Top mandarins call to have their privacy protected
SENIOR civil servants are urging the Government to put in place measures to protect their privacy after leaked recordings of a departmental meeting made headlines.
The annual conference of the Association of Higher Civil and Public Servants (AHCPS) passed a motion yesterday calling for extra privacy safeguards for Government staff.
It comes after the Business Post reported in February on a leaked taping of an internal meeting between Department of Health officials, where concerns were raised about ‘fake targets’ for HSE recruitment and ‘sloppiness’ in the health service’s financial reporting.
The motion, supported by a majority of AHCPS members yesterday, said there was ‘deep concern’ over recordings being made ‘without consent’ and leaked to the media.
‘Conference calls on civil service management to respond appropriately by putting in place measures to protect the privacy rights of our members in the workplace,’ the motion stated. Speaking to the Irish Daily Mail yesterday, the deputy general secretary of the AHCPS, Paul Malone, said the onus is on departments to ensure staff are aware of their ‘obligations’ under data protection legislation.
‘Our concerns are that our members should have rights to privacy and that they should be able to carry out their duties without the threat of secret recordings and subsequent leaks to the media,’ Mr Malone said.
‘We’ve asked for management inside in the civil service to react to this by putting into place protections for the rights of our members.
Asked what protections the AHCPS is seeking, Mr Malone said: ‘There could be compulsory training on data protection obligations for all employees, reinforcing that there are sanctions for the breach of that regulation. Also, the privacy policy within the civil service could be updated to cater for this issue.’
Civil servants are also calling on the Government to consider new legislation allowing staff the ‘right to disconnect’ for a better work/ life balance.
Meanwhile, the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Michael McGrath, confirmed that his officials are set to enter public pay talks with unions. It comes after public service unions triggered a review clause in the current pay agreement due to inflation. Mr McGrath said the discussions would be ‘difficult’.