Part 1

The Office for Students

Publication

Power for the OfS to publish notices, decisions and reports
67A
1
The OfS may publish notices, decisions and reports given or made in the performance of its functions.
2
Subsection (1) does not affect any other power of the OfS to publish such a matter.
3
Publication under this section does not breach—
a
an obligation of confidence owed by the OfS, or
b
any other restriction on the publication or disclosure of information (however imposed).
4
But nothing in this section authorises the OfS to publish information where doing so contravenes the data protection legislation.
For this purpose “
the data protection legislation
” has the same meaning as in the Data Protection Act 2018 (see section 3 of that Act).
5
In deciding whether to publish a notice, decision or report under subsection (1), the OfS must, in particular, consider—
a
the interests of—
i
students on higher education courses provided by English higher education providers,
ii
people thinking about undertaking, or who have undertaken, such courses, and
iii
English higher education providers,
b
the need for excluding from publication, so far as practicable, any information which relates to the affairs of a particular body or individual, where publication of that information would or might, in the opinion of the OfS, seriously and prejudicially affect the interests of that body or individual, and
c
the public interest.
6
For the purposes of this section and sections 67B and 67C—
a
a reference to a decision includes a reference to the reasons for it, and
b
any decision made in the course of exercising, or for the purposes of enabling the OfS to exercise, any of the OfS’s functions (including making any other decision) is made “in the performance of its functions”.
Ss. 67A-67C and cross-headings inserted (28.6.2022) by Skills and Post-16 Education Act 2022 (c. 21), ss. 33, 36(2)