FOI Tracker
Every Freedom of Information request we have filed or plan to file — what we asked, what they disclosed, what they refused, and what their refusals tell us about what they are hiding.
Where information is withheld, we use Freedom of Information law to obtain it. Where requests are refused, we publish the refusal and appeal. This tracker covers 54 FOI requests across five categories, targeting DHCW, Welsh Government, Audit Wales, and Health Boards.
Under the Freedom of Information Act 2000, public bodies must respond within 20 working days. We track every request from filing to resolution. Refusals are not the end — they are evidence of what the organisation wants to hide.
Update — March 2026: Blanket refusal of all 6 filed requests. DHCW and Welsh Government have refused every FOI request filed to date, using an identical PDF citing Section 8(1)(b) of the FOI Act — claiming the requests are invalid because they were submitted under a campaign name rather than an individual's name. No request was assessed on its merits. No information was disclosed. The ICO's own guidance states that public authorities should still consider requests where identity is not relevant to the disclosure decision, and that the duty to advise and assist (s.16) requires them to seek clarification rather than refuse outright. We are resubmitting all requests under an individual's name and filing a formal complaint with the Information Commissioner about DHCW's blanket refusal to engage. Read the full analysis.Download the refusal letter (PDF).
Status key:PlannedFiledAcknowledgedResponseOverdueRefusedUnder Appeal
Financial Accountability
Where the money goes. DHCW spends £78M+ of public money per year across nine programmes — all now under Level 3 government intervention. No programme-level cost breakdown has ever been published. These requests force the numbers onto the public record.
| Ref | Subject | Recipient | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| FOI-001 | NDR programme: total expenditure, annual breakdown, deliverables, and current status (2017–2025) Programme costs never publicly disclosed. Tribunal documents claim £60M+. This request forces a number on the public record. | DHCW | Refused s.8(1)(b) · Resubmitting |
| FOI-002 | WPOCT programme: total cost, contract terms, and re-procurement cost Verify the scale of cyclical re-procurement waste — estimated at £20-28M per year across the portfolio. | DHCW | Refused s.8(1)(b) · Resubmitting |
| FOI-003 | All external consultancy engagements exceeding £50K (2021–2025): vendor, value, deliverables, outcome £0.757M disclosed as "consultancy" appears artificially low. The classification boundary may obscure the true spend on external advisory services. | DHCW | Refused s.8(1)(b) · Resubmitting |
| FOI-004 | Channel 3 Consulting / Aire Logic NTA contract: procurement route, value, deliverables to date No award notice found on Find a Tender or Contracts Finder. Nine months of Phase 1 produced two reports. Channel 3 is private-equity-backed (WestBridge Capital £10M MBO). | DHCW | Refused s.8(1)(b) · Resubmitting |
| FOI-005 | Total funding allocated to DHCW annually (2021–2026), by programme and operational expenditure Establish the baseline of public money flowing into the organisation. Includes the £50M digital health commitment from 2019 — how was it allocated and spent? | Welsh Government | Refused s.8(1)(b) · Resubmitting |
| FOI-006 | NHS Wales App: total programme cost, user numbers, and reason for excluding 653,000 waiting list patients The Deputy CEO of NHS Wales described the App as "mired in delay, non-delivery." No cost figure has ever been published. | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-007 | RISP (Radiology) contract: supplier identity, total value, milestones, and current status A contract worth £47-56M of public money was awarded in November 2023 but the supplier's identity has never been publicly disclosed. Extraordinary for a contract of this scale. | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-008 | LINC/LIMS: total expenditure, supplier termination costs, current delivery timeline Eight years. One lab partially live. Original supplier contract terminated. Legacy system extended to 2030. What has this programme cost the Welsh public? | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-009 | GP systems double migration cost: VISION to EMIS, following In Practice Systems collapse Welsh GPs forced through two system migrations within one contract period. The consolidated cost and disruption has never been published. | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-010 | Cyber Security programme total expenditure and external contracts (2021–2025) One of nine programmes under Level 3 escalation with zero disclosed costs. What has DHCW spent on cyber security, and with which suppliers? | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-052 | Digital Medicines / Electronic Prescribing Service programme expenditure and adoption rates (2021–2025) EPS adoption stood at 7% among Welsh GP practices as of January 2025. NHS England's equivalent achieved near-universal adoption years ago. How much has been spent, and why is adoption a decade behind? | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-043 | WCCIS / Connecting Care: total expenditure, adoption rates, and organisations requesting to exit (2015–2025) Eleven years. £42M+. Intended to integrate health and social care records across Wales — a core policy objective. Organisations are reportedly seeking to exit the programme. What has it cost and what has it delivered? | DHCW + Welsh Government | Planned |
