that a civil servant should have on a work PC.
This is a public sector issue rather than you and a private company ? You might find a newspaper willing to help pay your solicitors fees !
My solicitor is writing to ask for a forensic analysis of the hard drive etc but the employer has not complied with any Freedom if info requests etc so far-
Your solicitor is asking for forensic analysis under the freedom of information act ? Time to change solicitor !
Depending what they've been doing with the PC it might be a bit late anyway, unfortunately. But hard to know without further info.
Can Trojans etc actually do this kind of stuff without users knowledge?
Trojans can do almost anything without the users knowledge, although the majority of trojans have a primary purpose of collecting personal information.
I wish you the very best, I really do, but there's very little we can do as its a bit of a needle in a haystack without knowing how your work IT is setup to make suggestions.
Do keep us updated.