Marine Spatial Plan

​​​​Request ​795118600

Marine Spatial Plan and the designation of Schedule 1A Marine Protected Areas under P.18/2026, 

Provide copies of the following: 

1. Any documented frameworks, methodologies, matrices, scoring systems, guidance notes or decision criteria used to determine the final boundaries of Schedule 1A sites including drafts. 

2. Any documents describing how ecological survey results, habitat sensitivity classifications, modelling outputs or confidence categories informed the final boundary configuration and management approach, including drafts.

3. Any documents setting out alternative boundary configurations, zoned management options, or feature-specific protection approaches that were considered during the development of Schedule 1A, including any recorded rationale for their selection or non-selection including drafts.. 

4. Any internal summaries, briefing notes or advice describing the decision-making process leading to adoption of the final boundary and management configuration including drafts.

Response

1.

All documented frameworks, methodologies, matrices, scoring systems, guidance notes or decision criteria used to determine the final boundaries of Schedule 1A sites including drafts are exempt under Article 23 of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 as the information is already available and can be found using the links below:

• MSP Priorities and Actions Plan

• Stakeholder responses on the 2026 to 2030 Marine Protected Areas and Ministerial decision on final boundaries

• Jersey Marine Spatial Plan ( JMSP) Marine Protected Area (MPA) further research report

2.

All documents describing how ecological survey results, habitat sensitivity classifications, modelling outputs or confidence categories informed the final boundary configuration and management approach are exempt under Article 23 of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 as the information is already available and can be found using the links below:

• MSP Priorities and Actions Plan​

• Jersey Marine Spatial Plan ( JMSP) Marine Protected Area (MPA) further research report​

3.

All documents setting out alternative boundary configurations, zoned management options, or feature-specific protection approaches that were considered during the development of Schedule 1A, including any recorded rationale for their selection or non-selection are exempt under Article 23 of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 as the information is already available and can be found using the links below:

• Stakeholder responses on the 2026 to 2030 Marine Protected Areas and Ministerial decision on final boundaries

• MSP Priorities and Actions Plan​

4.

Any internal summaries, briefing notes or advice describing the decision-making process leading to adoption of the final boundary and management configuration would be included in the above links.

Any additional information held would be exempt under Article 35 (Formulation and development of policies) of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011.

Article 35 is a qualified exemption; therefore, a public interest test has been applied and is shown at the end of this response.

Articles applied

Article 23 - Information accessible to applicant by other means

(1) Information is absolutely exempt information if it is reasonably available to the applicant, otherwise than under this Law, whether or not free of charge.

(2) A scheduled public authority that refuses an application for information on this ground must make reasonable efforts to inform the applicant where the applicant may obtain the information.

Article 35 - Formulation and development of policies

Information is qualified exempt information if it relates to the formulation or development of any proposed policy by a public authority.

Public Interest test

In applying this article, the following considerations were taken into account.

Public interest considerations favouring disclosure

• Disclosure of the information would support transparency and promote accountability to the general public, providing confirmation that the necessary discussions and testing have taken place.

• Disclosure to the public fulfils an educative role about the early stages in policy development and illustrates how the department engages with parties for this purpose.

Public interest considerations favouring withholding the information

• In order to best develop policy and provide advice to Ministers, officials need a safe space in which free and frank discussion can take place – discussion of how documentation is presented and provided is considered as integral to policy development as iterations of documents are demonstrative of the policy development process.

• The need for this safe space is considered at its greatest during the live stages of a policy.

• The release of the information without comprehensive interpretation alongside other data could impact the general public with misinterpretation and generate misinformed debate. This would affect the ability of officials to consider and develop policy away from external pressures, and to advise Ministers appropriately.

• Premature disclosure of this information may limit the willingness of parties to provide their honest views and feedback. This would hamper and harm the policy–making process not only in relation to this subject area but in respect of future policy development across wider departmental business.

Considering all considerations above, while transparency is important, the public interest in disclosure must be weighed against potential harm caused by distress or misinformation.

It should also be noted that once a policy is formulated and published, the public interest in withholding information relating to its formulation is diminished, however, the use of the exemption can be supported if it preserves sufficient freedom during the policy formulation phase to explore options without that process being hampered by some expectation of future publication.

The SPA has concluded that, on balance, the risk of causing significant concerns or spreading misinformation, the public interest in maintaining the exemption outweighs the benefits disclosing the information.