Economic League
Economic League, an organisation which collects data for private and government subscribers. Much of the information they collect results in the blacklisting of totally innocent workers, who have been unable to obtain or maintain jobs because of the inaccuracy of the League’s data. It is now a matter of public record that the League was set up by former intelligence agents and that since its inception it maintained official links with MI5 and Special Branch.
In the UK companies concerned about employing trade union activists, former tribunal litigants or political militants can contact an organisation called CAPRiM. This organisation was formerly called The Economic League. It reportedly went into liquidation two years ago, but has now risen pheonix-like from the ashes and has a registered address in Redditch, Worcestershire. What CAPRiM does is probably unlawful under the Data Protection Act, although its predecessor always claimed that its records were kept on card indexes. The Employment Relations Act 1999 outlawed ‘blacklisting’, but we await the necessary secondary legislation to make the Act bite. Meanwhile CAPRiM operates as a legitimate business, is active in the Institute of Directors and sits on the management board of a leading Business School.
Not just my paranoid rantings you know! Please check out “The Journal of Information, Law and Technology” They have covered the New Code of Practice – S51 (3) (b) of The Data Protection Act 1998 at:
http://elj.warwick.ac.uk/jilt/news00-2.html
and …..
For the giggle, thought i would include and extract from Hansard, to show that the state of affairs, continued.
Written Answers to Questions: Wednesday 8 February 1989
Economic League
Mr. Alton : To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether the Economic League is registered under the Data Protection Act 1984.
Mr. Renton : The Economic League has a single entry in the data protection register, a copy of which is in the Library, covering its processing of personal data for the administration of the organisation.
Mr. Alton : To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will seek to enact legislation to ensure that people blacklisted by the Economic League can obtain access to the files that have caused their blacklisting to check that information.
Mr. Renton : No.
http://www.parliament.the-stationery-office.co.uk/pa/cm198889/cmhansrd/1989-02-08/Writtens-1.html
The Economic League was set up in 1919 to fight Bolshevism and intervened in industrial relations
However, it wound up in 1994 after complaints of it holding inaccurate information on individuals; under data law it would have had to open its files. It had 40 current Labour MPs on its files, including the chancellor, Gordon Brown, and prominent trade unionists, as well as journalists and thousands of shopfloor workers.
Now again, open for business as: CAPRiM
Left blacklist man joins euro fight – Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/EMU/Story/0,2763,366293,00.html