| FOI-044 | OpenEyes ophthalmology programme: total expenditure and milestone slippage (2019–2025) Missed March 2021 deadline, then March 2023, now targeting early 2027 — approximately seven years late. Ophthalmology is one of the highest-volume outpatient specialties. The cost of this delay has never been published. | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-047 | Promptly Health £11M contract: procurement route, business case, and deliverables An £11M patient outcomes contract awarded in 2024 with no publicly visible business case. Ironic that a platform for measuring outcomes was commissioned by an organisation that admits it cannot measure outcomes. | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-031 | Per-capita digital health spending: Wales compared to England, Scotland, and Northern Ireland Without benchmarking, there is no way to assess whether DHCW's budget is adequate, excessive, or efficiently spent. No comparison has ever been published. | Welsh Government | Planned |
| FOI-034 | Internal management accounts and programme-level financial reports (2021–2025) Published annual accounts show only aggregate figures. The monthly or quarterly reports seen by the board contain programme-level cost detail, variance analysis, and forecasting that the statutory accounts omit. This is the real financial picture. | DHCW | Planned |
Governance & Oversight
How decisions are made and scrutinised. DHCW's board admits receiving information "late in the day." Welsh Government confirms a "pattern of late notification." The CEO admits "we don't have an ROI on all of our investments." These requests target the governance machinery that allowed nine programmes to fail simultaneously.
| Ref | Subject | Recipient | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| FOI-011 | Board meeting minutes and risk registers (2023–2025) The interim Chair admitted the board receives information "late in the day." The Cabinet Secretary confirmed a "pattern of late notification." What did the board know, and when? | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-012 | Options appraisals and technical recommendations for procurements exceeding £1M (2019–2025) Hundreds of millions in procurement decisions with no publicly visible options appraisals. Includes RISP (£47-56M), Promptly Health (£11M), and GP Systems (£80M). | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-013 | Internal audit reports and external audit findings (2021–2025) If audits flagged problems that leadership ignored, this is evidence of wilful neglect of duty. Internal audit reports are not routinely published by DHCW. | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-014 | Welsh Government correspondence on performance concerns, Level 3 escalation, and tripartite review What did Welsh Government know about DHCW's failures, and when? The June 2025 tripartite review conclusions have never been published. | Welsh Government | Planned |
| FOI-056 | Sanctions or interventions considered against DHCW CEO and executive directors, and reasons for non-implementation (2021–2026) Welsh Government escalated DHCW to Level 3 in March 2025 for failures across all nine major programmes. By March 2026, the Cabinet Secretary confirmed the organisation remains "some distance" from demonstrating return on investment. No member of the executive leadership has faced any visible consequence. This request asks: (1) whether Welsh Government considered removing, replacing, or formally disciplining the CEO or any executive director; (2) what options were assessed and by whom; (3) why no action was taken; (4) whether the Accountable Officer provisions of the NHS Wales governance framework were invoked; (5) whether any performance-related conditions were attached to continued appointment. If the answer is that no sanctions were considered, that is itself a finding — it means Level 3 intervention carries no personal consequences for the leaders who caused the failures it was designed to address. | Welsh Government | Planned |
| FOI-015 | Identity, qualifications, and terms of the independent digital expert appointed under Level 3 An unnamed expert is overseeing an organisation spending £78M+ of public money per year. The public has a right to know who this person is and whether they are genuinely independent. | Welsh Government | Planned |
| FOI-016 | Whether any DHCW programme has ever passed an independent service assessment NHS England requires all digital services to pass independent assessments against the NHS Service Standard. There is no evidence that any DHCW programme has ever been independently assessed against any standard. | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-022 | Penetration testing, Cyber Essentials certification, and NHS DSPT compliance (2021–2025) Cyber security is under Level 3 escalation. Does DHCW hold basic certifications? Has it conducted penetration testing per NCSC guidelines? These are binary yes/no compliance questions. | DHCW | Refused s.8(1)(b) · Resubmitting |
| FOI-032 | All measurable patient outcomes formally attributed to any DHCW programme since April 2021 The CEO stated in January 2026: "We don't have an ROI on all of our investments." The only quantified benefit found in public documents is £0.5M in non-cash "equivalent savings." Can DHCW name a single measurable patient outcome from £78M+ per year? | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-046 | Complete list of single tender actions and direct awards exceeding £100K (2019–2025) Non-competitive procurement is the highest-risk area for public spending. Channel 3/Aire Logic (FOI-004) is one specific case — this captures the full picture. How much of DHCW's procurement avoids competition? | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-048 | Audit Wales: all concerns raised, assurance ratings, and reports relating to DHCW (2021–2025) The independent external auditor's view — bypasses both DHCW and Welsh Government. Cross-references with FOI-013 (audit reports from DHCW) and FOI-014 (Welsh Government correspondence). What did Audit Wales know, and what did they do about it? | Audit Wales | Planned |
