In another stunning display of institutional arrogance & defiance of the law by The Highland Council, the Scottish Information Commissioner has issued 3 more decision notices in my favour against the Highland Council for completely failing to respond.

Who's in charge of Freedom of Information at the Highland Council?? 👇

The officer in charge of the FOI team at the Highland Council is none other than Stewart Fraser. The Monitoring Officer no less… who is under an enhanced legal & ethical duty to make certain the Council acts within the law… and issue reports to the full Council where he is made aware of any acts or omissions by the Council that are in contravention of the law.

The Commissioner is done messing about with this lot by the looks. The first application I made to the Commissioner resulting in Decision 015/2026 took well over 6 months from start to finish. The latest Decision Notices numbers 077/2026, 078/2026, 086/2026, 113/2026, 114/2026 and 115/2026 have all been coming in within about 2 months of the application going in. Why? Because in 5 out of 7 of these applications, The Highland Council refuses to reply not only to me but, also, to the Commissioner. The Highland Council think they are above the law.

This particular current Commissioner, David Hamilton, is not to be trifled with either as we have seen in recent months regarding court action between his office and The Scottish Government.

Although the court may not always agree with him, Hamilton seems intent on public information access rights being upheld and he refuses to show deference to public authorities just because they think they are entitled to it… and he should be applauded for that alone.

My last 3 decision notices all came in on the same day, 15 May 2026. Here's what they were:

Decision Notice 113/2026

The Highland Council has been unlawfully transferring personal data of Highlands residents to the Assessor/ERO for many, many years. It even appears from recent committee minutes they are transferring more and more sensitive data to them without residents being made aware including health data from Blue Badge applications and even your children's education records - all in violation of data protection law.

🚨 Keep in mind that you are entitled to erasure & compensation for damages for unlawfully transferred data.

See the full FOI 👉 [HERE]

Decision Notice 114/2026

This was simply an FOI about what the Council's plans were to implement s.164A of the Data Protection Act 2018. This was brought in via the Data Use & Access Act 2025 and it fully commences in June 2026 meaning preparations should have been well under way many months ago at the Council as it will change the way that data subjects can complain about data rights issues.

See the full FOI request 👉 [HERE]

Decision Notice 115/2026

The Highland Council does not have a Record of Processing Activities (RoPA) as legally required under Article 30 GDPR. It's not optional either. So, what does the Highland Council have to say about it? They claim they are special and are the only public authority in the UK (and EU no less) who doesn't require one of course. 😂 No, really… they actually said that… in a signed, sworn, 17 page affidavit by their Data Protection Officer lodged in Sheriff Court in March of 2025. They claim that because they have privacy policies, DPIA's, retention schedules (that they don't follow) and an information asset register… it's covered - No RoPA required. This only tells me that they have zero clue what a RoPA is or even what it is for. Given their pride over their Information Asset Register, I asked them for it. How did they respond?? “WE CAN'T” and we won't so we will just ignore you… and the Scottish Information Commissioner.

Read the full FOI request 👉 [HERE]

Have you ever heard of this appeal process? It's almost 80 years old. The Highland Council doesn't really want you to know about it either. As we see in s.238(2), the demand note (bill) shall contain several details about this appeal process however, the reverse of an actual demand note issued by The Highland Council say precious little about it and call them “Non-Valuation Appeals” ermm.. that's helpful. 🤔

One might assume you could find plenty of information about this appeal process on their website… ermm.. no, not really..

More Adventures at The Offices of “We Can't" at Glenurquhart Road & Treasure Map For How to Find The Secret Decoder Ring for the s.238 Appeal Rules Set By The Highland Council for Kangaroo Court.

There is not a single link to the rules made by the Council for these appeals on their website either as mentioned in s.238(3). So, how do you get a hold of the rule book exactly? Here's the completely absurd & obstructive process:

1. Send note of appeal to the Council's non-domestic rates team.

2. Wait 2 months for an email from Ruth Maclennan - Principal Revenues Officer to deliver a load of waffle and try to defend the decision of the Council even quoting the Data Protection Act 2018. Well, thanks for that Ruth, but, I don't think data protection law is the Council's strong suit. 😂 Then, Ruth tells you to contact Rozlyn Wheeler - Operations Manager -Revenues & Commercialisation

3. Wait another month and half for Rozlyn Wheeler to come back.. where she says she has “concluded her review". Really? I see nothing about the gauntlet of “Decisions by Ruth” or “Reviews by Rozlyn” in s.238 of the 1947 Act. It says, “appeals shall be heard by the Authority or a committee thereof". Not a single mention of Ruth or Rozlyn funnily enough - maybe that's in the secret rule book we haven't been given yet???

4. Eventually, I demand the rule book and a hearing because I was now really keen to finally clap eyes on this elusive, secret rule book of the Highland Council's Kangaroo Court and perhaps learn more about this unwritten and non-legislated process of “Decisions by Ruth” and “Reviews by Rozlyn”. I now get passed to Alasdair MacInnes - Senior Committee Officer or Democratic Services.

5. Alasdair finally delivers the rule book 4 months after I initially sent note. I bet readers are excited for this reveal… 😂

The Highland Council's Code of Practice for Non-Domestic Rates Appeals.

DOWNLOAD PDF OF THE RULES

Highland Council is Resisting Setting A Hearing For The Appeal.

I wonder why the Council have thus far refused to set the hearing as required despite Alasdair assuring me way back in March 2026 that this would be done? 🤔

See below for a few good reasons they aren't so keen to put this appeal in front of the councillors…. 👇

Added full text for the benefit of Google searchers…

THE HIGHLAND COUNCIL

CODE OF PRACTICE FOR NON-DOMESTIC RATES APPEALS

1. The Constitution of Appeal Committee

(a) The Appeal Committee will be drawn from Members of The Highland Council Resources Committee and comprise five Council Members including, where possible the Chair and Vice Chair of the said Resources Committee. Membership of the Appeal Committee should, insofar as possible, reflect the political balance of the Council.

(b) As it is important that Appellants have confidence that they will receive a fair hearing from an Appeal Committee, Appeal Committee Members should be reminded that they must act impartially. Hearings should usually be conducted in as informal an atmosphere as possible.

PROCEDURES

2. Selection of Chairmen and Members

(a) Each Appeal Committee should have the services of a Clerk whose role should be explained to the Appellants. The Clerk should normally be an administratively or legally qualified officer of the Council who will be responsible for arranging the Hearings and for the order of business. The Clerk will be expected to arrange for notes to be taken and to record decisions, reasons, etc. If the Appeal Committee withdraws or invites the parties to do so, the Clerk should remain with the Committee but only for the purpose of providing advice.

(b) The Appeal Committee may request additional legal advice from a Council solicitor.

(c) It is important that all of the Appeal Committee’s communications, conclusions and recommendations, if any, are fully and clearly expressed and capable of being understood by the appellants. As deemed appropriate by the Committee, communication may involve any support necessary and/or assistance including interpretation and translation.

3. Hearings

(a) An Appeal Hearing must afford the Appellants an opportunity of appearing and making oral representations and in all cases a time and place of hearing must be appointed. The venue for appeals should take account of the Appellant’s place of residence and their ability to travel. The notification to be given to the Appellants and any witnesses must include a statement as to their rights:-

(i) To appear or to be represented at the Hearing

(ii) To be accompanied at the Hearing by one person not including the person (if any) representing them

(iii) To lodge written representations and

(iv) To allow the presentation of their case to rest on representations, if any, lodged by them or on their behalf.

(b) Where an Appeal Committee proceeds by way of written submissions only, the Appeal Committee may seek further information from the parties or their representatives prior to issuing their decision.

(c) Affidavit Evidence may be submitted in exceptional circumstances. Copies of any such statements will be circulated to the Appellants and to the Director of Finance or Head of Revenues & Business Support prior to commencement of proceedings.

(d) Parties must be given not less than 15 working days notice of the Hearing date unless the Appellants and the Director of Finance have otherwise agreed.

(e) A Hearing should normally be held within 30 working days of receipt by the Director of Finance or the Head of Revenues & Business Support of the written request or, in the event of the Committee being unable to convene within that period due to circumstances outwith its control, as soon as possible after the expiry of that period. The Appeal Committee may postpone a Hearing date or alter its location if either is unsuitable to either party.

4. Conduct of Hearing

(a) Not less than 10 working days before the date fixed for the Hearing

(i) The Director of Finance or the Head of Revenues & Business Support must send to the Clerk to the Appeal Committee a copy of his decision to which the Appeal refers and such other information or written submission as he considers to be relevant to that decision.

(ii) The Appellants should lodge their written representations with copies of
any documents, reports etc relevant to their Appeal or to which their Appeal specifically refers.

(b) The Clerk must ensure that the Appeal Committee and all parties receive copies
of all such material at least 5 working days prior to the date fixed for the Hearing.

5. Procedure at Hearing

(a) The following order of hearing should be adhered to unless, for good reason, the
Appeal Committee determine otherwise.

(i) Case for or on behalf of the Finance Service

(ii) Questioning by or on behalf of the Appellants

(iii) Case for or on behalf of the Appellants

(iv) Questioning by or on behalf of the Finance Service

(v) Summing up by or on behalf of the Finance Service

(vi) Summing up by or on behalf of the Appellants

(b) Members of the Committee may ask questions at appropriate points as
determined by the Chairman.

(c) All parties attending the Hearing should normally be present throughout the proceedings subject to the discretion of the Chairman where cause has been shown.

(d) The clerk or legal adviser to the Committee may be called upon to give advice on procedures during the course of the Hearing and when the Committee retire to consider their decision and recommendations. At the instigation of the Committee, adjournments may be called for any reason including the provision of advice from other sources.

(e) At or before adjourning the Hearing, the Committee must give notice of the date, time and venue for the resumption of the Hearing and thereafter, if deemed by the Chairman to be appropriate, confirm this in writing.

(f) Where the Chairman considers that any questioning at the Hearing or any address would lead to undue repetition or elaboration such questioning or address may be disallowed.

(g) Hearings may be held in private if the parties so agree.

