£10 to see boss's secret files

Employees will be able to demand to see any company record that mentions them, including confidential emails, handwritten notes and personal files, under an anti-secrecy code designed to increase openness in the office.

The regulations will allow a worker access to any document about him or her for a fee of £10.

Few companies are thought to have grasped the full significance of the new rules which will appear in the final draft version of the Information Commission code on employee records, which sets the standards the watchdog believes employers must follow to avoid possible criminal liability.

"For a lot of employers, it's going to be a most horrible surprise," said Catherine Prest, of law firm Hammond Suddards Edge.

Trade unions are expected to welcome the code, which will require employers to provide "sickness records, disciplinary or training records, appraisal or performance review notes, email logs, audit trails and information held in general personnel files".

Employers undertaking internal disciplinary action will have to give access to the relevant records "even if responding to a request might impact on a disciplinary investigation?, the code states. The only documents-that may remain secret are those relating to management forecasting, such as plans to promote, transfer or make a worker redundant. Companies will also be able to refuse to disclose fall-back positions in negotiations over payoffs for staff about to lose their jobs.

The code, which comes under the new Data Protection Act, is being issued in four sections. The first covers job appointments and gives people the right to see interview notes. Rules will be published soon on drug testing and monitoring of emails, all of which are common in other European countries.

"There will have to be an enormous cultural change," said Ruth Lea, of the Institute of Directors.