| FOI-049 | Board composition, Chair appointment process, NED declarations of interest, and board skills assessment DHCW is operating under interim board leadership during its worst crisis. Simon Jones departed as Chair; Ruth Glazzard is Interim Chair. Does any board member have professional expertise in digital technology, software engineering, or health informatics? | DHCW + Welsh Government | Planned |
| FOI-050 | Original go-live dates vs actual delivery for all nine Level 3 programmes For each programme: what was promised, when was it promised, and what actually happened? The cumulative slippage — measured in years — is the clearest evidence of systemic delivery failure. | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-041 | Formal complaints and escalations raised against DHCW by Health Boards (2021–2025) The DHCW-side record of complaints from Health Boards. Cross-referenced against FOI-020 (the same question asked directly of each Health Board). Discrepancies between what DHCW acknowledges receiving and what Health Boards report raising are themselves significant. | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-042 | Complaints from members of the public, patients, and clinicians about DHCW systems — and whether a public complaints procedure even exists DHCW manages systems that directly affect patient care. When those systems fail, patients are harmed. Does DHCW have a mechanism for the public to complain? How many complaints have been received? How many were upheld? Sent to both DHCW and Welsh Government. | DHCW + Welsh Government | Planned |
Patient Safety & Systems
The impact on patients. Systems linked to at least one patient death. Unsupported technology handling every GP referral in Wales. An outage that mixed up patient records across the country. 21 system outages in seven months. These requests document the human cost of DHCW's failures.
| Ref | Subject | Recipient | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| FOI-017 | All serious incident reports related to WPAS, WCCG, or eMPI system failures (2020–2025) WPAS has been identified as a factor in at least one patient death. A Health Board called it their "single biggest risk to patient safety." Document the full scale. | DHCW + All 7 Health Boards | Planned |
| FOI-018 | WCCG system: current risk assessment, last security audit, remediation timeline WCCG runs on technology unsupported for eight years. If it fails, every GP-to-hospital referral across Wales stops. Force DHCW on the record about this risk. | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-019 | eMPI outage: full details of the incident that mixed up patient records across Wales Wrong communications were sent to patients and screening invitations were missed. Was this reported to the ICO as a GDPR breach? The details have only emerged through tribunal proceedings. | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-020 | Formal complaints raised by Health Boards regarding DHCW system quality (2021–2025) Health Boards' frustration with DHCW is reportedly unanimous. Sent to all 7 Health Boards individually to bypass DHCW's gatekeeping. | All 7 Health Boards | Planned |
| FOI-055 | Operational impact of DHCW system delays and failures on Health Board services (2021–2025) Sent to all 7 Health Boards individually. Requesting: (1) any internal assessments of the operational impact of DHCW system delays, outages, or programme failures on clinical services; (2) estimated clinical and administrative time lost to workarounds caused by DHCW system deficiencies; (3) any instances where DHCW delays contributed to patient referral backlogs, delayed diagnoses, or postponed treatments; (4) whether the Health Board has formally assessed DHCW as meeting, partially meeting, or failing to meet its digital service obligations. The Royal Colleges warned in July 2025 that patients "regularly experience delays that lead to worsening health." The Senedd found in 2023 that collaboration had "few tangible examples." This request asks Health Boards to document what DHCW's failures cost them — in staff time, clinical capacity, and patient outcomes. | All 7 Health Boards | Planned |
| FOI-021 | System outages log: the 21 outages in seven months cited by the Public Accounts Committee 21 outages across critical NHS infrastructure is extraordinary. Which systems failed, for how long, and what was the clinical impact? | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-033 | Betsi Cadwaladr data quality failure that suspended national waiting time statistics National waiting time statistics were suspended for approximately six months. Was this caused by a DHCW-managed system? If so, it connects directly to the broader pattern of system failures. | Betsi Cadwaladr UHB + DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-051 | All personal data breaches reported to the ICO, and whether DPIAs exist for Level 3 programmes (2021–2025) DHCW processes the most sensitive health data in Wales — patient records, referrals, prescriptions, screening data. The eMPI outage mixed up records across the country. How many breaches have occurred? Are basic GDPR safeguards in place? | DHCW | Planned |
Leadership & Appointments
Who runs DHCW and how they were appointed. Multiple senior leaders have no publicly disclosed academic qualifications, no healthcare background, and no prior Welsh NHS experience. The CEO was the incumbent when DHCW was created. The Chief Data Officer is described in tribunal documents as the CEO's protege. These requests ask: were appointments merit-based, or was the organisation built around the people already inside it?