6. Decisions of the Appeal Committee

(a) The Chairman of the Appeal Committee should inform the Appellants and the Director of Finance or his representative whether the Committee propose to notify their conclusions and recommendations, if any, in writing at the end of the Hearing or at some time in the future. If the Appellants are not present or represented at the Hearing then immediate written notification of a proposal to postpone the giving of conclusions and recommendations must be given to the Appellants.

(b) Where the Committee do not announce their conclusions and recommendations at the end of the Hearing they should do so in writing as soon as possible.

(c) Where the Committee so decide, their decision will be recorded by the Clerk and subscribed to by all members of the Committee before being sent by the Committee to the Appellants and to the Director of Finance. The Committee may decide to present their written findings to the parties at a specially convened meeting.

The clerk to the Appeal Committee should keep brief notes of the proceedings, attendance, voting and the decisions and recommendations in such a form as deemed appropriate.

Right Over The Target 🎯

Nothing says your right over the target better than total obstruction of access to information.

This is the 4th Decision Notice issued in my favour by the Scottish Information Commissioner in 2026 against the Highland Council.

I asked them for the full reports from the Investigatory Powers Commissioner's Office from 2020 and 2023. We see from my last subject access request, Stewart Fraser was blocking this request despite the Information Governance Manager & Data Protection Officer, Miles Watters stating he believed those had permission to be released.

I asked specifically for the social media register the IPCO recommended they put together because it appears from the summary that in the last report of 2023 the Highland Council got a ticking off about the use of social media for surveillance.

No - they are not allowed to just monitor and collect data on folk from social media for any old reason. But, they do it! Have a look at the Scottish Government's Codes of Practice below to learn more about the use of social media for surveillance. These codes are binding under s.26 of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 (RIPSA).

• Covert Surveillance & Property Interference Code of Practice

• Covert Human Intelligence Sources (CHIS) Code of Practice

Highland Council Play The Victim

Someone I know that used to work for the Council pointed out to me how one of the Highland Council's favourite tactics is to play the victim - a very astute observation. If an employee asks hard questions, they find a technicality to sack you over. If a councillor asks hard questions, Stewart Fraser will send them off to the Standards Commission with a complaint where the councillor is often exonerated - sometimes twice as Cllr. Andrew Jarvie found out. They whine like big babies in their court submissions as well. Almost pathological in their institutional victimhood.

Here we have them whining to the Commissioner in this recent decision notice at paragraph 10. “…Applicant corresponded with the Authority through various channels..” Eh? Like where? The courts and various other legal forums? Other than FOI and data protection issues, I'll have absolutely nothing to do with this “Authority". Anyone else buying the Highland Council is the victim lark? Naw..

The Last Place You Want to Be is in NO MANS LAND.

I will be writing shortly more about the 18 years of unlawful spying I've endured for no reason at the hands of the Highland Council. I even raised a T2 complaint at the Investigatory Powers Tribunal in July 2025 over it. Did you know that nearly 90% of complaints to that Tribunal are immediately thrown out for being out of time, meritless or vexatious? Mine wasn't.

I cleared that first gate because I had stacks of evidence obtained from the successful court action and I was well within the IPT's strict 1 year time limit as the Highland Council were spying on me during INV-SM2-24. Yes, during the court action - numerous occasions.

My T2 complaint went all the way to a jurisdictional determination. I was issued a 10 page decision by the IPT Vice-President Lord Boyd of Duncansby and Francesca Del Mese. Put shortly, they determined they did not have jurisdiction because the Highland Council were not investigating anything amounting to a crime to engage RIPSA, therefore, they had no jurisdiction to hear the complaint. I could have sought leave to appeal that decision but, I thought it was well founded.

Basically, that means The Highland Council are operating in NO MANS LAND.

It's just straight up human rights violations which are ongoing due to the retention of the unlawful surveillance data…. And harassment at state level. I will be publishing some of the evidence soon.

Now that I have exhausted the IPT's jurisdiction, the Highland Council have no argument that I should have exhausted it first because the IPT generally have exclusive jurisdiction over those matters if it falls within the scope of “challengeable circumstances".

Therefore, I will be raising an action in civil court against them over it very soon.

Read more about what happened below. 👇

The 2nd set of invoices from Anderson Strathern are in from the Highland & Western Isles Valuation Joint Board and a further £12,100 has been spent on legal fees in relation to INV-SM11-25 between 1 February & 31 March 2026.

Of course, this doesn't include April where we had an in-person hearing at Inverness Sheriff Court. The total is surely topping £40k by now and set to spiral! You are going to find out very shortly why! 😂

Very soon, I will start revealing what they are actually spending this money on and frankly, it's shocking. It partly makes me laugh it's so hideous but, it's quite serious all at the same time.

Of course, what they aren't spending it on is striking as well… more to come on that as well..

This time the spending includes £3,683 solely on dealing with FOI matters in “The Audit” on this Substack. One has to question why they would ask a solicitor to deal with FOI requests that ask for simple records such as risk registers, invoices etc. I can only guess it's in relation at least partly to a current application at the Scottish Information Commissioner because they are refusing to tell me if their Monitoring Officer has legal qualifications.

Why don't they want to answer that??

I will tell you why…. The Highland & Western Isles Valuation Joint Board has been institutionally captured… by a single senior officer from the Highland Council. And.. the question they don't want to answer is a massive key to the truth of it.

He's been found out and they are desperate to keep it under wraps… not for much longer I'm afraid..

I have a new FOI asking about the solicitor fees for my FOI requests. I'm sure there's plenty of irony in paying a solicitor to deal with my FOI request about why they are paying solicitors to deal with my FOI requests. Humour will get you through.. every time. 😂

Full invoices below.. 👇

What did I ask for??

1. Microsoft 365 e-Discovery Search Results Exports - namely, the raw Summary.CSV and Items.CSV files.

2. A schedule of any items wholly or partly redacted or withheld and any justifications for any exemptions raised under the Data Protection Act 2018.

3. I explicitly stated I wanted only the raw CSV files - not any of the content of items in the results of those exports.

The only difference between the 2 subject access requests was that having previously sent a subject access request to the SLCC, I already knew they were a big fan of hiding behind s.43 of the Legal Profession & Legal Aid (Scotland) Act 2007. However, the 2007 Act is not a valid exemption to raise to withhold personal data. The Data Protection Act 2018 and the GDPR are lex specialis to the 2007 Act, therefore, the only exemptions they may rely on are in Schedule 2 of the DPA 2018 which contains many safeguards and legal tests to be met. I also asked the SLCC for document control history of one particular document.

What are Microsoft e-Discovery Search Results Exports??

If you are unfamiliar with this, a quick explanation is that M365 e-Discovery is the backdoor to the panopticon of a companies or public authorities entire Microsoft tenant. It sees ALL. 👁️

In essence, the person(s) with admin access to that Microsoft tenant can search through the entire organisations staff members email accounts in Outlook, SharePoint, Teams, OneDrive etc. for your name or case reference number or whatever relevant search terms and pull a list of every single record they hold on you - at least within the M365 architecture.

Below is the example of my M365 e-Discovery Summary.CSV received from the SLCC. We can see they entered a search query to search for all files containing either my name, case reference or email address.

It took 2 minutes and 42 seconds to run that unfiltered search and it turned up 610 results across the entire tenant.

I should also point out that the SLCC, unlike the Highland Council, has no access or administrative privileges to M365 e-Discovery - the SLCC uses an external IT provider/processor. Therefore, the SLCC had to request that their data processor run these searches using the parameters supplied and return the results back to the SLCC.

Items.CSV

There are a few reports that can be generated from e-Discovery, but, initially, the Summary.csv and Items.csv are the most important.

The Items.CSV contained the 610 items found in the Summary.CSV and gives some very granular details, including but, not limited to…

1. Custodian (where the record is held)

2. Senders & Recipients (+CC and BCC)

3. Subject lines

4. Dates (both original and last modified)

5. Folder paths - never underestimate the story that can be gleaned from folder paths. You can see everything sitting in “John Smith's To-Do” folder to “Deleted Items” folders and even everything hard deleted or purged sitting in “Recoverable Items" folders that the user themselves cannot see but the panopticon still can. 🙈😮

I haven't posted a screenshot of that Items.CSV because I would have to redact so much it wouldn't be worth showing. But, suffice to say, it is a highly detailed spreadsheet capturing a snapshot of all your personal data being held within the Microsoft tenant.

Because the CSV file contains so much metadata stretched across multiple columns you can put AI to work sorting through it to organise it a bit better. I tested a few different AI models to sort it and Google Gemini turned out to be the most effective after double checking the work of all the models. I used Gemini to then run queries and produce further spreadsheets pinpointing groups of activities and communications from certain dates and of certain individuals and subject lines etc.

You can then use this to pinpoint the data you wish to see the full contents of.

In a coming dispatch.. we are going to talk about the Unified Audit Log in M365.. the forensic footprint of actions on your data.

Are You Really Entitled to This Data in a Subject Access Request??

The short answer is.. YES. ✅

It's important to remember that part of entire purpose of Subject Access Request rights under Article 15 GDPR is to verify the lawfulness of the processing of your data. How can you do that unless there is full disclosure of these logs?

All data generated from your personal data is also your personal data but, you are also entitled to “information” about the processing of the data. All of the data in the CSV files is already sitting in the Microsoft tenant.. the e-Discovery Exports and Unified Audit Logs are just focussed exports of your data held deep within the tenant.

Without getting too carried away on this point.. if you want to learn more, I highly recommend reading both the Advocate General's Opinion of Campos Sánchez-Bordona and the final CJEU Judgment in C-579/21 Pankki S by clicking here.

To summarise, you are entitled to disclosure of log data such as this because some of it is considered “information" required to be disclosed to a data subject under Article 15(1) GDPR and any data generated from your personal data is also your personal data which you are entitled to a copy of under Article 15(3). All of the reasoning for this also ties back to your right to “be aware of, and verify the lawfulness” of the processing of your data as we saw in Recital 63 GDPR above.

The Response From The Scottish Legal Complaints Commission.

Despite the SLCC being my current “adversary" I have to give credit were credit is due. I cannot find much fault in their execution of response to my SAR request of 30 March 2026. It's more or less seamless. Here's how it went…

1. SAR request made for M365 e-Discovery exports (summary.csv & items.csv) and document control history of a single document to the SLCC on 30 March 2026.

