United Kingdom Investigatory Powers Tribunal

This ruling relates to an open hearing held to determine whether the Tribunal had jurisdiction under RIPA to determine a claim made by a retired police officer against his former police force. The claim was for unlawful covert surveillance in breach of his right to respect for his private and family life and his home under Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights (the Convention) and section 6 of the Human Rights Act 1998 (the 1998 Act). The Tribunal ruled that, as the case related to the use of Private Investigators to undertake directed surveillance in relation to an employment dispute, no public interest would be served by giving the Tribunal exclusive jurisdiction over such a case. Therefore the Tribunal concluded this was not a case of directed surveillance within RIPA. It therefore fell outside the jurisdiction of the Tribunal.