| Ref | Subject | Recipient | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| FOI-035 | CEO appointment: was the role externally advertised? Person specification, interview panel, scoring, and whether other candidates were interviewed Helen Thomas was Director of Information at NWIS when it became DHCW in April 2021. She became CEO of the new organisation. Was there genuine open competition, or was the appointment predetermined? | DHCW + Welsh Government | Planned |
| FOI-040 | Performance objectives and appraisal outcomes for CEO and all executive directors (2021–2025) Nine programmes under Level 3 simultaneously. The CEO admits "we don't have an ROI on all of our investments." No director has faced any consequence for any programme failure. What are the actual performance standards the executive team is held to, have they met them, and what happens when they do not? | DHCW + Welsh Government | Planned |
| FOI-029 | Interview scoring tables, panel recommendations, and shortlisting rationale for all executive and director-level appointments since April 2021 The documents that show who scored whom, what the panel recommended, and whether recommendations were overridden. Scoring tables are the single most revealing document in any recruitment process. | DHCW + Welsh Government | Planned |
| FOI-030 | Ifan Evans: all academic qualifications, and conflict of interest assessment on his move from Welsh Government The Executive Director of Digital Strategy authored A Healthier Wales at Welsh Government, then moved to DHCW to implement it. Total remuneration exceeds £200,000. Were his degree subjects relevant? Was any cooling-off period applied? | DHCW + Welsh Government | Planned |
| FOI-038 | Sam Lloyd appointment: recruitment process, qualifications, and Welsh NHS experience for Executive Director of Operations Board-level director earning £125-130K (£150-155K total remuneration). Joined November 2022 from UK Health Security Agency. ~19 years in English public health agencies. No Welsh NHS experience. No publicly disclosed academic qualifications. The Chief DevOps Officer allegedly dismissed for whistleblowing reported directly to him. | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-036 | Chief Data Officer appointment: recruitment process, person specification, academic qualifications, and why the role is not board-level Rebecca Cook has spent ~19 years within NWIS/DHCW and is described in tribunal documents as the CEO's protege. She holds a "Chief" title but is not board-level, meaning her salary is not individually disclosed. No academic qualifications have been publicly identified. | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-037 | Sam Hall appointment: recruitment process, person specification, and healthcare experience for Director of Primary, Community & Mental Health Digital Services Joined November 2022 from the Welsh Local Government Association. Previously ONS and briefly CIO at Birmingham City Council. No healthcare experience. No publicly disclosed academic qualifications. How did she obtain a healthcare digital leadership role? | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-039 | Chris Collis appointment: recruitment process, qualifications, and healthcare experience for Digital Transformation Lead Professional background in digital television security and standards. Degree from University of Birmingham — subject undisclosed. Not a board member, no DHCW web profile, no Senedd appearances, no healthcare publications. The person leading how the entire Welsh NHS transitions from legacy to modern systems is invisible to public scrutiny. | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-054 | Full remuneration packages for all directors and senior leaders, including non-board "Chief" roles (2021–2025) Published accounts disclose only a handful of board-level salaries. Senior leaders with "Chief" titles — CDO, Chief Digital Architect — are structured below board level, hiding their pay from public view. What is the total leadership pay bill, and did anyone receive a pay rise during the period of escalation? | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-027 | Michelle Sell: current job title, pay band, and why her salary disclosure vanished from the annual accounts Disclosed at £90,000-£95,000 in 2021/22 accounts, then absent from subsequent years despite continued employment. Three director-level job titles in four years. A transparency anomaly requiring explanation. | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-028 | Chief DevOps Officer: role status, reason for downgrade, and recruitment cost Created October 2023 at Band 9 (£101-117K). Subordinate recruited October 2024. Holder allegedly dismissed December 2024. Role replaced with a lower-grade Senior DevOps Engineer. What happened? | DHCW | Planned |
Workplace Culture
How DHCW treats its people. The 2018 PAC found the predecessor organisation's culture was "the antithesis of open" with staff "reluctant to be critical on the record." DHCW publishes zero whistleblowing data, zero exit interview themes, zero disciplinary data. Self-reported 80% staff satisfaction contradicts Glassdoor reviews. These requests test whether anything has changed.
