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Lawrence

Which Schedules 2 and 3 are you referring to in the second para - those of the DPA itself?  Or paragraphs 2 and 3 of the Schedule to SI 417 ?

If the latter, and the disclosure is of sensitive personal data, I think the public authority may be expected to justify disclosure to a journalist under paragraph 3 of SI 417. It seems designed to address precisely that situation as it requires the 'data controller' (ie the person considering whether to release the information to the journalist) to reasonably believe that publication would be in the public interest. 

I suppose paragraph 2 might sometimes come into play when considering disclosure to a journalist but it would require that any disclosure was "necessary" for the discharge of a function relating to dishonesty, improper conduct, mismanagement etc which is a stricter test than that in Paragraph 3 which only requires that the disclosure "is in connection with" unlawful or dishonest etc conduct. 

Maurice

On 6 Jun 2012, at 12:08, Lawrence Serewicz wrote:

Phil and Maurice,
Thanks for the responses both are helpful and clarify the issue for me.  One item I wanted to check, was whether there was distinction between processing (say providing the information to a journalist or an interested body such as a trade association for their own purpose of protecting their reputation and members) and publishing it on a website or a council publication.

 

My thinking is that SI 2000 No.417 (Schedule 2) would cover the sharing (disclosing) to the journalist or the trade association.  While Schedule 3 would cover the publication of the information. 

 

Perhaps this is a difference without a distinction.  My approach would be that each serves a different purpose.  Following this train of logic, the ICO acts differently from a Council in terms of what it publishes.  By that I mean, a Council may have a regular publication (akin to a newspaper or a local journal) that goes to all households in an area, while the ICO does not have the same type of regular publication.

 

Perhaps, in the end, the issue is mute because both schedules cover the processing.  With the looming “right to be forgotten” I would be interested to know if the webpages are removed after a set period. I appreciate that this will not remove it entirely although it will reduce the level of curious access rather than determined access.

 

Thanks again for your help and the link to cases.  What was interesting is that I used the same approach to Cobain. The key difference is that the person in question was not courting the same publicity, the time from case to request is shorter, and the applicant is not an investigative journalist.

 

The Cobain case does give one pause concerning the use of s.32 both for the time frame and for the need to consider the applicant.

 

Best,

 

Lawrence

 




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