Hardware disposal (2023)

Response

You asked the House of Commons four questions regarding laptops and mobiles which were disposed of, donated, lost or stolen or damaged, clarifying that the time frame of your request is from April 2022 to April 2023, which we have sought to answer below.

Please note that while the House of Commons and the House of Lords are two separate public authorities for the purposes of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA), the information you have requested is the responsibility of the Parliamentary Digital Service (PDS), which is a joint, bicameral service which maintains the parliamentary intranet, which is used by both Houses. Therefore, some information that is held only covers the House of Commons while other information is held on a shared, bicameral basis. Whether the information covers just the Commons or both Houses of Parliament is specified in the response below. For any information solely relating to the House of Lords, you may wish to forward your request to foilords@parliament.uk.

Please provide a figure for the number of of a) laptops and b) mobile phones that were [between April 2022 and April 2023]:

We have interpreted “April 2022 to April 2023” in this instance to mean 1 April 2022 to April 2023. We have also interpreted laptops and mobiles in this instance to mean those specifically assigned to and used by MPs, their staff and House of Commons staff.

1) Disposed of or recycled via a third-party contractor

This information is held by the House of Commons. The total number of laptops assigned to House of Common passholders disposed of during this time period was 531, while the total number of mobile phones disposed of was 176. Please note that the figure for laptops relates to devices assigned to MPs, their staff and House of Commons staff, while the figure for mobile phones only relates to devices assigned to House staff.

Please also note that some additional items disposed of during this period were recorded on our systems as belonging to the “House Service” as opposed to specifically the House of Commons or the House of Lords. To be helpful however, we can disclose that 365 laptops and 58 mobiles, which cannot be disaggregated by House, were disposed of in this period.

Lastly, it may help you to know that, during this period, a large number of legacy laptops were disposed of as part of an on-going disposal project. During this project however, a record was not kept of which passholders these laptops related to, and it is not possible to identify whether any of these items were owned by House of Commons passholders. To be helpful however, we can disclose 492 legacy laptops were disposed of in this period.

2) Donated and refurbished for reuse.

This information is not held by the House of Commons. No parliamentary laptops or mobile phones have been donated during this period, including those belonging to House of Commons passholders, and likewise no mobile phones have been refurbished for re-use. While refurbished laptops are reused within Parliament, we do not keep records of the amount of times a laptop has been refurbished for reuse in a given period, nor the number of laptops which have been refurbished for reuse.

3) Lost or stolen.

This information is held by the House of Commons. We hold information about the total number of laptops and mobile phones used by Members, their staff and House staff which were lost or stolen in the period specified.

While the House of Commons holds this information however, it is also already available from a public source. This information is therefore exempt from disclosure in accordance with section 21(1) and (2)(a) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA), which removes a public authority from the obligation to provide access to information which is already in the public domain. This is an absolute exemption and the public interest test does not apply.

However, it may help you to know that this information can be found on the Information we already publish FOI pages of our website.

4) Damaged or otherwise unaccounted for.

This information is not held by the House of Commons. We do not specifically record the numbers of laptops and mobile phones whch were damaged or “otherwise unaccounted for” in a given period, including those used by House of Commons passholders.

It may help you to know that, where laptops are returned to the Digital Service in a damaged state, we will look to repair or rebuild these and then re-issue them to passholders. Any equipment that can’t be repaired will be disposed of via our formal disposal procedure. We do not repair damaged mobile phones, and also do not record specifically on numbers of devices disposed of due to being damaged.