I would be grateful if you could provide answers to the following questions regarding all council-owned properties, both commercial and residential, over the last ten years:
1) How many properties have been diagnosed with rising damp.
2) How many properties has the council instructed a contractor to install an injected chemical damp proof course.
3) Of these properties, how many have had a re-occurrence of damp, whereby the council has made an application under the installers guarantee.
4) How many claims under the guarantee were successful and how many were unsuccessful.
For questions 1-4, compliance with this request would exceed the appropriate cost limit under Section 12 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 which is £450 or 18 hours of officer time. We would have to check 523 sites to see who is responsible for dealing with damp and to also clarify if there was any damp and that would take 10 minutes per site which is 5230 minutes and 87 hours.
Under the Act, there is a duty to provide advice and assistance as to how a request can be refined to fit within the appropriate limit. Unfortunately, due to the way the data is held, this is not possible for this request.