2. Request acknowledged same day on 30 March 2026.

3. SLCC instructed their external provider/processor to provide the data from e-Discovery. Searches conducted 17 April 2026.

4. SLCC disclosed all items requested on 24 April 2026 including full items.csv with 610 entries.

5. Requested a further document control history on 24 April 2026 and the SLCC supplied it by morning of 27 April 2026.

6. On 27 April 2026, I requested Article 18(1)(c) restriction due to approx. 170 items found in “deleted items” and “recoverable items” folders in items.csv. Requested Unified Audit Log and contents of all emails from 9 – 16 March 2026 found in the items.csv disclosed.

7. On same day, 27 April 2026, requests acknowledged by SLCC as a 2nd SAR and supplied retention schedule as requested and confirmed no actions would occur to the data requested to be restricted meantime & would respond fully to restriction request in due course and further data requests as well.

This is nearly perfect execution of a data rights request by the SLCC and as you can see, the data was disclosed with no quibbles, I spotted a few issues and then exercised further rights over the data all within the space of a month.

I am glad the SLCC, unbeknownst to them was able to provide such a striking comparison to the execution of a nearly identical data rights requests response by the Highland Council. It really just demonstrates the appalling and obstructive behaviour by the Highland Council in this regard.

To be clear, at the point of these requests.. I just happened to be in litigation with both parties; the SLCC in the Inner House of Court of Session and the Highland Council in various “venues". The only real difference between them is that the SLCC rely on an external data processor for many tasks whereas the Highland Council does not, all of their IT is in-house.

The Response From The Highland Council.

The timeline boils down to this.. I made a request for the summary.csv and items.csv on 30 March 2026 and they responded on 29 April 2026 with this absolutely nonsensical and obstructive reply…. see below.

From the Offices of “We Can't” on Glenurquhart Road.

Firstly, I didn't ask them for documents. I asked them for 2 CSV files. It took the SLCC 2 minutes and 42 seconds to run the same exact searches the Highland Council call “disproportionate”.

When you see the detail of what these audit logs provide.. you can see exactly why the Highland Council do not want to hand them over. Obstruction of access to personal data is a criminal offence under s.173 of the Data Protection Act 2018.

Who's behind all the obstructive behaviour in the Highland Council? It's not this chap, it's his boss. A Data Protection Officer shouldn't have a “boss”. They are meant to be independent officers there to inform, advise and monitor the data controller and free from conflicts of interest under Articles 38 and 39 GDPR - not be acting as a lapdog running interference. But, at the Highland Council.. the Data Protection Officer answers to the Strategic Lead, Donna Sutherland and her superior.. none other than Stewart Fraser, the self-initiated King of the Highland Fiefdom.

Exciting news coming…

The type of exciting I might not be able to publish much about for a couple months but.. it's set to hopefully change data rights for the better in all of Scotland. 👊

This is the 2nd and 3rd Decision Notices issued in my favour against the Highland Council in 2026 at the Scottish Information Commissioner….

Decision Notice 077/2026

What didn't they want to answer??

The Highland Council has Access Officers acting as Planning Enforcement Officers and it's a problem…

The Council's Scheme of Delegation delegates a number of tasks and powers under the various planning statutes to planning officers only who should have the proper training. However, the Highland Council has a number of Access Officers doing these duties and I have found one of them dealing with appeals at the DPEA which he definitely should NOT have been doing. From the documents, he appears to have needlessly harassed a woman up in North Sutherland over replacing an old caravan only for her to be granted a certificate of lawful development by the DPEA after much headache. To make matters worse, he got dunted off the case mid appeal and the Highland Council kept referring to him later as a planning enforcement officer which he certainly is not!

The same Access Officer invisibly processed my data and conducted covert spy missions at my own property hiding behind hedging taking videos and photos ½ a kilometre from the nearest public road or land and took photos with zoom lenses from a much further distance on another occasion.

I will be posting a much more extensive article on the Highland Council's unlawful surveillance in the very near future as my FOI audit into it all continues…

Decision Notice 078/2026

What didn't they want to answer??

There is some more irony in this one! 😂

I asked them for all of their communications with the ICO about the Article 31 infringment, “Failing to Cooperate with the Commissioner” being recorded against them in July 2025. Not only did the Highland Council fail to respond to the FOI, they also failed to cooperate with the Scottish Information Commissioner when tried to investigate their failure to respond to the FOI. 🙄

You can read about the ICO infringement here…

I made an FOI request to the Highland Council in late May 2025 to ask about their Subject Access Request (SAR) statistics over the last few years. It was my own experience and that of several other individuals I had met, that the Highland Council regularly fell foul of the law with respect to responding to these requests for personal data by the required deadline.

Of course, those failures were the very subject of my recent successful court action against the Council in INV-SM2-24 wherein a compliance order was granted in my favour under s.167 of the Data Protection Act granting orders under Articles 15, 16 and 18 of the GDPR.

In particular, I was interested in their use of the Article 12(3) GDPR extension (now also Article 12 (3A)) In normal circumstances, a data controller has 1 month to respond to a subject access request. In some circumstances, if a request is deemed “complex” the data controller may notify the requestor that their request was deemed complex and that under Article 12(3) GDPR, the requestor having been notified of the extension, the data controller is allowed 2 further months to respond. But, the extension must be applied before the original due date of 1 month has passed.

The Council failed to respond to either the request or the request for review of my request and I duly sent it off to the Scottish Information Commissioner (SIC) in an application for a decision. The Council having failed to respond to the request even after investigation by the SIC, a decision notice was issued, 015/2026, giving the Council until 13 March 2026 to respond. The Council missed that deadline as well, eventually responding on 20 March 2026.

Barring the Pink Elephant, the Numbers Look Not Too Bad? 😂

The whole request & response can be found here. But, I will just comment on the major issues.

The response to question 2…

Over a quarter (26.66%) of extensions applied to subject access requests under Article 12(3) GDPR were applied AFTER the original due date of the SAR! 💀

Question 3…

I think the Council found it to be quite clever to state the percentages of “All Cases” appearing to rise towards a more compliant and improving figure, however, it entirely discounts the truth behind the numbers.

A breakdown…

Article 12(3) GDPR Extensions Applied

2022: 44.86%

2023: 48.28%

2024: 38.67%

2025: 45.75%

2022-2025: 44.14%

Nearly half of all subject access requests to the Highland Council have an Article 12(3) extension applied. That is a staggering number considering these are only meant to be rarely applied to complex requests.

If you extrapolate the trend of 26.66% of those extensions are applied AFTER the original due date which is a violation of the GDPR in its own right, we are beginning to see that the Highland Council is majorly failing in it’s legal obligations under the Regulation which warrants an immediate internal audit. But, who audits the data protection compliance of the Council if the Chief Audit Executive, Donna Sutherland is also the strategic lead & manager of the data protection team?! Have a look at another FOI that is currently being ignored by the Council on this topic.

Extended SARs Failing to be Responded to On Time.

2022: 43.10%

2023: 72.31%

2024: 20.83%

2025: 35.65%

2022-2025: 39.00%

Even after extending the deadline for a further 2 months in almost half of all SARs received by the Highland Council, they are still failing to fulfill 39% of those on time! And… what does “late” even mean? My SAR in 2023 was not answered at all. I had to firstly, go to the ICO where they eventually released 13 pages; 9 of those pages my own emails. Then I had to take them to court for a court order after which, some 27 months after the SAR was sent, they ended up disclosing hundreds of pages of data. These definitions of “late” are probably further questions I will need to put to the Council. Also, what does “on time” exactly mean? Do they send a couple pages & withhold the rest? Do they provide the requester with copies of their own emails only and call it good?

The “all cases” percentages presented by the Council are a statistical manipulation designed to skew the reality of their non-compliance when you consider their clear abuse of the Article 12(3) GDPR extension which at best could be reasonably used in about 3-5% of cases which may be truly “complex”, then, the fact they are applying these extensions 26.66% of the time in breach of the law and then further, failing to respond to 39% of those extended cases on time. It reads more like failures on top of failures.

Why are the Council failing to adequately respond to SARs?

In my opinion and experience from the court action.. the Highland Council are disorganised data hoarders. They completely disregard the basic data protection principles, Article 5(1)(c) “data minimisation” and Article 5(1)(e) “storage limitation”. They collect far too much data that is irrelevant, inadequate or unnecessary then store all of it well past its retention date. This is unlawful under the GDPR.

The Highland Council has vast Corporate Retention Schedules, to which they are obliged to adhere to rigorously. (See their retention schedules here.) For example, in another recent SAR disclosure from the Council in January 2026, they disclosed a letter I had written to the Council in 2007 notifying them of a change of address. Their retention schedule states that should have been destroyed well over a decade ago!

It was discovered in my court action that despite the Council using Microsoft 365, they do not have any records management functions switched on which is further indication they are infringing Article 24 and 25 GDPR and making it nearly impossible to comply with the data protection principles.

If you have any experience with subject access requests with the Highland Council, leave a comment…

Since then, an incredible set of events has unfolded. 😂 First, £99.60 turned into £49.80 due to an error by the Assessor of the Highland & Western Isles Valuation Joint Board. Except…. in his attempt to correct the error, he made a 2nd error, which I called him on straightaway.. both errors now admitted in the letter below. 👇

If you weren't already aware, the 2023 - 2026 Valuation Roll for Scotland went out of force when the clock struck midnight on 1 April 2026, meaning that the Assessors are not able to alter that roll as they normally can when it is still in force. That meant the Assessor was now pressed for time to now correct the 2nd error before the 1st of April 2026.

Of course, a lawful and valid entry onto the valuation roll is a prerequisite for a valid demand notice for Non-Domestic Rates charges from the Highland Council. Meaning that, considering I had already had the appeal process in progress against the Council's demand notices under s.238 of the Local Government Scotland Act 1947, if the Assessor could not correct the errors by the 1st of April 2026, the Council would lose the appeal by default.

This is where it becomes rather comical. 😂😂

The Assessor, likely thinking he was being quite clever by waiting for the very last moment of the deadline to issue a 3rd valuation notice.. sent the 3rd notice on 31 March 2026 attempting to now correct the 2nd error. I actually suspected he might try and do exactly this.

