MPs allowed to use personal emails?

[titch]

BBC News - Matt Hancock: Labour calls for investigation into private emails

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-57631547

 

Reading this article is suggests MPs are allowed to use personal emails as long as they forward any correspondence to their "work" email after.

 

Surely that's not acceptable? Didn't Hillary Clinton almost go to prison for doing that? Are we over zealous in schools making staff use their work email?

[FN-GM]

Surely that cannot be right??

[localzuk]

EDIT: Realised it was political...

 

I suppose it depends on the specifics of the law. It'd have to be taken on a case by case basis with each email. Were there breaches of data protection rules, or breaches of disclosure rules etc... However, consequences do also matter in the context. In our roles, our policies are there to protect our organisations and the children we look after. We don't have the capacity to allow flexibility with it. But in government? What would the consequences be from not following the guidelines? If there are no real consequences then the guidelines are like many a policy - useless in the real world.

Edited June 28, 2021 by localzuk

[elsiegee40]

Mod Warning

 

This thread will remain open only if it stays on the topic of use of personal email for work purposes.

 

If it strays into politics it will be locked and remain so.

 

@titch Hillary Clinton was not jailed. The FBI did investigate, but “concluded no "reasonable prosecutor" would bring a criminal case against Mrs Clinton, but that she and her aides were "extremely careless" in their handling of classified information.”

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-31806907

Edited June 28, 2021 by elsiegee40

[jthompson]

I would expect the rules to have some kind of catch-all like "anything work-related in a private email account should be forwarded asap", rather than an allowance for work to be conducted over private channels. We're all very used to that distinction being pretty much sacrosanct in our line of work, so these sorts of stories always seem amazing to me. Similarly the idea of a CCTV camera being planted in a miniter's office, but that in itself not being the scandal.

[elsiegee40]

As we are all aware, Freedom of Information and Subject Access requests are difficult to fulfil at the best of times. Doing so when personal email addresses are involved makes it even worse.

 

Then there’s Data Protection and GDPR. Any organisation handling personally sensitive information should see use of their organisation’s emails as a basic precaution for data security.

[ITGuyNW]

I mean, do we really think MPs care about it? Should he use his personal email for work? No. Will he (and they) do it anyway? Yes. Will there be any repercussions? No.

 

Nadine Dorries under fire for lax attitude to cybersecurity | Nadine Dorries | The Guardian

[jmak]

Have been resisting all weekend as I am aware of the political rules of the forum...

 

We're all aware of the politician who's in trouble, but the first thing that struck be about the story was "how the hell did CCTV footage from a private office inside a government building get into the hands of the press?"

 

That seems like a massive data breach to me; I can imagine the trouble we'd be in if CCTV footage from a school got leaked.

[paulkerton]

So, as long as when a GDPR request comes along, he is happy for people to be given access to his email, I'm not entirely sure there is a legal stop to it, ultimately. He's not an employee after all. I'm sure that would be the legal loophole anyway.

 

That seems like a massive data breach to me; I can imagine the trouble we'd be in if CCTV footage from a school got leaked.

Absolutely whistleblowing protection for this.

[mikeprice]

I can imagine initial contact being made via a personal email address

 

e.g. maybe Mrs mikeprice meets someone who is selling something that she think would be useful in a school I work in

but she doesn;t know my school email address - so she give the contact my personal email

they contact me via that - so - being responsible I reply from my school address - and all the negotiation and stuff goes through that

 

 

e.g. when I left my last school all the communication was on my school email. Hence, when I left the school still had access to all the negotiation between me and the suppliers.

If I had used my personal address they would have no access to these negotiations.

And I would be perfectly free to delete all the emails whenever I want

 

Same applies to MPs