cc: "Briffa Keith Prof \(ENV\)" <K.Briffa@uea.ac.uk>, "Jones Philip Prof \(ENV\)" <P.Jones@uea.ac.uk>
date: Tue, 13 May 2008 12:28:14 +0100
from: "Burgess Jacquelin Prof \(ENV\)" <Jacquie.Burgess@uea.ac.uk>
subject: RE: Freedom of Information Act request
to: "Tim Osborn" <t.osborn@uea.ac.uk>, "Mcgarvie Michael Mr \(ACAD\)" <M.Mcgarvie@uea.ac.uk>, "Palmer Dave Mr \(LIB\)" <David.Palmer@uea.ac.uk>

Dear Tim, Keith and Phil, 
I am very concerned, as you are, about the potential dangers associated
with this issue, and the School will do everything it can to protect you
and the CRU /UEA's reputation in the face of this threat.     I strongly
support the decision not to release this correspondence in response to
the FOIA request.  
Yours 
Jacquie   




-----Original Message-----
From: Tim Osborn [mailto:t.osborn@uea.ac.uk] 
Sent: 12 May 2008 15:07
To: Mcgarvie Michael Mr (ACAD); Burgess Jacquelin Prof (ENV); Palmer
Dave Mr (LIB)
Cc: Briffa Keith Prof (ENV); Jones Philip Prof (ENV)
Subject: Re: Freedom of Information Act request

Sorry, forgot the attachments first time round. Tim
------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Michael, David and Jacquie,

so far, we have had responses from 11 of our colleagues who are named 
on the FOIA request.

Their very clear message to us is that we do not have their 
permission to release emails or other correspondence that they sent 
to us during the preparation of the IPCC report.

Their full responses are contained in the attached file <FOI David 
Holland colleagues responses.pdf>.

In addition, we have received specific guidance from Susan Solomon, 
the co-chair of IPCC working group 1 (and hence in overall charge of 
the process for writing this report): "distribution of interim 
materials, or other forms of elaboration are not appropriate".

See her full advice in the other attached file <Advice from Susan
Solomon.pdf>.

The reason that we're also sending this to you, Jacquie, is that this 
is a matter of concern to the School, and is not solely an FOIA 
issue:  were we to ignore the wishes of our colleagues and release 
their emails, it would be damaging to the School.  These are all 
senior scientists within the international climate science field who 
we will be wishing to collaborate with in terms of joint funding, 
joint research and joint publications.  Keith and I feel that it 
would seriously harm of future involvement in such collaborative work 
with these, and perhaps other, scientists if we do not consider their 
strongly held views regarding the collegial and private interactions 
that we held with them during the preparation of the IPCC report.

We do, of course, want your advice with regards to the FOIA request 
and to what extent the views of our colleagues might change how UEA 
will respond to it.

Please note that the FOIA request also asks for letters/emails 
between Tim (as well as Keith) and these 19 individuals and 5 
organisations, thus doubling the effort needed to identify this 
information, and also that the request is not limited to these 
individuals/organisations but includes any such correspendence 
related to our work as IPCC authors and any internal CRU 
correspondence related to the IPCC process.  Thus it would be a large 
undertaking to fulfill this FOIA request.

The underlying purpose of this request, and related ones to Phil and 
subsquent requests that may follow, is to disrupt/delay our work and 
harm our reputations.  While the ultimate aim of this is to bolster 
those who are campaigning against the message and recommendations of 
the IPCC, important side effects would be to the detriment of ENV and
UEA.

Best regards

Tim and Keith

At 11:36 08/05/2008, Mcgarvie Michael Mr \(ACAD\) wrote:
>Jacquie,
>
>I held a meeting this morning with Keith Briffa, Tim Osborn and Phil 
>Jones, to discuss a FOIA request which had come from one of the 
>contributors to the climateaudit.org website. Dave Palmer, the 
>University's FOIA expert, was also present. It was agreed that I 
>would alert you to this for your information. (You may recall that I 
>alerted you to a number of similar requests from another contributor 
>to the website last year, involving Phil.)
>
>We have agreed a plan of action to deal with this request within the 
>regulations. The request is unreasonable as it currently stands (it 
>asks for all letters and emails between Keith and 19 individuals 
>worldwide and 5 organisations over IPCC business). I will keep you 
>posted on this as necessary.
>
>Best wishes
>
>Michael
>
>
>Michael McGarvie
>Senior Faculty Manager
>Faculty of Science
>Room 0.22C
>University of East Anglia
>Norwich NR4 7TJ
>tel: 01603 593229
>fax: 01603 593045
><mailto:m.mcgarvie@uea.ac.uk>m.mcgarvie@uea.ac.uk
>
>
>
