Scottish exams fiasco could spark data protection case

The Scottish Assembly has launched an investigation into why several thousand Scottish students received inaccurate or incomplete exam results after a processing meltdown by the Scottish Qualifications Agency (SQA) - an investigation which could see the SQA sued under the Data Protection Act.

However, lawyers have stressed that this would be difficult because of the need under the terms of the Act to prove financial loss.

Concern was raised after the minister for children and education, Sam Galbraith, admitted that the main cause of the problem was "missing data".

Anne Hind, assistant Data Protection Commissioner, said: "The Data Protection Act provides rights to individuals, that if data controllers cause 'damage or damage and distress', those individuals are eligible for compensation from the data controller [in this case the Scottish Qualifications Agency]."

Anthony Riem, a partner at data protection specialist law firm Philippsohn Crawfords Berwald, said: "Whilst the Data Protection Act in principle offers protection to deal with this problem by giving school leavers a right to claim damages, it is difficult to see how those damages could be proved or quantified."

A spokesman for the Scottish Assembly said that all aspects of the collation and distribution of exam results in Scotland would come under scrutiny, but refused to specify if the investigation would look at specific data protection issues.

Universities have said they will allocate places on the basis of results predictions, not results. But observers have stressed that students with known accurate results have an advantage over those still waiting.

The SQA said in a statement that the 2,000 students who had inaccurate or incomplete results had had their situation 'evaluated', but declined to comment on whether they had yet received their results.

The fiasco has led to the replacement of SQA CEO, Ron Tuck, by Scottish Enterprise Forth Valley chief executive, Bill Morton.

A spokesman for the Scottish Assembly said it was now confident the situation was being addressed. "Ministers made it clear at the time that they were unhappy at the information that the SQA provided," he said. "But the SQA has since been working around the clock to correct this, and the appointment of Bill Morton has restored confidence."