Virgin cleared over showing CCTV proving Corbyn needn’t sit on floor
THE release of CCTV footage of Jeremy Corbyn looking for a seat on a train did not commit a serious breach of data protection law, it was ruled yesterday.
The Labour leader was filmed sitting on the floor of a Virgin train carriage and claiming he was unable to find a seat on the “ram-packed” service from London to Newcastle upon Tyne last August.
But Virgin then released footage showing Mr Corbyn walking past empty seats.
The operator “should have taken better care” to obscure other passengers’ faces, according to the Information Commissioner’s Office.
Virgin had “no reason to publish pictures of anyone else on the train”, the commissioner found.
But the watchdog stopped short of action against the train firm to reflect “the exceptional circumstances of the breach”.
Sir Richard Branson, who co-owns the rail operator with Stagecoach, got involved in the row by posting a link to the images on his Twitter account.
Mr Corbyn later insisted he had wanted two seats together so he could talk to his wife on Virgin Trains East Coast.
Companies must provide details of how they handle personal data and if they do not process it in the way people expect they could be breaking the law.
The commissioner ruled that Virgin had a “legitimate interest” in using the CCTV footage outside its published conditions as it was correcting what it deemed to be misleading news reports that were potentially damaging to its reputation.
The watchdog concluded that Mr Corbyn would have had “different expectations” than other passengers as to his privacy because he had made a video showing him on the train and would anticipate that Virgin would “respond in kind” after he raised the issue of overcrowding.