| Ref | Subject | Recipient | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| FOI-023 | Number of PIDA (whistleblowing) disclosures, grievances, and disciplinary actions (2021–2025), with outcomes DHCW publishes zero whistleblowing data despite having a statutory policy. Tribunal proceedings allege staff were dismissed after raising concerns. How many disclosures? How many upheld? | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-024 | Number of compromise / settlement agreements signed, with aggregate cost and whether confidentiality clauses were used (2018–2025) Settlement agreements with "gagging clauses" are a known mechanism for silencing staff who raise concerns. One exit package at £36,848 was noted for 2022-23. The full picture is unknown. | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-045 | Employment tribunal claims filed against DHCW: number, claim types, costs, and outcomes (2018–2025) Distinct from settlement agreements (FOI-024) — tribunal claims are formal court filings. At least two claims are believed to exist, including allegations of whistleblowing detriment. The total number, cost, and outcomes are unknown. | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-025 | Staff turnover rates by grade and department (2021–2025), with exit interview analysis Self-reported 80% staff satisfaction contradicts Glassdoor reviews describing bullying, toxic environment, and micromanagement. Do exit interviews exist? What do they say? | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-026 | Identities, roles, day rates, IR35 status, and tenure of all off-payroll workers earning £245+/day (2021–2025) 23 unnamed people spending an estimated £1.5-4.5M per year of public money. NHS England publishes this data routinely. Only one — Stuart Davies via Hafod Interim Limited — has been identified. | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-053 | Disciplinary proceedings: number, allegation types, outcomes, and whether disciplinary action correlated with whistleblowing or grievances (2021–2025) The "counter-discipline" question: were employees who raised concerns subsequently disciplined? If disciplinary action follows whistleblowing disclosures or grievances, the correlation is evidence of retaliation — a recognised pattern in organisations with toxic cultures. | DHCW | Planned |
| FOI-057 | Blocking of carenhs.org from NHS Wales networks: who authorised it, when, and on what grounds DHCW blocks access to carenhs.org — a public accountability website containing only publicly sourced material from Senedd proceedings, Audit Wales reports, and Welsh Government statements — from all NHS Wales network devices. This request asks: (1) on what date was carenhs.org first blocked or classified in a manner that prevents access; (2) who submitted the request to block the site — by name, role, and department; (3) what category the site was classified under and what criteria were applied; (4) whether the blocking was implemented automatically by a web filtering product or manually requested by a DHCW employee; (5) what review or appeal process exists for sites blocked by DHCW; (6) whether any assessment was made of the site's content before blocking, and if so, what specific content was identified as justifying the block. Blocking a site that contains only public-record criticism of a public body raises Article 10 ECHR concerns and contradicts the Nolan Principles of accountability and openness. | DHCW | Planned |
How this works
Filing: Each request is submitted under the Freedom of Information Act 2000. Public bodies in Wales must respond within 20 working days. We file via WhatDoTheyKnow — every request, response, and refusal is publicly visible.
Tracking: When a request is filed, its status updates from Planned to Filed. We track acknowledgements, responses, refusals, and appeals — and publish everything.
Refusals are useful. If DHCW refuses disclosure, the refusal itself becomes evidence of what the organisation wants to hide. We publish the refusal, analyse the grounds, and appeal where appropriate. Escalation to the Information Commissioner's Office is free.
Non-responses are even more useful. If DHCW misses the 20 working day deadline, we publish that too. An organisation under Level 3 government intervention that cannot meet its statutory transparency obligations demonstrates the same contempt for accountability that this campaign exists to expose.
Cross-referencing: Every response is compared against tribunal documents, public statements, Senedd testimony, annual reports, and accountability meeting transcripts. Contradictions between FOI responses and other public statements are among the most powerful findings. We also send parallel requests to DHCW and Welsh Government on the same topics — discrepancies between their answers are themselves newsworthy.