Subject: IR/26/16 - Buckler - Acknowledgement
From: NIO FOI
Direction: received
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 2026 15:59 UTC
Institution: Northern Ireland Office
Refs: 26FOI103
Archive id: gm-1a0ede5733d4fb7c
------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Sion Bucker,

Thank you for your email of the 28/09/26 in relation to your request for an
internal review into the way the department handled your request for
information under reference: 26FOI 103.

Your request is being handled under the Freedom of Information Act 2000
(FOIA).



We will endeavour to inform you of the outcome of your internal review no
later than the 26/10/26.



The review of your request will consist of an analysis of the handling of
your request by an independent official who was not involved in handling
your original request. If the original decision is overturned, the request
will be re-visited and any information, if held, released to you, entirely
or in part. If the original decision is upheld, you will receive a letter
from the Freedom of Information team detailing the reasons why we are
unable to provide the requested information.

If on receipt of our response you are still not satisfied, you can make a
further appeal to the Information Commissioner. You can write to the
Information Commissioner at:
Information Commissioner
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire
SK9 5AFFurther information about the role of the Information Commissioner
and the appeals process can be found at www.ico.org.uk

If you wish to discuss this, please contact the Freedom of Information
Team. Please remember to quote your reference in any correspondence.

Yours sincerely,


Freedom of Information Team


[image: image.png]




On Mon, 28 Sept 2026 at 22:41, Sion Buckler <[email redacted]>
wrote:

