Secret Recording

[margiffer]

Is it legal for a secretly recorded conversation to be used as evidence to have someone dismissed once submitted to their employer ?
Can anyone help please ?

[judgemental24]

Re: Secret Recording

You use covert recordings without the employers permission, though not unlawful will be a total breakdown of trust between the employer and employee

The only exception will be if the recording is part of a protected disclosure

Are we talking about a conversation recorded in work time or out of work??

[margiffer]

Re: Secret Recording

Thank you for reply . The recording was secretly done in the privacy of my own home on a weekend by someone well known to me . Just like to know if you are a lawyer uk or USA.
Thank you.

[nemesis45]

Re: Secret Recording

I assume ( please correct me if I'm wrong) that some derogatory was said about the employer in a conversation in your own and with somebody you would trust i.e. you would consider the conversation was confidential?

What ever was said in private should not be recorded and shared with anyone.
Has the employer taken action?

nem

[mystery1]

Re: Secret Recording

As i understand it, in Employment courts they will use evidence as long as there was no expectation of privacy. If you are in a conversation with someone who records it, tough. If

you are having a private discussion with someone in a room with nobody else around, door closed etc and the a recorder has been left then the ET will not use the recording.

Criminal courts, i think, may attach appropriate weight to the evidence. This would take in to account how and where the recording was obtained.

M1

[margiffer]

Re: Secret Recording

Hi, and thank for your replies. Yes I would have considered the conversation to be confidential as in my own home. The conversation was outside of work time and yes the employer after listening to the recording with other colleagues has actually dismissed me even though I was a highly respected member of an NHS medical team.

[judgemental24]

Re: Secret Recording

I have to disagree to an extent

If you had been discussing work in the pub after work your comments might have been overheard and passed onto your employer as an example.

You can then be brought up on a disciplinary if justified for bringing your employer into disrepute

[mystery1]

Re: Secret Recording

Hi, and thank for your replies. Yes I would have considered the conversation to be confidential as in my own home. The conversation was outside of work time and yes the employer after listening to the recording with other colleagues has actually dismissed me even though I was a highly respected member of an NHS medical team.

Sounds like it wasn't private if it was one of the participants of the conversation who recorded, and used, the recording.

M1

[margiffer]

Re: Secret Recording

I was in the privacy of my own home ! Just me and my partner indoors, invited this well known to me person into my home, who deviously recorded conversation, then submitted it to my employer.

[judgemental24]

Re: Secret Recording

There is nothing stopping this person doing that.

The right to privacy as to Article 8 ECHR only applies to Government bodies and not individual citizens. The Data Protection Act will not apply In this case as the person doing the recording did it without the employers knowledge

[Crazy council]

Re: Secret Recording

I thought the law made this illegal, unless the person knows they are being recorded ( with consent ). Its not illegal to record it, but it is to play it back to anyone

The key parts are, its in the OPs property, not a public place or work place. But in there own home.

[judgemental24]

Re: Secret Recording

Vaughn v. London Borugh of Lewisham (2013) confirmed that covert recordings may be admissible into evidence with employment tribunal procedings

You do not need the other persons prior consent to record without their knowledge, that is a myth

It is what purpose you use the recording for is what matters

How many Youtube videos are there on Baliffs and TV licence inspectors??

The UK does not have a law in statute on individual right to privacy or restricts person to person recordings, with consent or not.. It will be on what is proportionate to the individual circumstances and existing statute

[mystery1]

Re: Secret Recording

I was in the privacy of my own home ! Just me and my partner indoors, invited this well known to me person into my home, who deviously recorded conversation, then submitted it to my employer.

Your home isn't private if you invite someone in. Had they left a recording device and left that would be different.

M1