One ruling, two interpretations

The infamous e-mail slip-up by Nationalist Party general secretary Paul Borg Olivier last year is back in the headlines after the two political parties gave different interpretations to a ruling by the Data Protection Commissioner.

The case dates back to last year when Dr Borg Olivier sent an e-mail to Cabinet ministers and mistakenly copied former Labour general secretary Jason Micallef, instead of Parliamentary Secretary Jason Azzopardi. In it he had proposed a data-sharing mechanism but Labour had insisted this was spying on the public and blurring the lines between the party and the government and called on the commissioner to investigate.

The PN said the commissioner dismissed allegations by Labour leader Joseph Muscat that Dr Borg Olivier breached the law when he asked Cabinet ministers to forward personal details on complainants.

The commissioner's investigations, the PN said, led him to conclude that under no circumstances had there been any processing of personal data and, therefore, the data protection law had not been violated.

The PN said the commissioner's decision shattered months of mud-slinging and deceptive attacks by Dr Muscat and the PL against Dr Borg Olivier and officials of the Office of the Prime Minister.

But, Labour insisted that had it not revealed a web of spying, there would, in the words of the commissioner, have been "serious consequences" on the right to privacy of people whose personal information would have been divulged.

It noted that the commissioner said: "For these reasons, the general secretary of the Nationalist Party is being warned that his request, had it been implemented, would have had serious consequences on the right to privacy of the individuals about whom personal information would have been issued."