Freedom of information response

1. Information on the overall architecture of your internal intranet, including any documentation or diagrams that illustrate how the intranet is structured.

Our intranet uses Connect Internet Solutions’ ‘Hivetalk’ product, which is based on Wordpress technology. We do not maintain documentation or diagrams of the intranet’s structure, but an overview of Hivetalk intranets can be found at www.hivetalkintranet.com

2. Any information related to the hierarchy or structure of the information on your internal intranet, including any documentation related to the use of folders, subfolders, and other organisational structures.

The intranet has separate top-level areas for:

• staff directory
• downloads and forms – subfolders for all internal documents, all internal forms, public-facing documents and forms
• services and initiatives – subfolders for internal service departments and internal staff initiatives
• committees and boards – subfolders for staff committees and staff boards
• news
• events
• staff noticeboard

In addition, the following top-level menus are available that signpost to relevant areas above and provided limited additional information:

• staff zone
• manager zone
• councillor zone

We do not maintain separate intranet documentation related to the use of folders, subfolders or other organisational structures. An overview of the organisation structure is available online at https://www.thurrock.gov.uk/organisation-structure

3. Any guidelines or protocols related to the creation and use of links within your internal intranet, including any documentation related to the use of hyperlinking or cross-referencing.

We do not maintain guidelines or protocols related to the creation and use of links within our internal intranet.

4. Any information related to the use of templates or other tools for creating content on your internal intranet, including any documentation related to the standardisation of formatting or other stylistic considerations.

Content on our internal intranet is created using standard Wordpress templates and tools (‘Classic view’) within the Hivetalk product. We do not maintain documentation related to the standardisation of formatting or other stylistic considerations as these are constrained by the product itself. For information on Wordpress templates and tools, go to https://wordpress.com/support/dashboard/

You are free to use any information supplied to you for your own use, including non-commercial research purposes.  However, any other type of re-use, for example, by publishing the information or issuing copies to the public will require the permission of the copyright owner.

Where the copyright is owned by Thurrock Council, you must apply to the Council to re-use the information.  Please email information.matters@thurrock.gov.uk if you wish to re-use the information you have been supplied. For information where the copyright is owned by another person or organisation, you must apply to the copyright owner to obtain their permission.

If you are dissatisfied with the way in which the council have managed your FOI request you can pursue an Internal Review by contacting us using the above email address. Your request will be considered by a senior member of the Information Management Team who will update you with the outcome of the review. 

If you remain unhappy following the outcome of your Internal Review you may wish to refer your case to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) and details of this organisation can be found at www.ico.org.uk . Please be advised that the ICO will not consider your case until they have confirmation that you have already been through the Internal Review stage with the council.