This was a large-scale illegal operation involving mass invasion of privacy and serious breaches of the Data Protection Act. You might think that by now the 44 companies implicated in it, including household names such as Balfour Beatty, Sir Robert McAlpine and Carillion, would have been brought to book. Sadly not. On discovering the covert database the Information Commissioner took very limited action. Ian Kerr – the man who carried out the day-to-day work of maintaining the database and responding to employers’ requests for information – was fined £5,000 and “enforcement notices” (requiring the unlawful activity to stop) were only issued against a handful of the companies who admitted being involved. The companies themselves were never separately investigated and most have got away scot-free.
This is a human rights issue of enormous public importance. Contracting out the blacklisting of innocent workers, politicians and journalists is no better than farming out phone hacking to private detectives. So Liberty has written to the Information Commissioner asking him to conduct thorough investigations into the 44 companies and take enforcement action where necessary. If we cannot persuade him to discharge his public duty, we may have to seek the assistance of the courts.
