EVER wanted to find out how many exorcisms the county council has paid for? Or are you trying to uncover some confidential information at the heart of local Government?

Whatever the facts and figures being sought, local authorities are having to pile through huge numbers of Freedom of Information Act requests.

The act, which became law on January 1, 2005, gives anyone the legal right to access information held by more than 100,000 public bodies, including historical documents from when the act was agreed in 2000.

Since the act became law, Colchester Council has received a total of 644 requests for information.

About 524 requests saw information released to the public and 95 per cent of requests were released within the allocated 20 days.

Most requests, about 50 per cent, came from the public followed by businesses, journalists and MPs.

The most popular subjects ranged from planning to car parking and contracts with contractors.

Phil Pettitt, ICT programme manager, said: “The council is now receiving quite a number of requests each year and in recent months, that number has increased quite significantly.

“There was an 82 per cent increase last year on the previous year and there seems to be no sign of this abating.”

Mr Pettitt believes a number of requests were used for commercial interests, but he is not able to ask why the information is being requested.

He added: “People have a right to the information for whatever reason if we hold it.”

Health issues have attracted less interest from the public.

Figures from Colchester Hospital University NHS Foundation Trust show they received 319 requests for information since 2005.

Information governance manager Rees Cox said: “We frequently get requests for MRSA and clostridium difficile information, mixed sex wards and facilities, maternity and department structures.

“The three main groups of requesters are media, MPs and recruitment agencies or companies, this is followed by students doing dissertations or companies asking for surveys to be completed.”

Ms Cox explained that the trust has already bought new software to help it analyse the data it holds, while an extra member of staff has been drafted in to help.

She said: “Dealing with FOI requests is quite resource intensive, mainly in the fact that statistical information is held in different formats than that required to fulfil the needs of the requester.

“The long-term plan is to make the information available on the trust’s web pages.”

Essex County Council’s most quirky request asked: ‘how many exorcisms have been paid for by Essex County Council?’.

“Not surprisingly, the answer was none,” said Giles Roca, head of communications.

So far this year, the county council has received 167 requests for information, mostly through the Your Right to Know mailbox.

Mr Roca said: “Used in the right way, the Freedom of Information Act provides important access for residents to information.

“But increasingly it is being used by groups who see it as a tool to gain media coverage and publicity, which actually costs the council taxpayer money.

“Many questions that are asked via FOI can easily be answered on our website.

“We do our best to answer all enquiries where we can, though there are a number of exemptions that we are able to apply.

“There are 23 exemptions in total, but common exemptions used by Essex County Council include personal information, commercial interest, information intended for future publication and information provided in confidence.

“We are able to refuse to provide information if it will cost the council more than £450 to locate, retrieve and provide the information, though our practice is to offer to discuss ways in which the cost of meeting the request may be reduced.”