But...on the morning of 1 April 2026, I had updated my appeal to the Highland Council & sent if off as follows with a new ground..

Built on Sand.

Notice paragraph 14.6. Well, I also sent a proposal off just an hour or so after to the Assessor over the “revaluation" that just came into being on the new valuation roll in force from 1 April 2026. You can't have a “revaluation” when 2 entries on the old roll that were already unlawful due to legal errors! The revaluation, due to the errors were built on sand. I more or less reiterated in the proposal what was written above for the appeal.

At half 3 that same afternoon, the postie arrived with the 3rd valuation notice made at the last minute by the Assessor to attempt to fix the 2nd error and what happened??

He made a 3rd and now fatal error given the time to correct it had run out at midnight. A hat trick of errors. 😂

He made the same error that I more or less predicted he might make in my updated appeal above at 14.6. He failed to put the correct effective date of 13 October 2025, attempting to backdate it further than the statute allowed to 1 April 2025.

In effect, the Highland Council has now lost the s.238 appeal by default. No lawful entry on the roll? No valid demand notice. Simple as that.

Highland Council Can Pound Sand

This is where Highland Council and their bungling bureaucrats have gotten themselves with their over-zealous campaign of petty vindictiveness. 💀

This of course should all be considered on top of the following:

1. The “patch of grass” on my croft is not even a rateable subject. 😂 It has no improvements, fences, enclosures, buildings or structures (neither temporary or permanent) nor infrastructure like facilities of any kind or hard standings and it is on agricultural land. Hardly a “camping site”. The Assessor & the Highland Council attempted to create a “class of one".

2. The Assessor never even made the decision to enter it onto the roll… the Highland Council did, or more accurately, the Assessor's legal representative, the Chief Officer of Legal & Corporate Governance did. Why? See my article on how this all began 👉 here and read my proposal to the Assessor which perfectly highlights The Highland Council's petty wee vendetta after getting caught lying about an “unauthorised business" in 2023 to attempt to gain entry to my property.

I was absolutely delighted to see this success for a party litigant who challenged East Dunbartonshire Council over inaccurate data recorded in a report concerning his daughter.

The full decision is here. 👉 East Dunbartonshire Council v Paul Paton [2026] SAC (Civ) 17

Without going into a full analysis of what happened as the decision speaks for itself, the summary is that the claimant raised a simple procedure action against the Council to rectify inaccurate records & seek damages under the GDPR and was successful.

I have to assume from the appeal decision that the claimant originally sought an order to rectify the records plus damages. I believe this to be the case, as it states that as soon as the claim was raised the Council conceded that the records should be rectified and they did so but, then went on to challenge the damages part of the claim.

The damages part was challenged by the Council on the basis that they thought the father was not entitled to make the request nor claim for damages as their position was that he was not the data subject.

The Sheriff saw it different and in favour of the claimant and awarded damages to the claimant. East Dunbartonshire Council then raised the appeal to the Sheriff Appeal Court.

In the decision, we can see that the SAC were quite happy wading through a number of case authorities from England and the CJEU to determine how they should answer the question of who's personal data it was. They concluded that the data was sufficiently linked to the claimant and given his parental responsibilities he was entitled to request rectification & pursue damages.

The Future of GDPR & Data Protection Claims in Scotland.

GDPR & data protection litigation is still in its infancy in Scotland. England & Wales being miles ahead in many respects. But, we are likely to see a massive uptick in these claims in Scottish courts due to both the ICO's reformed stance towards complaints after the Data Use & Access Act 2025 coming into force and as people's awareness grows of their robust rights under the GDPR.

In fact, given the ICO's reformed stance, I, myself will be bypassing the ICO altogether & resorting to going straight to the courts for any future data issues. To be fair, they weren't a whole lot of use prior to this anyways. The ICO's spreadsheet ticking culture has worsened, not strengthened individuals data rights.

The other aspect of this case that is fabulous for Scots everywhere is the growing acceptance that these low value GDPR claims belong in Simple Procedure despite the technical & sometimes complex interpretations of data protection law involved.

Why should an individual have to worry about significant costs against them simply for exercising basic data rights? Especially when the opposition may be a large company or a public authority with vast resources? Provided claims are less than £3000 in simple procedure, expenses are capped.

Look at my current claim, INV-SM11-25, wherein the opposition, a public authority, have already spent £17,367 on legal expenses even before a hearing has been set?!? This is an inequality of arms that is not congruent with an individual's right to privacy and protection of their data rights - unless the individual has some form of protection to redress the balance in this respect. ⚖️

If you plan on heading to court any time soon for a GDPR claim in Scotland, keep this latest Sheriff Appeal Court decision under your arm for the inevitable “forum challenge” by the opposition. These claims belong in simple procedure if they are low value - don't let them tell you any different and the Sheriff Courts are slowly accepting this same view.

I plan to write a lot more on how to tackle these claims in Sheriff Court soon. I have already written some basic articles explaining the procedure and will be adding more shortly.

See the following articles…

👉 Data Protection Compliance Order Claims in Simple Procedure in Sheriff Courts in Scotland.

👉 s.167 Compliance Order Under the Data Protection Act 2018.

We also need to keep an eye on Farley v Paymaster which is currently at the Supreme Court to check if the court has an appetite for divergence from the EU on the threshhold for damages in Article 82 GDPR damages claims. Hearing is set for October 2026.

As of 27 March 2026, an application for leave to appeal, COS-XA34-26, of a decision of the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission has been lodged and served on the respondent and all interested parties. The application concerns a complaint made one year ago in respect of matters surrounding the Sheriff Court litigation reported on this Substack. The matter is now before the court and I will update as appropriate as it develops…..

The latest FOI from the Highland & Western Isles Valuation Joint Board reveals that they have incurred legal costs of £17,367 up to 30 January 2026 instructing Anderson Strathern in the ongoing Sheriff Court action concerning data protection issues.

Minding this is only up to the end of January, quite a bit has happened since January including the first case management discussion that legal work needed to be done in preparation for and Anderson Strathern turned up with not just a partner but, also a director who is apparently a data protection expert I could see in the “virtual” courtroom. A hearing has now been set for end of April on my motion. That will be an in-person hearing for which these solicitors will need to travel to Inverness for and that hearing likely to last several hours with skeleton arguments needing prepared to be lodged just prior.

From what I can see in their documentation, the Assessor of the HWIVJB operates with a miniscule external legal budget annually of £20k because they pay the Highland Council a “recharge” of £30k annually for legal advice & representation of Highland Council's Chief Officer of Legal & Corporate Governance, Stewart Fraser who is delegated all legal authority over the Board as their legal representative and also as Clerk and Proper Officer of that Board. I recently asked the HWIVJB in an FOI for their Service Level Agreement for those legal services from the Highland Council but, they could not provide one! So.. nobody really even knows what that recharge pays for exactly.

It's becoming clearer all the time that the Highland Council really just views the HWIVJB as a “department" of the Council - they have next to zero of the required legal contracts and agreements between them, to the point I will probably just FOI to ask what they have instead of asking for what they should have, only to respond they don't have it! 😂

The Assessor of the HWIVJB is actually meant to be an independent statutory officer appointed to the Board who is required to operate free from all political pressures of the constituent Councils making up the Board. They are *meant to be* a separate public authority in their own right. We can see I already found major problems though… here.

Sunk Cost Trap & the Law of Diminishing Returns

After Highland Council's loss in INV-SM2-24, they appear to be behind this extravagant waste of public funds throwing good money after bad to now defend the indefensible in INV-SM11-25.

Any rational thinking person can see that after the significant in-house resources at the Highland Council spent on defending INV-SM2-24 only to lose, that they are now spiralling down the sunk cost trap in this new case. INV-SM2-24 was 21 months long & 16 hearings over that period… then at the end, not only having lost, having uncapped expenses granted against them because they were found to have proceeded with a defence but, not in good faith as to its merits and conducting themselves in a way amounting to “manifestly unreasonable behaviour”.

Ouch.

Institutional arrogance is driving their current behaviour & extravagant spending in the new case, INV-SM11-25. The threshhold of the law of diminishing returns was reached many, many months ago with more & more money and resources thrown at a exponentially wilder and more reckless defence. And for what? INV-SM11-25 is simply about complying with the law.

£17,367 … and that was only for the pre-warm-up.

Bremner Refuses to Comment on Cllr Christie's Questions of Concerns of Council Litigation

Councillor Alasdair Christie pressed Council Leader, Raymond Bremner yesterday, 26 March 2026 at the full Council meeting for an answer asking if he was “embarrassed” that former staff were making complaint of discrimination and whistleblowing concerns in employment tribunal matters with the Council.

See that clip here 👉 VIDEO CLIP

Bremner refusing to comment, making excuse that he cannot discuss legal matters. However, a pattern emerged long ago relating to these issues like that concerning the McNicholas employment tribunal against Care & Learning Alliance and Cala Staffbank & Highland Council's part in that mess which bears similar hallmarks to retaliation against citizens and employees. Cllr Christie should now press Bremner to answer on the overall pattern rather than individual cases.

The entire list of non-family litigation from 1 April 2023 to current at the Highland Council presented in an Appendix in relation to Cllr Christie's question can be found here. It makes interesting reading. What I took away from it, is that the Highland Council is fairly “under exercised” in the courts hence, likely why so many problems spiralling out of control.

"The only thing that saves us from the bureaucracy is its inefficiency."

— Eugene McCarthy

Appeal under s.238(1) Local Government (Scotland) Act 1947

The Highland Council

20 February 2026

Appellant: [redacted]

In Relation to Demand Notices (Combined Total £99.60):

Ref: 203478724 (FY 2024/25) - £49.80

Ref: 203478725 (FY 2025/26) - £49.80

Productions Bundle 1 supplied alongside.

Notice of Preliminary Pleas – Motion to Sist & Ground of Appeal

I. 1st Preliminary Plea – Motion to Sist Proceedings

Part 1 of the 1st Preliminary Plea – Lis Alibi Pendens

1. The Appellant moves for an immediate sist of these proceedings on the basis of lis alibi pendens. The Appellant submits that any determination of the current appeal before determination of a prior action raised against the ratings authority, The Highland Council, at Inverness Sheriff Court, INV-SM11-25 would be incompetent.

