Serious Crime Bill [HL]

moved AmendmentNo. 99A: 99A: After Clause 65, insert the following new Clause— ““Exempted data Nothing in this Part authorises the disclosure of data contained in— (a) the National Identity Register (as defined in the Identity Cards Act 2006 (c. 15)), or (b) any database established pursuant to section 12 of the Children Act 2004 (c. 31) (information databases), or the use of such data in data matching exercises.”” The noble Lord said: My Lords, this amendment would prevent data in the children's index or the national identity register being shared or used in data-matching exercises for the purposes of identifying and preventing fraud or for such other purposes as the Government may choose. The purpose of sharing and using data is, at least initially, for the prevention and detection of fraud. It is not for the protection of children. It was for the protection of children that Parliament agreed to the legislation authorising the creation of the children's index. Providing in-depth access to the data in these databases for the purposes covered by Part 3 amounts to an unacceptable example of function creep. The Government say that they want to collect and retain our personal data for one purpose, but then seek to use those data for another, unrelated purpose in the future. When it comes the collection of data for the children's index, the Government have heard from these Benches on numerous occasions in the past few weeks, not least from my noble friend Lady Walmsley, about the sensitivity of this issue and how it is becoming increasingly obvious to parents that information which is given about their children may be used for purposes that they did not envisage. I beg to move.