Lawyers are set to cash in on an anticipated spate of sackings by Citybanks of employees
found emailing pornography.David Green, head of employment at Charles Russell, says he
is currentlyworking on four cases with City institutions involving porn on theinternet.
"Sackings will start very soon," says Green.He says banks are, for the first time,
taking seriously the problem ofemployees downloading pornography from the internet and
sending it tofriends.To date, City institutions have contented themselves with sending
outsternly-worded warnings to all staff. But attitudes are changing fastbecause the
warnings have little or no effect."There is going to be a big wave of sackings,"
predicts Green. "This is aserious problem. Everyone is doing it, so if you sack one then
you have tosack everyone."The banks get quite upset about it as what is being downloaded
is prettyhorrific."What the institutions are most worried about is that pornography is
oftensent outside the company and may be intercepted, reflecting badly on thebank.The
situation adds to problems for employers on top of concerns overdefamatory emails. Green
says that many employees do not realise thatemails are disclosable documents under court
rules and can be retrievedafter deletion.