Veolia Environmental Services has lost its appeal against a High Court ruling, ordering it to release details of an £850m PFI waste contract with Nottinghamshire CC to antiincineration campaigners.

But, despite upholding the judgement of the right of access to information under the Audit Commission Act 1998, the Court of Appeal concluded such items should not be disclosed unless they were in the public interest.

The decision regarding Veolia Environmental Services’ appeal was described by leading procurement lawyer, Helen Randell, as a ‘great, balanced victory’ for both transparency and commerce.

Ms Randell, who is head of Trowers’ public sector commercial department, told Surveyor: ‘We are all operating in a climate of greater transparency. But for commerce to work properly through competitive tenders, some commercial information must be held back. This is an incentive for firms to offer local authorities greater value for money.’

Steve Mitchell, managing director of the firm’s regional division, said: ‘We first requested a legal ruling on this issue because we wanted to give clarity to local authorities, the general public and the waste management industry.’

Nottinghamshire’s cabinet member for environment and sustainability, Cllr Richard Butler, welcomed the judgement saying: ‘It will assist all local authorities in the future when they consider their statutory obligations to allow access to confidential information held by them.’

Ms Randell said the judgement balanced the interest that people needed to know their council was monitoring the performance and paying what it should for contracted services.

But it did not go so far that the integrity of commercial process was undermined.

The original request was made by Nottinghamshire resident and waste campaigner, Shlomo Dowen, under the audit laws. He was represented by Friends of the Earth lawyer, Laura Gyte, who expressed disappointment the court implied a qualification on commercial confidentiality.

She added: ‘In our view, this is a matter for Parliament – but it is important that even where commercial confidentiality is claimed, the audit laws mean public authorities must still disclose the information where it is in the public interest.’