Data Protection: Case Note on Scottish National Party v The Information Commissioner
My case note on the Information Tribunal's decision of 15 May 2006 in Scottish National Party v The Information Commissioner is the first update to my IP/IT-Update website since 3 May 2006 and indeed my first entirely new contribution to that site for yonks. The case is interesting and important for several reasons which I set out in the note. It may well have an impact far beyond our shores and indeed far beyond its subject matter. Readers who are not au fait with English (or Scottish or Northern Irish) data protection law may be interested to know that we have had data protection legislation in this country since 1984. We were by no means the first country to have such legislation. Sweden has had a Data Protection Act since 1973 and Austria since 1978. One of the reasons why Parliament enacted data protection legislation here was an early decision of the Swedish Data Inspection Board which prevented the Swedish subsidiary of a German multinational from transmitting data on i...