating FOI requirements clearly and confidently to colleagues at all levels, including designing and delivering FOI training and awareness activity.
While the primary focus of the role is FOI and EIR, there is some overlap with data protection work. The postholder will be expected
to have a good understanding of data protection principles and may be required to support the data protection team with casework when needed.
Key elements of the role include:
1. Managing FOI and EIR requests from receipt to completion, including complex and sensitive cases.
2. Interpreting FOI and EIR legislation, applying exemptions and exceptions, and producing clear, defensible decisions.
3. Engaging with services across the Council to identify, retrieve and analyse information relevant to requests.
4. Providing clear, practical advice and guidance to officers and members of the public on FOI and EIR matters.
5. Supporting the processing of internal reviews, complaints and escalations related to FOI and EIR responses.
6. Preparing high-quality written replies, decision notices, summaries and reports suitable for audit or ICO scrutiny.
7. Using case management systems to log, track and manage FOI/EIR cases accurately and consistently.
8. Confidently using operational and case management systems and SharePoint to locate, retrieve, download, review, combine and convert information held across service areas.
9. Designing and delivering FOI training, briefings and awareness sessions for colleagues across the Council.
10. Contributing to FOI guidance, templates, internal communications, learning materials and service improvements.
11. Supporting joint working with data protection colleagues and assisting with data protection casework when required.
Any Desk
At Buckinghamshire Council, we follow a hybrid working model. As an ‘any-desk’ worker, you will need to be connected to our network to access digital files and systems, but you can do this from home or from one of our offices.
You will be required to work as a minimum 2-days per week in the office, depending on your role and team needs, with the remainder working from home.
About you
You’ll bring strong practical experience of FOI work and a confident, balanced approach to applying legislation. You’ll be comfortable working independently, managing statutory deadlines and communicating clearly with a wide range of stakeholders.
You’ll thrive in this role if you are:
12. A clear and confident communicator, able to explain complex FOI or technical issues in plain language.
13. Credible and assured when working with colleagues at all levels of the organisation, including senior officers.
14. Highly organised and detail-focused, with the ability to juggle multiple deadlines and competing priorities.
15. Analytical and evidence-based, with confidence challenging assumptions and inconsistencies where appropriate.
16. Comfortable delivering training or briefings and responding to questions clearly and confidently.
You will also have:
17. Substantial hands-on experience managing FOI and EIR casework in a public sector or similar environment.
18. Strong working knowledge of the Freedom of Information Act, Environmental Information Regulations and relevant ICO guidance.
19. Experience applying exemptions and exceptions, including public interest tests.
20. Experience recognising and supporting internal reviews, complaints or ICO-related correspondence.
21. A sound understanding of data protection principles.
22. Data protection case work experience is desirable, as the role may involve supporting the data protection team where there is overlap or operational need.
23. Strong technical skills, with the ability to locate, retrieve and manage information across multiple systems accurately and efficiently.
24. Experience using case management systems to manage statutory casework and maintain clear, defensible records.
25. Confidence working with digital documents, including combining files, creating PDFs and applying appropriate redactions.
26. A working knowledge of SharePoint or similar document management systems.
27. NVQ Level 3 / HNC (or equivalent) as a minimum.
28. The ability to converse effectively with the public in spoken English.