Company deleting email trails prior to tribunal

[SolutionsSpecialist]

I have had a grievance against my company and put in a formal access request for data (specifically emails between myself and HR and a third party, relating to the issue in question). I have the ones sent between me and HR but not the third party, whose actions led to my grievance. The company brought in hard copies to our meeting.
However, when they sent the final outcome, whilst the outcome letter references the paper documents, none of them were attached. I queried this, and the HR department verbally told me the emails have been deleted from the server so they can't give me copies. I asked for that in writing and they have not responded to my email (presumably because they don't want me to have it in writing that they have destroyed evidence). I sought advice from Citizens Advice and the lady's view was, if the company's deliberately deleted evidence, it could be a much more serious issue but wasn't sure if it comes under a data breach or a breach of trust (or both). Would this come under a GDPR breach?

 

[Mike Kilby PC.dp]

The CA lady is right that if the company have deleted evidence, that could be a breach of GDPR. I would recommend you raise a query with the ICO. I suspect if you tell them what you've put here, they will issue a case and write to the company concerned.

 

[The Byre]

You might like to look into bringing a civil case against the other part on the grounds that the evidence has been tampered with. Unfortunately, E.Tribunals are not strictly courts of law and the rules of evidence, therefore, do not apply (as far as I know!) If you can PROVE that emails were deleted, that would be tampering with evidence (in a court of law) and that falls under the common law offence of 'Perverting the Course of Justice' which is a serious criminal offence for which people can and do go to prison.

The problem here is that it is likely to be your word against theirs and if the emails are nowhere, then they are nowhere and cannot be presented to anyone as they don't exist!

Deletion of emails could be regarded as a Breach of Trust which is a civil wrong (a concept developed some 600 years ago!) as it denies you access to a legal right. It, therefore, would be subject to civil proceedings.

(This issue could make a really good exam question!)

 

[Employment Law Clinic]

I have had a grievance against my company …

Is it a grievance, or as the title suggests, a tribunal?


No idea about the GDPR issues, but I would expect that the ICO (as they’ve indicated they would while we all get familiar with the new rules, and perhaps case law makes them clearer) that they’ll simply encourage better behaviour, perhaps issue a slap on the wrist in most cases.

However, when they sent the final outcome, whilst the outcome letter references the paper documents, none of them were attached.

If it’s a tribunal you’re going to, just present the covering letters. The Employment Judge will be more than capable of drawing necessary conclusions from the references in the covering letter to the final outcomes while the actual documents are unavailable – and their conclusions would be heavily weighted in your favour.


The documents are gone, so nothing you can do about that. Just ensure you bring this fact to the tribunal’s attention within your evidence.


Karl Limpert