2. The Appellant satisfies the four-fold test for a successful plea of lis alibi pendens required under Scots law found in Bain v Bain 2001 GWD 32-1270 and under reference of McLaren, Court of Session Practice as follows.

2.1 Identity of the Question. The question raised in the prior action, INV-SM11-25 at Inverness Sheriff Court is the lawfulness of the processing of data under the Data Protection Act 2018 and the GDPR underpinning the question of the propriety of the charges at issue in this appeal. The s.167 order sought in INV-SM11-25 craves compliance orders under Articles 15, 18, 17(1)(d) and 19 under the GDPR.

2.2 Prior Suit. The prior action was raised on 27 October 2025 and served on the Respondents on 12 November 2025. This is a follow on action by the Appellant of his prior successful action against The Highland Council at Inverness Sheriff Court, INV-SM2-24 under s.167 of the Data Protection Act 2018 and Article 79 of the GDPR disposed on 5 December 2025 and final decree of 30 December 2025.

2.3 Same Parties. The parties to the action in INV-SM11-25 are [redacted], the 1st Claimant and 2nd Claimant and Appellant in their capacities as data subjects and The Assessor for the Highland & Western Isles Valuation Joint Board, the 1st Respondent in his capacity as the de jure data controller and The Highland Council, the 2nd Respondent in their capacity as purported data processor or de facto data controller.

2.4 Competent Jurisdiction in Scotland. The Inverness Sheriff Court is a court of competent and superior jurisdiction in Scotland. As the lex specialis, the Data Protection Act 2018 and GDPR, is the governing law for the data in question, the Sheriff Court is the primary forum for determining the facts.

3. As the four-fold test of lis alibi pendens in Bain is satisfied, it is a matter of natural justice and comity that this Committee defers to the superior court. To proceed would create an unacceptable risk of conflicting judicial findings and constitutes a procedural impropriety.

Part 2 of the 1st Preliminary Plea – Lex Specialis Derogat Legi Generali

4. The Appellant submits that the Data Protection Act 2018 and the GDPR constitute lex specialis in relation to the processing of personal data for the purposes of the legi generali, the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1947.

5. It is a fundamental principle of law, lex specialis derogat legi generali, that where two statutes govern the same subject matter, the specific special statute overrides the general statute. The 1947 Act cannot be used as a statutory shield to validate or cure data processing that is fundamentally unlawful under the lex specialis.

6. This identical principle was already raised and adjudicated upon by the Sheriff in favour of the Appellant in INV-SM2-24 with regard to a request by the Appellant under Article 16 GDPR for the rectification of inaccurate personal data of the Claimants in records of planning committee agendas, reports and minutes of The Highland Council. The Council was ordered by the Sheriff on 10 January 2025 to submit a decision to the Appellant and the court on the Article 16 GDPR request. The Chief Officer of Legal & Corporate Governance of the Highland Council, Stewart Fraser, submit an official decision of refusal on that request on behalf of the Council to rectify those records on the basis of reliance on a general law, Schedule 7, s.7(1) of the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1973. This official decision of refusal by the Council was rejected by the Sheriff and an order was granted in favour of the Appellant, ordering the Highland Council to rectify the records by supplementary statement under the terms of Article 16 GDPR on 7 May 2025.

7. The Appellant submits that the satisfying of the lis alibi pendens test is not merely a procedural formality, but a jurisdictional necessity. Because the GDPR and Data Protection Act 2018 is lex specialis, the Sheriff Court is the primary and competent forum for determining the legality of the data processing. As a quasi-judicial body convened under the general provisions of the 1947 Act, this Committee lacks the subject matter competence to adjudicate on complex breaches of the lex specialis, particularly where those breaches are already sub judice in a superior court. To refuse a sist would be to ignore the supremacy of the lex specialis and would invite a conflict of laws that this Committee is not legally equipped to resolve.

II. 2nd Preliminary Plea – Independence and Impartiality of a Quasi-Judicial Body (Article 6 ECHR)

8. The Appellant formally objects to any member of Legal Services of the Highland Council acting as legal advisor or clerk to this Committee in relation to these proceedings and moves the Committee made up of laypersons to obtain independent legal advice and direction.

9. Under Article 6(1) ECHR, a quasi-judicial body must be independent and impartial. This includes the “appearance of bias.” The Appellant submits that the Council’s legal services is institutionally conflicted and cannot provide neutral advice to lay-councillors for the following reasons.

9.1 Active Adversarial Litigation. The Legal Services of the Highland Council is currently defending the Council against the Appellant in INV-SM11-25. They are the Appellant’s direct legal opponents. The Chief Officer of Legal & Corporate Governance & Monitoring Officer of the Highland Council, Stewart Fraser, is also the legal representative, in the normal course of circumstances, of the Assessor of the Highland & Western Isles Valuation Joint Board for which there is a proposal now raised against the valuation roll entry forming the legal basis of the charges at issue. The Chief Officer of Legal & Corporate Governance will also be potentially cited as a witness in INV-SM11-25 in the event the Appellants current motion for summary disposal is refused on the hearing of the motion in April 2026 and the case then therefore, proceeds to a proof diet.

9.2 Judicial Finding of Bad Faith. In INV-SM2-24, the court found The Highland Council liable for uncapped expenses due to “manifestly unreasonable behaviour” and a defence not conducted in good faith as to its merits. This finding of litigation misconduct by the Legal Services of the Council makes their presence in a quasi-judicial role a fundamental violation of the fair hearing requirement.

10. Allowing a legal team that is in active adversarial litigation and having already been judicially sanctioned for bad faith toward the Appellant to influence the Committee’s decision-making would render any decision tainted by the appearance of bias. The Appellant relies on the test of appearance of bias formulated in Porter v Magill [2001] UKHL 67,

“whether a fair-minded and informed observer, having considered the facts, would conclude that there was a real possibility that the tribunal was biased”.

11. The Committee is formally notified that should these preliminary pleas be rejected, the Appellant shall immediately petition the Court of Session for reduction of that decision.

III. Ground of Appeal - Improper Charges – Legal Nullity of the Evidentiary Basis

12. Statement of Ground. The demand notices are improper charges under s.238(1) of the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1947 because it is derived entirely from personal data processed in fundamental breach of the GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018 and in breach of an Article 18 order against The Highland Council in INV-SM2-24.

13. Particulars of Illegality. The charges are improper for the following reasons.

13.1 The processing of personal data underpinning the charge is unlawful under Articles 5(1)(a)(b)(c)(d)(e) and (f), 6(1), 6(3) and 6(4) of the GDPR.

13.2 The Highland Council, the ratings authority, and the Assessor of the Highland & Western Isles Valuation Joint Board are infringing numerous regulations under Chapter IV of GDPR including Articles 24, 25, 26, 28, 29, 30 and 32. The infringements are subject to consideration in INV-SM11-25 in the Sheriff Court and subject to active and open concurrent Article 77 GDPR complaints to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO). The ICO now having recorded an Article 31 infringement for “failing to cooperate with the Commissioner” against the Highland Council on 10 July 2025 in one of Appellants complaints. The Council therefore, is obstructing the ICO in the performance of its regulatory functions in relation to the Appellants complaints.

13.3 Incompatibility with Statutory Purpose. The 1947 Act cannot be interpreted to allow the Council to profit or benefit from data processing that violates the Data Protection Act 2018 or GDPR.

13.4 The Appellant submits that the lawfulness of the data is a condition precedent to the lawfulness of the charges. As the data processing is currently being challenged as a nullity in INV-SM11-25, the resulting charge is similarly contaminated and remains improper until such time as the superior court confirms otherwise.

The court found that Dunn made a series of fraudulent representations to his solicitor, Digby Brown, as well as to the court in pursuing a claim for damages under the Data Protection Act 2018 & the GDPR over “special category data" (Article 9) and related matters surrounding his employment at the defenders business and in relation to a subject access request and alleged resulting data breach.

The defenders agents quickly smelled a rat and began to investigate Dunn's claims finding that significant misrepresentations were made by Dunn throughout the claim including in support of a successful anonymity order they obtained earlier in the case. The anonymity order appears now to have been a tactic to obscure the fraudulent representations made in pursuing the claim. Sheriff K J Campbell KC at para. [35] stated,

“In Bruff, (cit supra) to which the defender referred, I observed at paragraph 14 that:

“knowingly seeking to rely on a witness whose statement is entirely untrue amounts to an abuse of process. In my view, there can be few more egregious examples of abuse of process than knowingly relying on a witness for a material part of a case whose evidence is subsequently accepted to be completely untrue”

As in Bruff, the falsehood in this case goes to the heart of the court process. I consider that making an application for anonymity which is founded on a fraudulent representation, and persisting in that, is an abuse of process. I am therefore satisfied that it is appropriate not only to find that the court ought to disapply QOCS on the basis of abuse of process, but to recall the anonymity orders made on 13 and 21 February 2025. That is an exceptional step, but it is now clear that the basis on which it was represented to the court that the orders should be made was false. There is no basis for the order to continue. Further, I consider there is force in the defender’s submission that enforcement of the award of expenses which I have made requires the information to appear on the face of the record. I will therefore recall the orders and require that the pursuer’s name and address appear in the instance of the action.

A very strong & well founded decision on Sheriff Campbell KC's watch. 👏

[READ the full decision.]

The Highland Council already wears this T-shirt.

You may recall in my own case.. INV-SM2-24, my motion for uncapped expenses against the Highland Council under s.81 of the Courts Reform (Scotland) Act 2014 was granted for the defender having “stated & proceeded with a defence, has not acted in good faith as to its merits, or has behaved in a manner which is manifestly unreasonable in relation to the claim”.

My motion lodged on 3 July 2025,

Motion for Uncapped Expenses

1. Claimants respectfully move the Court to uncap expenses for the whole of the action under provisions s.81(5)(a)(iii) and s.81(5)(b) of the Courts Reform (Scotland) Act 2014, on the grounds that:

1.1 The Respondent, having stated a defence, did not act in good faith as to it’s merits.

1.2 The Respondent has behaved in a manner which is manifestly unreasonable in relation to the claim.

2. Summary of grounds & all these grounds are aggravated by the fact that the Respondent is a public authority:

2.1 Unreasonable Delay & Obstruction

2.1.1 Refused substantial efforts from Claimants to settle in July 2024 & prolonged claim unnecessarily with obstructive & retaliatory behaviour.

