Vessels stopped by Police or Customs and Immigration (FOI)

​Request

How many vessels have the States of Jersey Police and / or Customs and Immigration, meet at any harbour or land on the Island following intelligence from sources, I would like this request broken down into the amount of vessels and the people on each vessel also the date when each action occurred. I do not require information about people being meet by the authorities at Elizabeth terminal or Albert pier terminal. This request only concerns those arriving by private non-commercial vessels.

Response

This information is subject to both absolute exemption under Articles 26A and 27, and qualified exemption under Article 42 of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 and the information is therefore refused.

Exemptions applied

Article 26A - Information supplied by, or relating to, bodies dealing with security matters

(1) Information is absolutely exempt information if it is held by a scheduled public

authority and either or both of the following apply –

(a) it was directly or indirectly supplied to the scheduled public authority by any of the bodies specified in paragraph (2); or

(b) it relates to any of those bodies.

(2) Those bodies are –

(a) the Security Service within the meaning of section 1 of the Security Service Act 1989 of the United Kingdom;

(b) the Secret Intelligence Service within the meaning of section 1 of the Intelligence Services Act 1994 of the United Kingdom;

(c) the Government Communications Headquarters within the meaning of section 3 of the Intelligence Services Act 1994 of the United Kingdom, including any unit or part of a unit of the armed forces of the Crown which is for the time being required by the Secretary of State to assist the Government Communications Headquarters in carrying out its functions;

(d) the special forces within the meaning of section 84 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 of the United Kingdom;

(e) the Tribunal established under section 65 of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 of the United Kingdom;

(f) the Tribunal established under section 7 of the Interception of Communications Act 1985 of the United Kingdom;

(g) the Tribunal established under section 5 of the Security Service Act 1989 of the United Kingdom;

(h) the Tribunal established under section 9 of the Intelligence Services Act 1994 of the United Kingdom;

(i) the Security Vetting Appeals Panel referred to in section 23(3) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 of the United Kingdom;

(j) the Security Commission referred to in section 23(3) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 of the United Kingdom;

(k) the National Criminal Intelligence Service established under section 2 of the Police Act 1997 of the United Kingdom;

(l) the Service Authority for the National Criminal Intelligence Service established under section 1 of the Police Act 1997 of the United Kingdom;

(m) the Serious Organised Crime Agency established under section 1 of the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005 of the United Kingdom;

(n) the National Crime Agency formed under section 1 of the Crime and Courts Act 2013 of the United Kingdom;

(o) the Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament established under section 1 of the Justice and Security Act 2013 of the United Kingdom.

Article 27 - National security

(1) Information which does not fall within Article 26A(1) is absolutely exempt information if exemption from the obligation to disclose it under this Law is required to safeguard national security.

Prejudice test

To engage this exemption it is necessary to conduct a prejudice test. To publically disclose details of non-commercial vessel checks conducted by police or customs/immigration officers would prejudice our ability to maintain our national security as it would assist those with intent to cause harm to our island to avoid detection.

Article 42 - Law enforcement

Information is qualified exempt information if its disclosure would, or would be likely to, prejudice –

(a) the prevention, detection or investigation of crime, whether in Jersey or elsewhere;

(b) the apprehension or prosecution of offenders, whether in respect of offences committed in Jersey or elsewhere;

(c) the administration of justice, whether in Jersey or elsewhere;

(d) the assessment or collection of a tax or duty or of an imposition of a similar nature;

(e) the operation of immigration controls, whether in Jersey or elsewhere;

Prejudice test

To engage this exemption we have first conducted a prejudice test. To publically disclose details of non-commercial vessel checks conducted by police or customs/immigration officers would prejudice our ability to conduct our obligations as detailed in Article 42, as it would assist those with intent to conduct criminal activity, avoid import duties, or by-pass immigration controls to avoid detection.

Public interest test

Since the exemption which is engaged is a qualified, not an absolute, exemption we have conducted a public interest test as required by Article 9(2) to assess whether, in all the circumstances of the case, the public interest in supplying the information is outweighed by the public interest in not doing so. Whilst we accept that some members of the public may be interested in this subject, this interest is outweighed by the public good (the public interest) not to disclose the number of non-commercial vessels that are met, nor the times that we may meet them.