DRAFT ANALYSIS of the Photo Card Bill 2004 … for letter to Costa, asking for answers to these questions

16 May 2005 Analysis of the Workplace Surveillance Bill 2005 Introduction This paper sets out the Australian Privacy Foundation’s analysis of the Workplace Surveillance Bill 2005 (NSW). The Workplace Surveillance Bill represents a step forward in terms of tackling the issue of employee privacy, while also being mindful of employers’ interests in preventing unlawful behaviour in the workplace. However the Bill has several key deficiencies, the most significant of which are the failure to regulate overt surveillance, and the failure to provide remedies for employees who suffer a breach of privacy as a result of workplace surveillance. We suggest that both employees and employers would benefit from a Bill which provided greater clarity in the area of overt surveillance. It is our view that unless modified, this Bill represents more a lost opportunity than a serious attempt at law reform in the contentious area of workplace privacy. This paper therefore includes a number of suggestions for how the Bill could be modified to provide greater privacy protection to employees, and greater clarity and certainty for employers. Overt surveillance The Bill follows the approach of the existing Workplace Video Surveillance Act 1998 (NSW), by allowing overt surveillance with minimal regulation by way of notice requirements, and then defining every incidence of workplace surveillance which does not comply with the notice requirements as its ...