This is an extract from The Employment Practices Code: Data Protection, which you can read on the Information Commissioner's Office's website, here.

Workers, like any other individuals, have a right to gain access to information that is kept about them. This right is known as subject access. The right applies, for example, to sickness records, disciplinary or training records, appraisal or performance review notes, e-mails, word-processed documents, e-mail logs, audit trails, information held in general personnel files and interview notes, whether held as computerised files, or as structured paper records. A fee of up to £10 can be charged by the employer for giving access.

Responding to a subject access request involves:

• telling the worker if the organisation keeps any personal information about him or her;
• giving the worker a description of the type of information the organisation keeps, the purposes it is used for and the types of organisations which it may be passed on to, if any;
• showing the worker all the information the organisation keeps about him or her, explaining any codes or other unintelligible terms used;
• providing this information in a hard copy or in readily readable, permanent electronic form unless providing it in that way would involve disproportionate effort or the worker agrees to receive it in some other way;
• providing the worker with any additional information the organisation has as to the source of the information kept about him or her.

There are a number of exemptions from the right of subject access which can be relevant in anemployment context.