2.1.2 Failed to comply with court orders of 2 OCT 2024 to supply evidence and/or witness lists. Failed to comply with court orders of 10 JAN 2025 to supply documentary evidence of searches. Failed to fully comply with court orders of 7 MAY 2025 causing further delay.

2.1.3 Repeatedly refusing to acknowledge or comply with their clear statutory obligations unless compelled to by court order.

2.1.4 Despite multiple findings of failings of their legal obligations under
GDPR, the Respondent persists in that same manner by now also failing to facilitate Claimant's rights under Article 19, obstructing Claimant’s ability to exercise further rights to halt further damages caused wholly by the Respondent’s actions.

2.1.5 Overall obstruction of access to and concealment of personal data until compelled to disclose it by court order for 27 months.

2.2 Retaliatory Behaviour

2.2.1 Transfer & disclosure of personal data under dispute in this court
action to numerous 3rd parties including another public authority for malicious purposes. Sending of 4x legal notices demanding more personal data under threat of civil penalties, criminal offences & fines between September 2024 – February 2025 during this court action.

2.2.2 Unlawful obtaining of personal data via unauthorised covert surveillance on numerous occasions during this court action. Most notably, on 13 FEB 2025, the Respondent posted the retained historic paper file containing covert surveillance data to the Claimants & on that same day, sent two Council officers to enter two neighbouring private properties to the west of Claimant’s property and took video, as well as numerous closer photographs (photos not disclosed to the court) of Claimant’s residential premises obscuring themselves by hedging, ½ a kilometre from the nearest public road or land.

The Dunn case details looking quite familiar with many similar threads running through it... the exception of course that in my case, it was the defender, The Highland Council at the receiving end of expenses awards against them for quite shocking behaviour indeed.

It appears that the owner of Lochdhu Lodge at Altnabreac, Kevin Booth, was caught in middle of the build of his underground torture dungeon in the summer of 2010 and his agent, Knight & McDonald Architects of Thurso submit a retrospective planning application, 10/02657/FUL, on his behalf.

The drawings above are incredible… you might agree. “Steel chequer plate shutters to secure access to the accommodation”. No, nothing to see here folks. 👀

The Highland Council’s planning enforcement team have been busy chasing me for a non-existent “unauthorised business” and recently harassed a woman and her partner up in north Sutherland for simply replacing an old caravan with a new one wherein the DPEA eventually had to grant her a “certificate of lawful development” because Highland Council were too pigheaded to admit they were wrong! They are currently also absurdly pursuing enforcement against a polytunnel & wind break mesh against another man down near Portmahomack!

Yet, they grant retrospective permission to this chap for a torture dungeon where it appears numerous crimes have taken place & now it's come out in court he also dug a 60 meter long tunnel with a trap door inside a building in the curtilage of a listed property. There are very few planning breaches which qualify as immediate criminal offences, but, this is one of them. What are Highland Council's planning enforcement team doing about this?

An Open Planning Enforcement Complaint to the Highland Council on behalf of the people of the Highlands.

You can send a copy of this complaint to the Highland Council by clicking the link below which will bring up your email client already filled in with the appropriate details for sending straightaway. 👇

Report A Breach of Planning Control

Alternatively, you can also download the documents below and use Highland Council's website form. 👇

Link: Report a Breach of Planning Control.

DOWNLOAD: Copy of Complaint

DOWNLOAD: Copy of Evidence Supporting the Complaint

Complaint – Lochdhu Lodge, Altnabreac, Halkirk, Caithness KW12 6UR

1. This complaint is in relation to alleged breaches of planning control with respect to both operational development, a material change of use and breach of conditions without the benefit of planning permission, prior approval or discharge of conditions. The alleged breaches are evidenced outlined in attachments. Given the gravity and scale of the alleged breaches in relation to a listed property meriting extra protections and related criminal activities concerning both the harm to public amenity and public safety, the Planning Authority is encouraged to weigh in favour of balance of the expedience test of the issues outlined and to consider urgent action to remedy the breaches outlined in the public interest.

2. Mr. Kevin Booth, owner/proprietor of Lochdhu Lodge, Altnabreac via his Agent, Mr. Neil McDonald of Knight & McDonald Architects, 6 Princes Street, Thurso, Caithness, KW14 7BQ made a retrospective planning application, 10/02657/FUL. The Highland Council approved that application on 20 August 2010, case officer, Mr. Victor Hawthorne. The application was stated to comprise development consisting of an “ancillary building” and was further described by his Agent as an “ancillary building dwelling” in the full site plan. The ancillary building was described to not have any water or waste connections. Conditions were attached to this grant of planning permission as follows:

Conditions and Reasons Relative to Application 10/02657/FUL.

(2) The building hereby approved shall at all times be used in connection with and ancillary to, the existing use of the site as a domestic property.

Reason: The Planning Authority does not consider the establishment of a separate unit to be appropriate in this location.

3. The decision of Sheriff Neil Wilson with respect to the summary application in Sir Iain Livingston v Booth [2025] SC Wick 8, WK-B17-23, provides ample evidence of a number of alleged breaches of planning control including;

a) Unauthorised engineering and/or building works comprising operational development consisting of an underground, curved, concrete tunnel of some 60 meters length accessed from a “trap door” in an ancillary building within the curtilage of Lochdhu Lodge leading to an underground “chamber” described as having several areas, containing, inter alia, an empty coffin, life-sized Egyptian figures and a metal bench. The site and section plan contains no indication of a curved, concrete tunnel of that length. Given this is connected to a listed property, this is a serious deviation from the approved plans and warrants urgent protection.

b) It also appears from the same decision, pg. 2, para. 6 that an unauthorised business is being operated from the premises without the benefit of planning permission, the taking of “payments” for “services” and is in breach of the conditions imposed on application 10/02657/FUL. This is a significant and material change of use of the premises from domestic to commercial/business activity as well as operating in breach of the conditions of the application. Further evidence suggests the unauthorised business is not currently listed on the valuation roll for Non-Domestic Rates and in any case, was described as a dwelling, yet is not currently featuring on the Council Tax list.

4. Given the above decision in the case of Sir Iain Livingstone v Booth [2025], there are serious concerns raised with respect to the alleged breaches of planning control in relation to public amenity, public safety and potentially the environment. Considering the gravity of risks to public safety outlined in relation to the unauthorised development, the Planning Authority is urged to investigate and consider whether an offence 1,2 under s.8(1) of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) (Scotland) Act 1997 has occurred and secondly, consider issuing the appropriate Breach of Condition and an Enforcement Notices with an urgent Stop Notice under the relevant Acts, the Town & Country Planning (Scotland) Act 1997 and Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) (Scotland) Act 1997 to compel cessation of serious harm and injury to public amenity & safety.

5. It is noted that Mr. Booth via his Agent has been deceptive in his application 10/02656/FUL relating to the “dungeon” given the evidence now accepted by the court. Therefore, the time limits in s.124 of the Act are not applicable. Welwyn Hatfield Council v. SoSCLG & Beesley [2011] UKSC 15, R. (Fidler) v. SSCLG - [2011] EWCA Civ 1159.

6. The Planning Authority is trusted to exercise their discretion within the terms of reasonable expectations of the public to prevent harm of public interests and to consider the expediency of the action and take steps as necessary to remedy the significant breaches of planning control outlined and also to give due consideration of the peril of “under enforcement” given the gravity of the breaches and harm to the public interests. The Authority should also weigh the material considerations alongside the clear and apparent egregiousness of the breaches in their decision with respect to protection of public safety.

Article 31 infringements especially by public authorities are relatively rare. The ICO really only records these when a data controller completely ignores them over a complaint. Ignoring the national regulator over data protection complaints isn't really the best idea for any data controller much less a Council considering the enforcement measures at the ICO's disposal.

This infringement was the 2nd to be recorded in this particular complaint. The complaint concerned a data breach in an FOI/EIR at the website of WhatDoTheyKnow.com. The spreadsheet comprising the data breach was removed from that website and originally an Article 5(1)(f) infringement recorded against the Highland Council by the ICO.

Fast forward to February 2025, I had mentioned this infringement being recorded in a written submission in the court case, INV-SM2-24. The Council said they did not know a thing about it & their Data Protection Officer, Miles Watters queried the ICO about it.

In doing that, the ICO then re-opened this case because apparently, the ICO had originally recorded the data breach as being self-reported. However, as can be seen above, despite the Highland Council proactively contacting the ICO themselves about the data breach infringement being recorded, they then went on to completely ignore the ICO when they reopened the complaint.

Is the ICO a Paper Tiger or a Sleeping Lion?

As I have reported here in the past, my experience with the ICO this far has been fairly underwhelming despite having several infringements recorded against the Highland Council off the back of my Article 77 complaints.

The ICO is also swamped & now running on a 10 month wait time for dealing with complaints.

Most people are aware of some of the giant fines the ICO has slapped on various data controllers for data breaches and other issues. However, it's not a fine that the Highland Council needs, what they need is some rather heavy handed persuasion to get their house in order.

With an Article 31 infringement now recorded, there are very few moves left in the ICO's play book. If the ICO were to let them off the hook for ignoring them, they are only teaching the Council it is fine to ignore them. So, what's next?

I have made numerous other complaints to the ICO regarding the outcomes & findings in INV-SM2-24 as well as the systemic non-compliance with Chapter IV GDPR by both the Highland Council & the Highland & Western Isles Valuation Joint Board over the past year. However, this has moved well past a personal complaint given that this now admitted systemic non-compliance demonstrates total disregard of the law & for the data rights of every resident of the Highland Council region.

Suffice to say, the ICO rung me last week and are now merging all past & current complaints. Perhaps, something will finally be done now that the Council & VJB, in my opinion, are currently sat wide open to a group action by region residents for damages under the GDPR & Data Protection Act 2018.

Up next will be a short dispatch about the absolute sham of an operation in the Highland Council's Internal Audit department…..

Two incredible revelations occurred off the back of court ordered disclosures in my data protection compliance order case, INV-SM2-24 against the Highland Council.

1. One of my neighbours had been interfering with my postal communications for many years & even sent information and photographs of post to the Highland Council.

