Covid-19 pandemic blamed for fall in FOI requests

Ombudsman Peter Tyndall. Last year, his office received 584 review applications and dealt with more than 400 throughout the year. Picture: Sam Boal/Rollingnews.ie

The number of Freedom of Information requests to public bodies fell by 21% last year, "most likely" due to the impact of Covid-19, according to the 2020 annual report of the Information Commissioner.

The “unsurprising” fall in Freedom of Information (FOI) requests to public bodies, from almost 40,000 in 2019 to 31,591 last year, marked the first decline in nine years and followed a trend where FOI requests increased by 42% since 2014.