Author: Panopticon Blog

11KBW Information Law Reports with JUSTIS, 2nd and 3rd edition updates

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The second edition of the Information Law Reports is now available. Reported cases include: OFCOM v Information Commissioner, Department of Health v IC, University of Newcastle upon Tyne v Information Commissioner and BUAV.

The third edition of the Information Law Reports will be released in late March 2012. Reported cases include: Birkett v DEFRA, Colleen Smith v IC and Devon & Cornwall Constabulary, Voyias v IC and Camden, Keiller v IC and University of East Anglia.

The reports are edited by Timothy Pitt-Payne QC, Anya Proops, and Robin Hopkins, three of the leading practitioners in the field of information law and members of 11KBW’s Information Law Group.

For more information on the Information law reports and how you get your free trial click here

11KBW Information Law Seminar

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11KBW last night hosted a successful and well-attended information law seminar. The seminar was chaired by James Goudie QC and papers were presented by Tim Pitt Payne and Anya Proops. Tim presented a paper which considered issues of surveillance and employee banning lists and vetting (‘The Surveillance Society In and Out of the Workplace’). Anya presented a paper on recent FOIA developments (‘Recent FOIA Developments: Parliamentary Crises, Ministerial Vetoes and Beyond’). 11KBW would like to thank all those who took the time to attend. If you are legal practitioner and are interested in attending future 11KBW information law seminars, please contact our Head of Marketing, Lucy Miller (lucy.miller@11kbw.com; 0207 632-8500).

Foul or suspected foul

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Posted by Julian Wilson

In Barclays-v-Guardian [2009] EWHC 591 (which Anya Proops commented on a couple of days ago), Mr. Justice Blake referred to the well known distinction between tax evasion and tax avoidance and then commented critically on the Guardian’s description of the Barclays’ employee who leaked its internal documents to Vince Cable MP as a “whistleblower”. The Judge said: “usually one blows a whistle to denote a foul, and I have already observed that the distinction between evasion and avoidance needs to be borne in mind in this context.” It appears that the Judge must not have had the Public Interest Disclosure Act in mind in referring to the term “whistleblower”. To qualify under the statute for potential protection, a worker’s disclosure need not be of a proven “foul” but only made with a reasonable belief that his employer is failing to comply with a legal obligation (ERA s.43B). Further, to gain potential protection for a qualifying disclosure where it has been made to an MP, the disclosure need not be of a proven “foul” but needs to be made with an honest and reasonable belief that that the information disclosed and any allegation contained in it are substantially true (S. 43G). Most whistleblowers have only a hunch that something is a foul without the means to prove it and the idea of PIDA is to protect them if they make the disclosure to a person having the ability and resources to investigate it. The protection offered to whistleblowers would be of no utility if only those with the legal brain necessary to distinguish evasion from avoidance could enjoy protection.  

Make it intelligible

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Posted by James Goudie QC

One of the circumstances when there is a duty to provide information is when there is a duty to consult. One of the four elements of fair consultation is the provision of adequate information on which to respond. In R (Breckland DC) v The Boundary Committee and R(East Devon DC) v The Boundary Committee [2009) EWCA Civ 239] concerned with proposals for local government reorganistion, the Boundary Committee (BC) was under a statutory duty to solicit representations upon their draft proposals and to take account of those representations. The Court of Appeal today held that this meant that the BC must carry out a process of consultation, including publishing enough material to enable all those interested to respond intelligently, and that the information must be published in a form which members of the public may understand. The Court of Appeal further held that the BC had failed adequately to consult on affordability, because they had not provided sufficiently intelligible information in relation to that criterion or given adequate time for response to it.

Welcome to Panopticon

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Welcome to “Panopticon”, a new blog about Information Law maintained by members of 11KBW’s Information Law Practice Group.  We opened our doors to the public on 18th March (you will see some earlier posts, below, created while the blog was still under development).

Information law is about the right to know, and the right to keep private – and it is also about the ever-shifting boundary between those rights.  It encompasses areas such as data protection, freedom of information, the protection of private information under article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, breach of confidence, and the regulation of surveillance.  It is a fascinating and fast-moving area of the law, and is directly relevant to contemporary debates about open government, the “database state” and the “surveillance society”.  For a more detailed explanation, click on the link at the top of the page  (“What is Information Law?”).

A word about our title.  The Panopticon was Jeremy Bentham’s proposed new model prison, in which constant surveillance would be a tool for moral regeneration (see here for details and illustrations).  It has become an enduring metaphor in debates about the benefits and the dangers of systematic information-gathering.  The title has a secondary meaning:  this site is our own “Panopticon”, in which we try to keep an overview of developments in this area and to share them with our readers.

We hope you will find the blog interesting and informative.  You may also be interested to explore 11KBW’s main website:  this includes a wide range of conference papers and other materials about information law.

We don’t have a facility to post comments on individual posts, but please feel free to provide feedback by emailing Claire Halas:   Claire.Halas@11kbw.com