FOI 472-2025 / Apr 2025 / Fleet and EV data
FREEDOM OF INFORMATION REQUEST REFERENCE NO: 472-2025
I write in connection with your request for information which was received on 25th April 2025 as follows:
Q1. Has the police force introduced discounted salary schemes for employees who own electric vehicles.
Q2. What information you hold on the value of vehicles purchased and sold by the police force in each year since 2015.
Q3. What information you hold on the number of petrol, diesel, hydrogen, hybrid, plug-in hybrid and fully electric vehicles purchased by the police force in each year since 2015.
Q4. What information you hold on the number of vehicles in the police fleet aged up to one year, between one and two years, between three and five years and older than five years.
Q5. What information you hold on the number of vehicles purchased by the police force in each year since 2015, broken down by car manufacturer.
Q6. What information you hold on the level of carbon emissions and source of carbon emissions for the police force in each year between 2015 and 2025.
Q7. What information you hold on start and end dates for lease agreements held by the police force for its vehicle fleet.
Q8. What information you hold on the number and proportion of police vehicles that were petrol, diesel, hydrogen, hybrid, plug-in hybrid and fully electric in each year between 2015 and 2025.
Q9. What discussions the police force has had with Distribution Network Operators on steps to accelerate the upgrades to substations near charging points for police electric vehicles.
Please find the Warwickshire Police response set out below.
Response: Section 1 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000, places two duties on public authorities. Unless exemptions apply, the first duty at Section 1(1)(a) is to confirm or deny whether the information specified in a request is held. The second duty at Section 1(1)(b) is to disclose information that has been confirmed as being held.
Please be advised that Warwickshire Police are unable to confirm whether or not any information is held in relation to Q9 of your request and Section 12(2) applies.
Section 12(2) states:
“…Subsection (1) does not exempt the public authority from its obligation to comply with paragraph (a) of section 1(1) unless the estimated cost of complying with that paragraph alone would exceed the appropriate limit.”
In order to determine if such information is or is not held and, if held, to ensure that all information is located, it would be necessary to make enquiries with all business areas within Warwickshire Police, who would in turn be required to conduct extensive searches of all their recorded information including written and electronic communication. As you will appreciate, this would take an inordinate amount of time and would be above the amount to which we are legally required to respond, i.e., the cost of confirming or denying whether any information relevant to this part of the request is held, exceeds the ‘appropriate level’ as stated in the Freedom of Information (Fees and Appropriate Limit) Regulations 2004.
In accordance with Section 12(2) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000, please treat this letter as the Refusal Notice I am required to provide to you in respect of this part of your request.
Regarding Q3, Q4, Q5, Q6, and Q8, the requested information is not centrally recorded and is therefore not held in a readily retrievable format. In order to determine responses to these parts of the request it would be necessary to carry out extensive searches and manual checks against each vehicle on the fleet system, which would also take an inordinate amount of time and would be above the amount to which we are legally required to respond, i.e., the cost of locating and retrieving the information relevant to this part of the request exceeds the ‘appropriate level’ as stated in the Freedom of Information (Fees and Appropriate Limit) Regulations 2004.
In accordance with Section 12(1) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000, please treat this letter as the Refusal Notice I am required to provide to you in respect of these parts of your request.
In accordance with Section 16 of the Act, I have a duty to provide advice and assistance on how to refine your request.
Due to the extent of the searches required, I am unable to suggest a way to revise Q6 of your request to bring it within the fees limit.
Regarding Q2, although we have not been able to determine the full extent of information held, it may be possible to provide some information from 2022 onwards and in financial years only, should you wish to revise and resubmit your request, although the usual disclosure rules will apply.
Regarding Q3, Q4, Q5 and Q8, please be advised that it may be possible to provide the following information using the current fleet list, should you wish to revise and resubmit your request, although the usual disclosure rules will apply, and exemptions will be used for vehicles in specialised roles:
- A breakdown by the following fuel types: unleaded, diesel, hybrid, and electric vehicles.
- A breakdown by manufacturer and year of registration.
Outside the Act and as a gesture of goodwill, responses to Q1 and Q7 have been provided below. This data was located before it was realised that not all of the information could be retrieved within the fees limit and should not be taken as a precedent that additional information would be supplied outside of the time/fees legislation for any subsequent requests.
Q1 response: Yes.
Q7 response: No information held as our vehicles are bought outright.
Every effort has been made to ensure that the information provided is as accurate as possible.
Your attention is drawn to the below which details your right of complaint.
Should you have any further enquiries concerning this matter, please write or email the Freedom of Information Unit quoting the reference number above.
Yours sincerely
Freedom of Information Officer
Freedom of Information Unit
Warwickshire Police
PO Box 4
Leek Wootton
Warwickshire
CV35 7QB