I have revisited the survey I conducted in Feb 2019. There is no significant shift in position from most councils.
The table below shows the current permissions to reuse the content of Scottish Local Authorities' websites. Many are lacking in clarity, have messy wording, are vague or misunderstand terminologies. They also, in the main, ignore legislation on fair re-use.
The Scottish Government's own site is excellent and clear: permitting all content except logos to be be reused under the Open Government Licence. At present only Falkirk and Orkney Councils - two of the smaller ones - allow, and promote OGL re-use. There is no good reason why all of the public sector, including local government, should not adopt the terms of OGL.
Since 2015 the public sector has been obliged by the RPSI Regulations to permit reasonable reuse of information held by local authorities. So, even if Scottish LAs have not yet adopted OGL for all website content, they should make it clear how a citizen can re-use their data and information from their website. In my latest trawl through the T&Cs and Copyright Statements of 32 Scottish Local Authorities, I found only 7 refrencing RPSI rights there, with 25 not doing so (see the expanded table below). I am fairly sure that these authorities are breaking the legal obligation on public bodies to provide that information.
| Authority | Comments | Ref PSI | Rating |
|---|---|---|---|
| Aberdeen City | Copyright | N | |
| Aberdeenshire | OGL - seek permission? | Y | |
| Angus | Copyright | Y | |
| Argyll & Bute | Copyright | N | |
| Clackmananshire | OGL - seek permission? | Y | |
| Dumfries & Galloway | Copyright | N | |
| Dundee City | Copyright | N | |
| East Ayrshire | Copyright | N | |
| East Dunbartonshire | Copyright | N | |
| East Lothian | Copyright, but ref to PSI | Y | |
| East Renfrewshire | Copyright | N | |
| Edinburgh, City of | Copyright | N | |
| Falkirk | OGL | Y | |
| Fife | Copyright (seek permission to reuse) | N | |
| Glasgow City | Copyright | N | |
| Highland | Allows reuse wihout permission) | N | |
| Inverclyde | Copyright | N | |
| Midlothian | Copyright | N | |
| Moray | Copyright - apply to reuse | N | |
| North Ayshire | Copyright | N | |
| North Lanarkshire | Copyright | N | |
| Orkney | OGL but vague qualifier | N | |
| Perth and Kinross | Non commercial re-use permitted w/o application. No OGL reference | N | |
| Renfrewshire | Vague - implied ok to re-use. | N | |
| Scottish Borders | Copyright Personal copy (no licence) | N | |
| Shetland | Clear ROPSI use (inc commercial but no OGL) | Y | |
| South Ayrshire | Personal use copying only | N | |
| South Lanarkshire | Copyright | N | |
| Stirling | Copyright | N | |
| West Dunbartonshire | Copyright | N | |
| West Lothian | Messy. Copyright - apply for reuse then OGL? | Y | |
| Western Isles | Copyright | N |
If you spot an error - or missing data - please fork this repo and submit a pull request, as four others have kindly done!
Alternatively email me at ian@codethecity.org with an update.
Back to the review of Local Authorities Open Data. Back to the main 2020 review.