2. The Highland Council not only collected this data behind my back for many years without my knowledge… they used this intercepted loot & dodgy interpretations of it to open Kafkaesque style planning enforcement investigations.

Clearly, the Highland Council knew what they did was indefensible, which is why they refused to comply with my GDPR rights by firstly, ignoring my subject access request in 2023 & secondly, further obstructing my access to that data to the point that the court eventually needed to order them to disclose it.

If you are wondering why the Highland Council retaliated against me to the level they did during this court action, you might be starting to see why… this is just one of a myriad of sordid details that emerged from this case.

I posted about the bizarre lengths they will go to out of pure vindictiveness recently. 👇

How did I end up with post pirates as neighbours?

The post pirates registered the property address from our title deed verbatim with the Council as their own many years ago… then had the cheek to try and stop us using our own address as designated on our own title deed.

Our title is the only title deed in all of Scotland bearing that property name or address!

In fact, the Highland Council shouldn't even be taking money from these people to register that address because the Council's only statutory remit over addressing designations is over property numbers and street names.1

The address has neither a property number nor a street name - as is the case with a vast many addresses in rural Highlands.

Many rural Highland addresses have only a property name & a “locality” rather than a street name. The Royal Mail is responsible for designating the locality & post code and property names are a private matter over which the Highland Council has zero statutory remit.

But, that didn't stop the Council from interfering in the matter!

As you can imagine, this has caused all sorts of delivery problems over the years.

However, as it turns out, the neighbours have been interfering, delaying and seemingly stealing my post for quite some time as I now have ample evidence of.

That includes totally mental actions such has taking a letter on a 30 mile roundtrip to a dentist’s office with my child’s name on it and ranting & raving at a receptionist & screaming at courier drivers, posties & random visitors to my croft about it. 👀

Why did the Highland Council accept information & photos of stolen postal communications?

A question which I have asked them but, a question they have never answered.

The answer is because they wanted to use it to instigate a bogus planning enforcement “fishing expedition”.🎣 Then they repeatedly lied and tried to deceive me about it all. You can read about that here. 👇

The Council received all this information in October 2021 from the post pirates & then continued right up to May 2025 to obstruct my access to this information until they were forced to disclose it by court order.

Obstruction of access to personal data by altering, defacing, blocking, erasing, destroying or concealing is a criminal offence under s.173(3) of the Data Protection Act 20182 for which the officers of a body corporate may be liable under s.198.3

Not many people realise that there is a range of criminal offences under the Data Protection Act 2018 because they are rarely prosecuted. However, the ICO prosecuted a s.173 offence in 2025 against a director of a care home, Jason Blake, in Bridlington, Yorkshire after having found personal data was blocked, erased and concealed after a subject access request was made by the daughter of a resident at the care home.

My best advice to anyone having any issues at all with the Highland Council is to send them a subject access request straightaway and find out what data they are processing of yours because clearly they believe they have powers they do not in fact possess.

I will be posting a short piece soon on “invisible processing" at the Highland Council and on why processing your data they have received from someone else without your knowledge is unlawful and what you can do about it.

☎️ I also took a phone call from the Information Commissioner's Office this afternoon & in coming weeks I will be posting more about what is going to happen next from my end to tackle the data protection problems at Glenurquhart Road that is affecting all Highland residents.

Unnecessary & disproportionate state interference into the private lives of citizens like this is a sure sign of a rotten culture in the senior ranks of the Council.

🔥 Hot off the Article 79 press…

PROPOSAL

9 February 2026

Highland & Western Isles Valuation Joint Board

Entry #: 01/14/045030/6

Description: Camping Sites

Address: [Redacted]

Proprietor: [Redacted]

Net Annual Value: £100

Rateable Value: £100

Effective Date: 01-APR-24

New/Improved Mark: Newly Built

SAA Practice Note: Licenced Touring Caravan & Camping Sites M17-23.

Link to Entry on SAA.gov.uk

Outcome Sought: Deletion of entry from the Valuation Roll

STATEMENT OF GROUNDS

SECTION 1 – Illegality, Procedural Impropriety & “Wednesbury” Irrationality

The entry is void ab initio as the decision is ultra vires due to, (1) unlawful processing of personal data, (2) the decision was unlawfully made or unduly influenced by the unauthorised or unwarranted dictate of another person or agent of a body corporate, (3) it is a procedural impropriety due to bias and malice, and (4) the decision is so irrational and unreasonable that no reasonable person (or independent Assessor) acting reasonably could have made it.

1. GROUND 1 – Unlawful Processing of Personal Data

1.1 The entry is based on unlawfully processed data of the appellant and is currently under consideration in Inverness Sheriff Court, INV-SM11-25. The Assessor of Highland & Western Isles Valuation Joint Board, Frank Finlayson is the 1st Respondent, the de jure data controller and The Highland Council is the 2nd Respondent, the purported processor or de facto data controller. The claim is an action under s.167 of the Data Protection Act 2018 (DPA 2018) seeking a compliance order under Articles 15, 17(1)(d),19 including an interim order under Article 18 of the GDPR.

1.2 Claim INV-SM11-25 is a follow on claim from INV-SM2-24. INV-SM2-24 was a successful action by the appellant under s.167 of the DPA 2018 against The Highland Council. A s.167 compliance order was granted in favour of the appellant on 7 May 2025 under Articles 15, 16 and 18 GDPR. Further orders granted in favour of the proprietor was an extension of restriction of processing on 24 October 2025 and uncapped expenses under s.81(5)(a)(III) and (5)(b) of the Courts Reform (Scotland) Act 2014 on 8 July 2025.

1.3 The genesis data was unlawfully obtained and further processed by the Assessor via (1) data obtained from third party sources by intrusive means wherein the Assessor has no legal mandate expressly laid down in law to obtain that data, (2) planning data unlawfully transferred to him by agents of the Highland Council and further processed by the Assessor that is under court ordered restriction and (3) data supplied to him by agents of the Highland Council that they obtained via unlawful surveillance of the appellant in violation of Article 8 ECHR.

1.4 The Assessor of the Highland & Western Isles Valuation Joint Board as a data controller is knowingly operating in systemic non-compliance with Chapter IV of the GDPR, infringing Articles 24, 25, 26, 28, 29, 30 and 32 undermining the lawfulness of the entirety of his statutory duties to compile and maintain the Valuation Roll and Council Tax List for the whole of the region.

2. GROUND 2 - Lack of Statutory Independence of the Assessor & Undue Influence by Agent of a Constituent Authority

2.1 Scheme of Delegation & Institutional Capture

2.1.1 The appellant made a formal complaint to the Assessor on 30 October 2025 highlighting serious governance matters relating to the Scheme of Reference & Delegation of the HWIVJB. On comparative analysis of the HWIVJB scheme to a sample of 5 other VJB’s around Scotland, the HWIVJB scheme is a notable outlier, delegating all authority over the Assessors’ legal affairs to a single officer of the Highland Council, Stewart Fraser, in his capacity as Chief Officer of Legal and Corporate Governance and Clerk to the HWIVJB. The monitoring officer(s) of the HWIVJB being subordinates to that officer in their roles at the Highland Council who also rely on that same officer for all legal advice and guidance in the performance of their duties as they are not themselves legally qualified. A clear departure from separation of powers required for a fit and lawful governance model.

2.1.2 The same officer, Stewart Fraser, is subject to an ongoing Scottish Legal Complaints Commission complaint lodged in March 2025 due to his role in the claim INV-SM2-24 and surrounding retaliatory and unreasonable behaviour during that claim and ongoing in his multiple roles at the Highland Council & HWIVJB. Summary of grounds of that complaint served on him 14 August 2025 are (1) breach of Rule B2.1.3 conflict of interest and related, (2) failing to prevent misuse of the appellants personal data, and (3) attempting to disadvantage a party litigant by retaliatory actions in the course of litigation.

2.1.3 The same officer, as evidenced in a letter dated 10 October 2025 just prior to the entry having been made has exerted undue influence over the decision-making of the Assessor in relation to the entry under challenge and two other related entries in an effort to continue to harass the appellant and his family. That officer now acting to his own personal and his employer’s interest to the detriment of the Assessors’ interests, given that the Assessors' authority over his own legal affairs having been improperly delegated by the Board to an interloper usurping the independence of the Assessors’ statutory office.

3. GROUND 3 - Procedural Impropriety: Motivated by Bias and Malice

3.1 Background

3.1.1 It is important to point out that the Appellant has a long history with the Council and that includes numerous false allegations amounting to harassment of the Appellant over an 18 year period. The claim INV-SM2-24 against the Highland Council began after they failed to respond to Appellants subject access request of 15 March 2023. Planning officer, Aidan Brennan wrote the Appellant a letter alleging an “unauthorised business” was being run from the property in January 2023. However, the Council refused to state the nature of any alleged “unauthorised business”. The Council’s solicitor later admitted on 10 January 2025 in court in INV-SM2-24 that the Council did not know the nature of any business and were still “investigating”. After court orders were granted in that action and further personal data disclosed in June 2025, it came to light that the alleged unauthorised business that was reported by a neighbour occurred in October of 2021. No camping at the property even took place at the property until late 2022 therefore, the nature of any unauthorised business still remains a mystery. Evidence supplied.

3.1.2 Appellant submits that the Council were not pleased firstly, that the Appellant raised a court action against them in March 2024 over data rights issues and secondly, that the Council’s deception over the alleged unauthorised business had been uncovered via court ordered disclosures of personal data. Their senior officer chose to retaliate by weaponising his control over the machinery of the Assessors’ office in the manner he has out of vindictiveness that has characterised Appellants entire experience with the Council throughout the years. The Council also have recent history involving retaliatory behaviour such as towards a whistleblower in conjunction with the McNicholas Employment Tribunal amongst others. Evidence supplied.

3.2 Recent Events Leading to the Entry onto the Valuation Roll

3.2.1 On 17 September 2025, appellant sent the Assessor a “letter before action” due to him having failed to comply with the appellants data rights under Article 15, 18, 21(1) GDPR via requests sent a year previous on 25 September 2024.

