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Except as provided in this Clause 38 (and subject to Clause 39), both the Council and the Contractor shall at all times during the currency of this Contract and thereafter,
use their respective best endeavours to keep all Confidential Information confidential and accordingly not to disclose any Confidential Information to any other person, and
not use any Confidential Information for any purpose other than the performance of its obligations under this Contract.
Confidential Information may be disclosed to such extent only as is necessary for the purposes contemplated by this Contract or as is required by law or other regulatory body or court of competent jurisdiction.
Before deciding on requests to the Council under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 for the disclosure of Confidential Information the Council shall (unless obliged by said Act to make such disclosure without consultation or otherwise) consult the Contractor with a view to obtaining its agreement to the action to be taken in respect of any such requests.
The consultation shall take the form of a letter to the Contractor setting out full details of the request for Confidential Information and the Contractor shall submit any comments it wishes to make to the Council as to whether the disclosure would prejudice its commercial interests if it were to be released, within five working days of the date of the said letter.
The Council will take into account any comments made by the Contractor before any decision is made as to whether or not the Confidential Information requested is to be released. In any cases where the Council decides that the public interest in disclosing the Confidential Information outweighs the public interest in not doing so, it shall notify the Contractor accordingly.
Any requests that are made directly to the Contractor for the disclosure of Confidential Information shall be immediately referred to the Council (and in any event not later than two working days from the Contractor's receipt of the request) for it to decide whether the Information should be disclosed. Clauses 38.4 and 38.5 will also apply to such requests that are referred from the Contractor to the Council.
Any Confidential Information may be used for any purpose or disclosed to any other person to the extent that:
it is at the Effective Date, or becomes thereafter public knowledge through no fault of the disclosing party provided that in doing so the disclosing party shall not disclose any Confidential Information which is not public knowledge; or
the disclosing party can show to the reasonable satisfaction of the other that the Confidential Information was already known to the person to whom it was disclosed before it was divulged by the disclosing party.
Nothing contained in this Clause 38 shall prevent either the Council or the Contractor from distributing and/or issuing or permitting to be distributed or issued any material in connection with the Council's Best Value Duty.
The obligations under this Clause 38 shall survive the expiry or termination of this Contract for a period of three years.
The Contractor may retain copies of the information produced or collected in the course of providing the Services, but shall not disclose such information and shall not exploit such information commercially without the prior written consent of the Council, which may be withheld, or may be granted upon such terms and conditions as the Council in its absolute discretion shall see fit, and save as shall be permitted by such consent, the Contractor shall use such information only for the purposes of the Contract.
Either party ("the Receiving Party) may disclose Confidential Information to its officers, professional advisers, members, contractors or employees where such disclosure is reasonably necessary provided always that the Receiving Party shall use reasonable endeavours to ensure that such officers, professional advisers, members, contractor and employees comply with the same obligations that the Receiving Party is obliged to comply with pursuant to this Clause 38.
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E-mail: contracts@thanet.gov.uk
Tel: 01843 577111