2012 Annual Report of the Interception of Communications Commissioner
During the reporting year 38 inspections were also conducted at local authorities who were not
making use of NAFN at that time and for 18 of these local authorities it was their first inspection.
Only 8 of the local authorities who reported using their powers in 2012 (but not through
NAFN) were not inspected by my team during the year.
Figure 14 illustrates that 94% of the local authorities inspected achieved a good level of compliance
with the Act and Code of Practice which is an increase of 12% on the previous year. These
percentages should be treated with caution as the public authorities being inspected are not the
same every year.
Figure 14 – Comparison of Local Authority Inspection Results, 2010 to 2012
2%
Poor
4%
11%
2012
4%
Satisfactory
14%
2011
20%
2010
94%
Good
82%
69%
I outlined earlier in my report that a traffic light system (red, amber, green) has been adopted
for the recommendations that emanate from the inspections. This enables public authorities to
prioritise the areas where remedial action is necessary. This year 171 recommendations were
made by my inspectors during the 39 local authority inspections and this is an average of 4
recommendations per public authority (if all NAFN users are treated as one). This is a 66%
reduction on the number of recommendations emanating from the 2011 inspections. Figure 15
shows the breakdown of recommendations by colour.
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