3.2.2 On 4 October 2025, the Depute Assessor, Roy Christie stated in correspondence disclosed via FOI to the Highland Council that there was a “high chance” of legal action being taken against the Assessor due in part to the lack of data processing agreement (Article 28(3) GDPR) between the Assessor and the Highland Council.

3.2.3 On 7 October 2025, the HWIVJB treasurer and Highland Council's Finance Officer, Brian Porter made a material misstatement on the HWIVJB’s Annual Governance Statement submitted to their external auditor stating he “disclosed all known instances of non-compliance or suspected non-compliance with laws and regulations whose effects should be considered when preparing financial statements” and that all known and potential legal claims had been disclosed.

3.2.4 On 10 October 2025, the 8 page letter was sent to the appellant, heavily relying on “legal advice” from Mr. Fraser stating they would continue to process the data despite it being under dispute. On 14 October 2025, the above entry along with two others onto the council tax list were made using the data under dispute.

3.2.5 Appellant raised the current claim, INV-SM11-25 against the Assessor and the Highland Council on 27 October 2025.

3.2.6 Appellant submits that the further processing of data in dispute and administrative decisions made to make those entries on the valuation roll and council tax were motivated by bias, malice and undue influence by Mr. Fraser.

3.2.7 A key piece of evidence of bias malice is in the character of the entry itself outlined below.

4. GROUND 4 - “Wednesbury” Unreasonableness

4.1 The Facts of the Property

4.1.1 Appellants land is a registered croft with mixed use of woodland and agriculture. The area pertaining to the entry is an unfenced, unimproved area of grass with no temporary or permanent structures with no facilities. The area is largely used by the Appellants wife for domestic and recreational purposes, tent camping herself there for many weeks out of each year.

4.1.2 In late 2022, the Appellants wife began allowing John O’ Groat trail walkers pitch a tent there on their passing through after the influx in tourism around the NC500 after Covid. She allows people to book ahead, a single tent pitch only on Airbnb or word of mouth. The most nights ever used as such in a single year was 19 nights, one year as few as 1 night. Campers must arrive with everything they need and take all their rubbish away – more akin to wild camping. This information was all provided in detail to the Assessor.

4.1.3 Within a 15 mile radius of the property, there are several crofters and community groups offering similar via sites such as PitchUp or money boxes and QR codes, many available and used all throughout the summer and none of these properties, quite rightly, are on the valuation roll. Evidence supplied.

4.1.4 However, the unreasonableness is even more evident by examining what is on the valuation roll rather than what is not, which the Appellant summarises further below.

4.2 The Characteristics of the Entry

4.2.1 The entry is currently 1 of 129 total entries on the Valuation Roll in the category “Camping Sites” in “Leisure, Entertainment, Caravans & Holiday Sites” in all of Scotland.

4.2.2 Out of those 129 entries, the appellants entry currently has the lowest “rateable value” in all of Scotland in that category of RV £100.

4.2.3 The next lowest in rateable value in that category on the HWIVJB valuation list is RV £300 on the Isle of Canna, “Canna Campsite” that has 2 camping pods, a cabin, multiple tent pitches with full facilities, an 8 bed bunkhouse and 2 caravans which has the total capacity to generate £750 per night between all accommodations assuming 4 booked tent pitches.

4.2.4 The third lowest in rateable value in that category on the HWIVJB valuation list is RV £500 on the Isle of Barra, “Barra Sands Campsite” that has glamping pods, numerous pitches for tents, caravans, campervans and motorhomes with and without electric hook-ups with full facilities including a laundry and two blocks of showers and toilets.

4.2.5 Given the Appellants 28 day limit for total days they could book a single pitch at £20 if they wished per The T&C (General Permitted Development) (Scotland) Order 1992, it would total a potential £560 per year. The disparity between the Appellants property and the Canna or Barra properties and their “rateable value” and characteristics alone is stark.

4.2.6 The Appellants entry is the only entry in all of Scotland that has neither temporary nor permanent structures or facilities of any kind.

4.2.7 Appellants refer to the lists of all entries in that same category supplied. The appellants can demonstrate that the decision by the Assessor is irrational purely by the act of his attempting to create a “class of one”.

4.2.8 Every single entry on the HWIVJB valuation roll in that category that does not have structures such as a camping pods or other type of sheltered accommodation, is a typical camp site with permanent building(s) providing facilities such as toilets, showers or kitchen/laundry or dining facilities. This is also true for the rest of the entire valuation roll in that category throughout Scotland. The Appellants property is literally an area of unimproved grass on a crofting unit.

4.2.9 If any of the 13 other Assessors in Scotland thought it would be reasonable to make such an entry of this description onto the valuation roll, it would be very evident on the roll and is the ultimate evidence of the irrationality of this entry. The Appellants property currently stands as a total outlier in all of Scotland as a whole. The Appellant’s entry is not merely the lowest value in Scotland; it is a legal anomaly. The Assessor has not identified a rateable subject; he has fabricated a ‘class of one’ to facilitate the Highland Council’s targeted harassment of the Appellant.

SECTION 2 – Statutory Non-Rateability, Misdescription, and Failure of Valuation Merits

5. GROUND 5 - Statutory Exclusion: Agricultural Exemption & Lack of Permanence

5.1 Agricultural Character & Exemption

5.1.1 The subject is a small portion of an agricultural field. Under s.7 of the Valuation and Rating (Scotland) Act 1956, agricultural lands and heritages are excluded from the valuation roll. The primary nature of the land remains agricultural; it is undeveloped, not serviced, and has no permanent structures. The temporary presence of a tent does not divest the land of its agricultural character.

5.2 Lack of Permanence and Change of Use

5.2.1 For a subject to be entered onto the valuation roll, it must exhibit a degree of permanence. The Appellant’s use of the land is transient and seasonal. There are no pitch markings, fences, enclosures, infrastructure, buildings, hard standings etc.

5.2.2 The use of the land for camping is limited to less than 3 weeks per year. Under the “de minimis” principle, such fleeting use is insufficient to trigger a “change of use” from agricultural to non-domestic.

5.2.3 Note the “New/Improved Mark” in the valuation roll entry stating “Newly Built”. There is nothing “built” nor “improved” at the property relating to the entry.

5.3 Absence of Commercial Entity

5.3.1 The entry is described under SAA Practice Note M17 (Licenced Touring Caravan & Camping Sites). This is a gross misdescription.

5.3.2 The subject is not “licenced” nor is it capable of being licenced under the Caravan Sites and Control of Development Act 1960, as it possesses zero facilities.

5.3.3 The Assessor has failed to identify any "commercial subject." A patch of grass without services is not a "site" in the context of the Valuation Roll; it is merely a field.

5.4 Lack of Uniformity & Targeted Enforcement

5.4.1 The appellant identified other locations nearby which operate active similar sites, of varying facilities and longer operating seasons, yet remain correctly excluded from the Roll as agricultural or domestic pertinents. The Appellant clearly highlights the disparity in the existing roll, that the Appellants property is being treated as a “class of one”. The entry of this specific patch of grass, the only one involved in active litigation against the Assessor, is a breach of the principle of fairness and uniformity in valuation.

Some officers inside the Highland Council appear to be feeling uncomfortable about “The Audit”…

A recent FOI (EIR) request I sent was partially responded to and the other parts were deemed “manifestly unreasonable”.

EIR Guidance from The Scottish Information Commissioner’s Office on Regulation 10(4)(b): Manifestly unreasonable requests (Exception Briefing) states…

“The term “manifestly unreasonable” must be applied to the request, NOT the requester”

However… incidentally, I also received another subject access request disclosure last week from the Highland Council that just happened to be running concurrently with these FOI requests which captured some of the “attitude” by some officers inside the Council towards my requests.

The Highland Council passed this particular request onto their Principal Planning Enforcement Officer, Craig Wilson.. and the 1st question he asks?

Who is the requester❓

The request & emails between staff about it is here. 👇

What am I investigating with this request❓

🚨 Extremely serious breaches of human rights & data protection law I’ve experienced & further uncovered in my court case, INV-SM2-24, reports from other members of the public & also from publicly available appeal documentation from Directorate of Planning & Environmental Appeals (DPEA).

The Council routinely “invisibly process” people's data which is unlawful under the GDPR. In essence, a complaint can be made to the planning department about you and the Council do not notify the subject of the complaint sometimes for years.. as in my case.

The planning team also conduct “site visits” that I now call “spy visits” which are human rights breaches that fall foul of the entry rights allowed in the Town & Country Planning (Scotland) Act 1997.

Subscribe now

I’m not the only one investigating Highland Council’s planning enforcement team. See the article about “secret enforcement cases” that appeared in the media. 👇

The Court of Session wasn’t too impressed with Highland Council’s planning department either when they lost the Academy St. judicial review in 2024 where the court ruled they made unlawful decisions in a planning consultation.👇

You can read the full decision of Lord Sandison at the link in the below caption.

The Highland Council spent nearly £120,000 alone just on legal expenses and paying the successful parties legal costs in that case. An inordinate total amount of money and Council resources were wasted on that botched consultation & after all was said and done… not a single councillor or senior Council official called for a review of practices in Highland Council's planning department.

Therefore, the information I have requested is massively in the public interest & in fact, it is the councillors & senior officers at the Highland Council who should be the ones auditing their practices but, refuse to do so.

FOI are meant to be “Applicant Blind”?

Having chats about painting the requester (me) as “vexatious” & marking the request, “manifestly unreasonable”.

⚠️ Yet, I know how their IDOX data base works. They do not need to manually review each case. A few clicks of a button gives the event log for each case. It is also notable the information that they do not want to disclose. 👁️

A bit rich considering it is myself that is the one that has an actual judicial finding against the Highland Council for “manifestly unreasonable behaviour” & proceeding with a defence but, not in good faith as to its merits.👇

Not only that.. but, the same planning enforcement officer in the emails was directly involved in some of the very behaviour that was deemed “manifestly unreasonable” by the court.

He clearly dislikes that I am auditing his department - therefore, it's questionable whether he should even be dealing with these FOI/EIR requests.

Decision Notice Issued by the Scottish Information Commissioner

Last week, I was also issued a decision notice by SICO in relation to another FOI about subject access request statistics at the Highland Council. The Council completely failed to respond at all to this request and now have until 13 March 2026 to do so.💀

👉 Read Decision Notice 015/2026.