[Observer1940]

Thank you for the private message, the files which hold the 20,000 Court of Inquiries are unindexed.

My FOI Act Tribunal Appeal has been before a Judge who upheld the Information Commissioner decision (on a 'Balance of Probabilities' decision) and I am being refused the official 1940 Court of Inquiry documents into my Grandfather's 1940 crash on the basis that:-

a) they cannot be located and the FOI Act cost limit would be exceeded to search all files held in store thoroughly. However, I was up against three Solicitors (1 ICO and 2 Litigation) who were defending the other Parties to the Appeal! I could not continue further because of my health.

However, I did discover from paperwork submitted during the Hearing that:-
i) despite assurances, I discovered that not all files were in fact searched and only a sample of files were searched which turned out to be injury only Courts of Inquiry.
ii) that crashes caused by war are not generally going to be released.
iii) that two Court's of Inquiry went to the Air Ministry (according to K. Regs) and a 3rd copy went to the AIB. The two files usually held in 1940 by the Air Ministry, were an "Accident File" (A. prefix) and a "Casualty File" (P. prefix number being the Air Ministry P.4 Casualty Section). It was claimed that the Accident [A. numbered] files not selected for permanent preservation were destroyed in the 1990s.

However, the Casualty Files (P.4 Casualty Section) are closed for 75 years and it is my understanding from a 1999/2000 PRO (now TNA) Keeper's Report that these files should remain complete until the end of the closure period. Therefore, 1940 files ought to be complete at the moment.

However, a 2004 Parliamentary document confirms that the Court of Inquiries into aircraft accident (called Board of Inquiry in the document) were being removed from the main file and that they would be impossible to find and marry to original file, once the 13 million miltary files (some dating back to WW1) were moved from Hayes to Swadlincote. The FOI Act is effectively useless in this situation. (FOI Act came into force in 2004).

I am very disappointed not to discover easily from official sources.

It appears that the intention is never to release some of the Inquiries into RAF Wartime crashes.

Although, I have been able to discover that although they hit a balloon cable on Eastleigh Aerodrome, the balloon barrage was not the main cause of the crash and that despite the suggestion in released paperwork, it was NOT the Pilot's fault and that the crew were completely free of blame.

Mark