Statistics and Registration Service Bill

The hon. Gentleman raises an interesting point, but the devil is in the detail. Subsection (4) lists the exemptions to the general prohibition and my concern is that paragraph (a) in that subsection is sufficiently widely drafted that people will not have confidence that their data will be used only for statistical purposes. Our amendment No. 24 would narrow the scope of the provisions and replicate the existing restrictions under clauses 40 and 41. The hon. Gentleman is right about the broad principle, but I am concerned that the exemptions could be used to promote or enable more data sharing.