ABSTRACT
The influence of Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights on domestic law has ensured that the state’s use of technical covert surveillance equiprrent has become legally regulated over the past twenty years, albeit in a somewhat piecemeal fashion. The passage of the Human Rights Act 1998 will see the development of the ‘right to respect for private life’ in UK law. This paper seeks to reflect upon the impact that the European Convention has had on the regulation of covert surveillance, and whether there is a theoretical justification for developing the ‘right to respect for private life’ beyond traditional private spheres and into the public arena. It is argued that overt surveillance in the form of closed circuit television cameras (CCTV) should thus be legally regulated according to the principles established by the European Convention, and that such an extension of the ‘right to respect for private life’ need not be detrimental to the common good.
