We’ve had the answers to the questions to Rochford DC about our new councillor iPads:
Dear Councillor Black
Please find below answers to your questions ?
1) The Council chose iPads over other tablets because they offer a more stable operating system, the Good software itself is more stable on iPads, they require less technical expertise to use, they offer much better battery life, charge much faster and are easier to support.
2) Emails received to a rochford.gov.uk email address are stored in the Council’s email archiver. As such they could be examined if related to the official business of the Council in order to respond to a Freedom of Information Act enquiry. (It should be noted that the Freedom of Information Act also applies to official information held in private email accounts when held on behalf of the Council.) The Council has a procedure in place to authorise access to stored emails.
To enlarge on the first answer, the “Good software” is actually provided by a company called Good.
To enlarge on the second answer, Chris, Ron and Bruce still have their own personal email accounts separate from the council – these are the ones shown on this website and on our focus leaflets.