Key information
Request reference number: MGLA191021-5733
Date of response:
Summary of request
Your request
Following your earlier request of 27 September 2021:
Please can you confirm 1. if Sadiq Khan holds a British diplomatic passport 2. Sadiq Khan’s USA visa status 2a) Is the visa current and if so: i) What date was it granted ii) What is its expiry date 2b) What class of visa is it.
On 19 October you requested:
Does the position of the 'Mayor of London’ afford the incumbent diplomatic status and
– as a result – a diplomatic passport?
On 1 November you followed up on this request:
Can you confirm if Mr Sadiq Khan does or does not hold a diplomatic passport in his capacity as Mayor of London.
Our response
We can neither confirm nor deny whether the GLA holds information within the scope of your request.
The duty to confirm or deny in Section 1(1)(a) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 does not apply when considered along with the following exemption provisions: Section 40 (Personal information).
Section 40 (5B)(a)(i) provides an exemption from the duty to confirm or deny whether requested information is held, if the act of confirming or denying would disclose personal data.
(5B) The duty to confirm or deny does not arise in relation to other information if or to
the extent that any of the following applies—
(a) giving a member of the public the confirmation or denial that would have to be given
to comply with section 1(1)(a)—
(i) would (apart from this Act) contravene any of the data protection principles, or
(ii) would do so if the exemptions in section 24(1) of the DPA2018 (manual unstructured
data held by public authorities) were disregarded;
The GLA is not obliged to confirm or deny whether we hold third party personal data if giving the confirmation or denial would contravene the data protection principles.
Information about an individual’s passport status constitutes personal data which is defined by Article 4(1) of the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) to mean any information relating to an identified or identifiable living individual.
Even though you are now focusing your request on the role rather than the holder of the role, confirming or denying whether the GLA holds the requested information would reveal whether any information exists about the type of passport held by an individual. Such a statement would contravene the first data protection principle under Article 5(1) of UK GDPR which states that personal data must be processed lawfully, fairly and in a transparent manner in relation to the data subject.
This exemption provision is absolute and we are not required to assess the public interest
considerations in relying on s.40(5B)(a)(i).
You can find general information about the issuing of diplomatic passports in guidance published by the Home Office.
If you have any further questions relating to this matter, please contact me, quoting the
reference MGLA191021-5733.