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Electric Scooters (243A/21)

Request

  1. Can you please advise how many e-scooters were seized by the police force during 2020?
  2. If possible, can you also advise how many fines were handed out for riding e-scooters during 2020?

Seizures should be available from compounds if not recorded centrally. If e-scooters are not recorded as a category, please search for any vehicle seized where the make is Xiaomi, Ninebot, Inokim or Pure.

Response

Our data are not organised in such a way as to allow us to provide all of this information within the appropriate (cost) limit within the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act (see ‘Reason for Decision’ below).

However, although excess cost removes the force’s obligations under the Freedom of Information Act, as a gesture of goodwill I have supplied information, relative to your request, retrieved before it was realised that the fees limit would be exceeded (see Q2 as follows). I trust this is helpful, but it does not affect our legal right to rely on the fees regulations for the remainder of the request.

2. Nil

REASON FOR DECISION

Information with regard to question 1 (seized scooters) is not available in a readily retrievable format. This is because we do not have a category for e-scooters within our property or vehicle recovery systems and also cannot search for this information by the specified makes, without a manual trawl of these systems. Such a search however would exceed the appropriate limit (FOIA, s.12).

This means that the cost of compliance with the whole of your request is above the amount to which we are legally required to respond, i.e. the cost of locating and retrieving the information would exceed the appropriate costs limit under section 12(1) of the FOI Act 2000. For West Midlands Police, the appropriate limit is set at £450, as prescribed by the Freedom of Information and Data Protection (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004, S.I. 3244.

Further information on section 12 of FOI is available here:

https://www.app.college.police.uk/app-content/information-management/freedom-of-information/#fees-and-charges

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