Climate Emergency UK are mySociety’s partners in the Council Climate Action Scorecards project, which score every UK council across dozens of measures. In aggregate, the scores give councils a clear way to see how they’re doing, and concerned citizens a useful tool to scrutinise their own local authorities.

But not all the information needed for the Scorecards is openly available. In this short talk from FOI Fest, Isaac Beevor explains how Freedom of Information has solved that problem.

FOI Fest was a one-day conference from mySociety in February 2026.

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• Council Climate Action Scorecards

0:00 [Isaac Beevor] I’m Isaac. And I really appreciate actually, how Alex said my last name. It’s Isaac Beevor. But if you want to say it Isaac Bee-VOR, then that’s absolutely fantastic. So thank you. (more…)

Remember the big Post Office scandal? One person played a massive part in uncovering the evidence that eventually brought the extent of the collusion and malpractice to light.

In this lightning talk from FOI Fest, citizen investigator Eleanor Shaikh explains the monumental effects she achieved, with little more than some FOI requests and a determination to bring justice to sub-Postmasters. You’ll be inspired by what you could do, too!

FOI Fest was a one-day conference from mySociety in February 2026.

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0:01 [Myf:] This is a lightning talk from FOI Fest, the one day Freedom of Information conference from mySociety. We’re going to hear citizen investigator Elena Shaikh on how she used FOI to uncover hidden facts around the Post Office Horizon scandal,and the effects they had – all in under 10 minutes.

0:25 [Eleanor Shaikh:] I’m not an academic or a journalist, I’m just a customer of the Post Office who began supporting its victims in 2017 when my local branch was hit by an alleged shortfall of £57,000, and I watched the life of the postmaster come crashing down as the burden of proof was cruelly reversed, meaning that innocence rather than guilt had to be proven. (more…)

An expert panel discuss the current situation with FOI in the UK, and how it has shaped power and public life over the last 21 years.

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Panelists: – Jenna Corderoy, Investigative Reporter, Democracy for Sale – Warren Seddon, Director of FOI and Transparency, Information Commissioner’s Office – Maurice Frankel, Chief Executive, Campaign for Freedom of Information – Rose Whiffen, Senior Research Officer, Transparency International UK – Gavin Freeguard, State of the Future (moderator)

This was one of the sessions at FOI Fest. If you’d prefer to watch it as a video, head over to our YouTube channel.

0:05 [Myf] This is a panel from FOI Fest on the subject of “What has 21 years of FOI changed?”.

0:14 [Gavin Freeguard] So first, we have Rose Whiffen, who is Senior Research Officer at Transparency International UK. We have Jenna Corderoy, who’s Investigative Reporter at Democracy For Sale, and we have Maurice Frankel, the chief executive of the Campaign for Freedom of Information UK. (more…)