US FOIA - new FOIA Bill approved by Senate

Forbes.com : Senate Panel: Speed Up FOIA Requests
"The Senate Judiciary Committee approved a bill Thursday to close gaps in the Freedom of Information Act and speed release of government documents. Sponsored by Sens. John Cornyn, R-Texas, and Russell Feingold, D-Wis., the bill would penalize federal agencies that don't respond to FOIA information requests in a timely fashion."

Also see GovExec.com

Read the full text of the Bill, (Note:it is yet to pass through the House.)

The Bill moves the US closer to an ombudsman model of FOIA with the establishment of the Office of Government Information Services. The penalties for delay are also interesting in that if an agency breaches the time limit in the USA FOIA the number of exemptions available to use are vastly reduced to smaller core number, related to national secuirty and personal info etc.

Thomas Susman wrote an article about the Bill last year in Open Government

Add your comments below - would any of the provisions in the Bill be worth considerng here in the UK?