Critically evaluate the law on privacy in the workplace. As part of your evaluation, you need to consider the statutory and common law protection of workplace communication and data about employees. Is the current law an unnecessary burden on employers?
Essay Question:
Critically evaluate the law on privacy in the workplace. As part of your evaluation, you need to consider the statutory and common law protection of workplace communication and data about employees. Is the current law an unnecessary burden on employers?

The Executive Summary:
Your essay should start with an Executive Summary of your argument. Executive Summary is a concise document summarising your argument made in the main essay. It could be read separately from the main document and should make perfect sense to the reader, as in practice decisions are sometimes made on the basis of executive summaries. Your Executive Summary should:
-? Contain brief analysis of the question / issue within the question
-? Summarise the main argument
-? Follow the structure of the essay
-? Provide brief justifications for the arguments made
-? Only include materials used for the main essay
-? Contain a clear conclusion

Introduction to the topic:
Employment law is a fascinating and fast changing area of law. People spend a considerable amount of time in their workplace. They have obligations to fulfil their contractual responsibilities whilst they are there, but that does not mean that they forsake all of their rights. A developing area of law, which is particularly pertinent as a result of the increase in new technology, is the extent to which people should be entitled to privacy in the workplace. This debate is the focus of this question.

Guidance Notes:
Introduction:
The introduction should set out how you are going to structure your answer by providing a framework for your argument. It should provide the broad context for the essay by, for example, setting out what constitutes privacy in the workplace. It should also give some indication of your own view on whether the current law is an unnecessary burden on employers. What kinds of monitoring rights should employers have?

Main Body:
You might want to start your answer by considering practical examples of situations when data protection becomes relevant in the workplace. This needs to be followed by consideration and critical analysis of the statutory and common law provisions on protection of workplace communication and data about employees. It is anticipated that you will consider the Data Protection Act 1998, the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Acts 2000 and the Telecommunications (Lawful Business Practice) (Interception of Communications) Regulations 2000. There is also scope to consider the impact of Article 8 of the European Convention of Human Rights as incorporated into our jurisdiction by the Human Rights Act 1998. This should include a consideration of relevant cases.
It will be necessary to set out the mechanics of the various aspects of the legislative framework, i.e. what rights and responsibilities do they impose? In addition to the academic sources there is useful guidance on this on government websites.
A view needs to be formulated as to whether the current law is an unnecessary burden on employers. This needs to be presented in a measured, rather than an emotional way. You may consider broader public policy considerations when discussing this aspect of the question. There is also scope for considering recent examples of privacy in the workplace issues as reported in the media.

Conclusion:
This should provide a clear summary of the overall argument and specifically respond to the question.
! Please note that:

– The essay must not exceed 4, 000 words in length. Bibliography and Research trail are not included. Please add the bibliography and the Research trail in the end of the essay. The Research trail must be not more than 600 words.

For the purposes of this assessment, where the „Oxford system? has been employed, footnotes will not be included in the word count. Footnotes must however contain only information about the reference. There should be no argument or explanation to supplement the main body of work in footnotes.