> Freedom of Information Team
> Wales Office
> Gwydyr House
> Whitehall
> London [postcode redacted]
> [email redacted]
>
> cc: [email redacted] — the mailbox that sent the acknowledgement and the
> response
>
> Dear Sir or Madam,
>
> Request for Internal Review — 26FOI 103 — response dated 22 September 2026
> Requester: Sion Buckler
>
> I request an internal review of the handling and substance of 26FOI 103.
>
> This is an FOI review only. I am not asking the Wales Office to
> determine title, to reopen BP Properties Ltd v Buckler, or to adopt
> any party's case on the land. I am asking whether the letter of 22
> September 2026 answered the request that was made, and whether the
> search described in it was adequate.
>
> A. What is already on this file
>
> 1. 29 August 2026 — I asked the Wales Office for recorded information
> about Great House Farm. Your letter of 22 September quotes the request
> as five points. I adopt that quotation. The points were:
>
> - records of any communication or outreach between Cadw, or its
> predecessor functions, and the Office of the Secretary of State for
> Wales / Welsh Office concerning Great House Farm during July–December
> 1988;
> - records of any recommendation, briefing, submission, notification or
> formal appeal concerning the protection or listing of Great House Farm
> submitted to the Secretary of State;
> - records of any communications with the occupiers and owners of the
> property before the refusal decision of 5 December 1988;
> - any surviving destruction, disposal, transfer or accession
> documentation relating to the Great House Farm 1988 assessment file,
> including certificates, dockets, lists, database entries, retention
> schedules, disposal authorities or other contemporaneous records held
> by the Welsh Office, its predecessors, Cadw, or any repository to
> which relevant records were transferred;
> - information regarding a decision made in relation to Great House
> Farm in 1988, including the evidence that was used to support that
> decision.
>
> 2. 8 September 2026 — acknowledgement from NIO FOI ([email redacted]),
> recording the request date as 29/08/26. It named no officer and
> described no search.
>
> 3. 22 September 2026 — covering email from the same NIO FOI mailbox,
> attaching “26FOI 103 - Buckler - Response.pdf”. The covering email
> contained no substance. The letter is signed Freedom of Information
> Team, Wales Office, and directs any review to
> [email redacted].
>
> This review is within the two calendar months stated in that letter.
> The deadline you gave is 22 November 2026.
>
> B. What the letter actually says, and what it does not
>
> The operative paragraph is this:
>
> “We have carried out a search of our digital records and have
> determined that the Wales Office does not hold the information
> requested. Any paper files previously held by the former Welsh Office
> relating to this matter would have been transferred to the National
> Assembly for Wales in 1999, and subsequently to the Welsh Government
> in 2007.”
>
> That paragraph does not answer the request. The gaps are these.
>
> 1. Digital records only. The letter says a search of digital records.
> It does not say that paper, microfilm, card indexes, transfer lists,
> accession registers, or destruction schedules were searched. A 1988
> Welsh Office file is a paper file. A search confined to current
> digital holdings cannot find it, and cannot find the transfer or
> destruction docket that the fourth bullet asked for.
>
> 2. “Would have been transferred” is not a search result. It is an
> assumption about devolution. It is not a statement that a transfer
> list was consulted, that a file for this house appears on that list,
> or that the file was received in Cardiff. “Would have been” covers
> three different outcomes: transferred, destroyed, or still here under
> another description. The letter does not distinguish them.
>
> 3. The fourth bullet asked for the transfer, disposal and accession
> records themselves. Those records, if they exist, are Wales Office
> records of what left the building. They are not the assessment file.
> Pointing me to the Welsh Government does not answer a request for the
> docket, the list, the database entry or the disposal authority. Those
> may still be held here even if the file went to Cardiff. The letter
> does not say they were searched for.
>
> 4. The five bullets are not answered one by one. There is no finding
> on communications with Cadw; no finding on any briefing or appeal to
> the Secretary of State; no finding on communications with occupiers
> and owners before 5 December 1988; no finding on the evidence said to
> have supported a 1988 decision. A single sentence that digital records
> do not hold “the information requested” does not show that each limb
> was searched.
>
> 5. The letter uses “the refusal decision of 5 December 1988” only
> because I used it. It does not say whether that decision is
> recognised, whether a file for it was identified, or whether the
> decision is one of the papers “which would have been transferred”.
> Silence on a dated decision is not a not-held finding.
>
> 6. “You may therefore wish” is not section 16 advice. Section 16
> requires advice and assistance so far as reasonable. A reasonable
> step, where the department asserts a transfer, is to give the
> receiving body's file reference, the date of transfer, and the series.
> None is given. If the intention was section 21 (information reasonably
> accessible elsewhere), that exemption is not named, and the conditions
> are not addressed. A suggestion that I write to
> [email redacted] is not a section 21 notice.
>
> 7. “Does not hold” is stated as a conclusion. The search described
> cannot support it. A not-held finding under section 1 requires a
> search capable of finding the information. A search of digital
> records, plus an assumption about 1999, is not that search.
>
> 8. The request was answered from a Northern Ireland Office mailbox.
> The letter is in the name of the Wales Office. The review must be of
> the Wales Office search. Please confirm it will not be taken by the
> person who signed the 22 September letter.
>
> C. What the reviewing officer is asked to determine
>
> 1. What was searched, by name: digital systems, paper series, transfer
> lists, accession registers, destruction schedules, Gwydyr House
> holdings, and any index of files passed to the National Assembly in
> 1999 or to the Welsh Government in 2007. If a location was not
> searched, say so.
>
> 2. For each of the five bullets, a separate finding: held, not held
> after the searches at (1), transferred (with date, recipient and
> reference), or destroyed (with date and disposal authority).
>
> 3. Whether any transfer, disposal or accession record relating to a
> Great House Farm 1988 assessment file is held by this department, as
> distinct from the assessment file itself.
>
> 4. Whether any record of a decision on or about 5 December 1988, or of
> communications with the occupiers or owners before that date, was
> identified even as an index entry.
>
> 5. If information is held and is not to be disclosed, a section 17
> notice naming the exemption. Do not replace that notice with a
> referral.
>
> 6. If the review maintains that the file went to Cardiff, the transfer
> reference. Without it, the referral is an assertion.
>
> D. Scope, so the review is not narrowed again
>
> The window is July–December 1988. Possession of Great House Farm / Tŷ
> Mawr, Llandough, adjoining St Dochdwy's, was taken on 29 November
> 1988. Demolition of the farmhouse began on 6 December 1988. The
> refusal date in the request is 5 December 1988. Those dates fix the
> search. They do not ask you to decide the land.
>
> I have made a parallel request to the Welsh Government, following the
> referral. That does not discharge 26FOI 103. A file can have been
> transferred and the transfer docket can still be here. Both questions
> were asked. Only one was gestured at.
>
> E. Why these records are in scope, without asking you to decide title
>
> The public index is https://greathousefarmwiki.wordpress.com/
>
> The investigation distinguishes Parcel A (farmhouse, garden, buildings
> and yard — the family's maintained freehold interest out of the Bute
> estate) from Parcel B (eastern fields). Later papers use “whole farm”.
> BP Properties Ltd v Buckler [1987] EWCA Civ 2 decided possession,
> limitation and the October 1974 letters. It did not decide the
> documentary root of Parcel A. Whether the Secretary of State or Cadw
> looked at this house in the week it was refused and pulled down is a
> records question. It is not a request that you adopt the family's
> case.
>
> F. Preservation
>
> Please preserve any record that may fall within 26FOI 103 while this
> review is open, including transfer lists, destruction schedules and
> anything due for routine disposal. Do not transfer or destroy in-scope
> material without a written receipt that can be disclosed on the
> review.
>
> G. Reservation
>
> This letter does not waive any position on title, registration,
> concealment, limitation, or any later reopening. It is an internal
> review under the Freedom of Information Act 2000. It is not a claim
> form and is not service of proceedings.
>
> Please acknowledge receipt, give the review reference, and state the
> date by which the review will be completed. ICO guidance is that an
> internal review should normally be completed within 20 working days.
>
> Yours faithfully,
>
> Sion Buckler (Ret'd Sergeant)
> Royal Signals
> [email redacted]
>