I would like to publicly thank the Data Protection Commissioner for the prompt and effective action taken by his office in response to the numerous complaints of our clients that we recently submitted to the Data Protection Commission.

Bank of Valletta had for almost three months objected to provide clients with copies of the documentation held by the bank containing private personal information pertaining to client’s financial affairs. The basis upon which the bank had been refusing to provide the documents was that the same clients had “consented” to the bank’s conditional offer of May 26, 2011 in relation to the La Valette Property Fund. The bank’s refusal was notwithstanding the fact that data subjects were entitled to access the said information in terms of data protection legislation and indeed in terms of the Malta Bankers’ Association’s data protection guidelines for the promotion of good practice for the banking sector and this irrespective of whether the data subject had accepted the bank’s offer or not.

The failure to provide the requested information was impeding investors of the La Valette Multi Manager Property Fund from submitting documentary evidence in support of complaints for mis-selling to the Malta Financial Services Authority. Among other reasons, the basis on which clients were claiming that mis-selling took place was that the bank had not ensured that the investors meet at least the formal criteria in terms of which a person could be considered an experienced investor by the bank as selling agent of the said fund.

Thanks to the Data Protection Office, which instructed the bank’s data controller to accede to the data subjects’ right of access requests within 10 days, the clients have now had access to the data on their person and the struggle for their investment protection rights can continue.

In the circumstances, where so many public authorities soft pedal and cling to straws in order to avoid pronouncing themselves decisively in the interests of fairness, public accountability and consumer protection, the no-nonsense approach of the Data Protection Commission is a breath of fresh air.