Serious Crime Bill [HL]

My Lords, I am very happy to provide clarification and to take up the suggestion of the noble Baroness, Lady Carnegy of Lour. I hope I shall be able to do it as shortly as possible. I understand that an explanation would be helpful. The amendment of the noble Lords, Lord Dholakia and Lord Thomas of Gresford, would prevent the sharing of data which are contained in the national identity register and ContactPoint—previously known by the working title of ““information sharing index””—and the inclusion of those data in data-matching exercises. It would take it out in its entirety, which I do not believe is what the noble Baroness opposite would wish to do. Neither do I believe that, in truth, that is what the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford, would wish. ContactPoint will be a national online directory that will become operative in all 150 local authority areas by the end of 2008, consisting of basic demographic data pertaining to children and contact details of those providing specialist and targeted services to them. It is designed to facilitate a co-ordinated approach to providing care and services to children—something which, around the House, we have emphasised and underlined as necessary. Its purpose, as set out in Section 12 of the ChildrenAct 2004, is expressly linked to the duties in the Act on local authorities and their partners to co-operate to improve the well-being of children and to safeguard and promote their welfare. Access will be restricted to those who need it in connection with their work, including, for example, those in education, health, social care and youth offending. That is something which we have sought on all Benches to secure. Section 12 of the Children Act 2004 gives the Secretary of State power to make regulations governing the disclosure of data for the purposes of ContactPoint, in relation to both the bodies that must contribute data to this directory and the circumstances in which data from it can be disclosed. These regulations are due shortly to be laid before Parliament and are subject to affirmative resolution. That may satisfy the noble Baroness. Given the careful policy considerations that underlie the drafting of the Children Act, in particularSection 12, and the deliberate decision to vest in the Secretary of State the responsibility for making regulations governing the appropriate disclosure of information from this index, I am loath to pre-empt those decisions by making it impossible in this legislation for the Audit Commission or the specified anti-fraud organisation ever to have access to these data. For the present purposes, it is very difficult to see how the data contained in the ContactPoint would be relevant to the specific task of assisting in the prevention and detection of fraud. That is a criterion that has to be satisfied for data matching. We must remember what the Audit Commission will be able to do in obtaining data for data-matching purposes and that there are important limits on those powers.Even where the Audit Commission is able to require bodies to provide data on a mandatory basis under Section 32B, this must reasonably be for the purpose of conducting data-matching exercises that are designed to assist in the prevention and detection of fraud. So where data are provided on a voluntary basis, that must first be deemed appropriate for the purposes stated above, which will be a judgment that the Audit Commission as a public body will be required to make on reasonable grounds. I cannot see it but those would be the tests, and I think that how they would operate would be relatively safe and straightforward. On the basis of the regulatory framework already provided for in the Children Act and the limits on the Audit Commission’s powers to obtain information, I do not believe that it is necessary or appropriate to make the further amendment that is sought. Let me take this opportunity to explore whether part of the impetus for this amendment is the fear that data matching might be used to profile the propensity of children to commit offences in the future. I do not know whether the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford, had that in mind. I see him nodding. It is the sort of issue that I anticipate might concern him. I can quickly put his mind to rest by saying that I have tabled the amendment that will prevent the Audit Commission profiling individuals, both adults and children. So we have got rid of that difficulty. I turn now to the national identity register, which, as your Lordships know, is not yet in existence but will hold identity information on everyone issued with an ID card. It is intended eventually to include everyone aged 16 and over who is resident in the United Kingdom. I should stress that this will be a register of identity—information such as name, address, date of birth, nationality and so on. It will include photographs and biometric information such as fingerprints, but it will not be an amalgamation of every bit of personal data held by government. So there will be no criminal records, medical records or tax records. It is conceivable that under the Identity CardAct 2006 information in that register could be supplied to the Audit Commission under the statutory gateways already provided for in that legislation and subject to the terms of the secondary legislation. In particular, Section 20 of that Act would allow for the provision of specified information in the register to a specified public authority for a specified purpose. This would in theory enable identity information to be provided to the Audit Commission, but no information could be provided underSection 20 unless and until an order subject to the affirmative resolution procedure has been debated and agreed by both Houses of Parliament. The national fraud initiative is one of the very tools that might in the future provide the basis on which provision of information to the Audit Commission might be necessary in order to confirm an individual’s identity or provide particular information relating to a person, such as date of birth or address. Therefore, we can see no reason in principle why we should seek expressly to prohibit the Audit Commission’s use of the register in the manner proposed. Similarly we believe it would be a mistake not even to admit the possibility that the national identity register could be effectively and properly used for the prevention of fraud within the terms of Clause 61. One of the statutory purposes of the register as specified in Section 1(4) of the Identity Cards Act 2006 is the prevention and detection of crime. So, at a general level, if one accepts that fraud is a serious problem—the Government do, and the noble Lady opposite has said that she does too—and a corrosive problem that undermines confidence and makes us all pay more for services than we need to, it seems unwise to block off the use of means that might, and I emphasise might, be used to help to counter it. But the amendment is saying that in no circumstances could these two databases be used under this part of the Bill to prevent and detect fraud. I do not know whether either of them could or would be so used. In the case of the databases made under the Children Act 2004, I have already said that it is hard to conceive of their use for preventing and detecting fraud, but it would be going too far to rule them out from the start. We are not arguing in this part of the Bill for a free-for-all in the sharing or matching of data; it will be allowable only for the prevention and detection of fraud and will be subject to the safeguards of the Data Protection Act as regards proportionality and the other conditions which it applies. I also indicated when discussing AmendmentsNos. 96, 97 and 98 that we will be looking to introduce a code of practice for data sharing that would ensure that such data disclosure as takes place under Clause 61 is entirely correct and proper—one already exists for the Audit Commissioner. The range of safeguards available is such that we think that fears over the national identity register, which have been echoed by the noble Baroness, Lady Carnegy of Lour, will not prove well founded. We think that fears about databases established under the Children Act 2004, which are demonstrated by the amendment, are also unfounded. The noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, asked for a general comment about the JCHR report. We very much appreciate the concern raised by the JCHR on Clauses 61 to 64. We are considering these matters further and will return to them later; we have already committed to doing so, albeit in another place. We will seek to do this as soon as we can. The noble Baroness, Lady Anelay, asked whether we discussed the limitation of data matching involving the identity register to serious crime. We have—the Audit Commission is quite content with the limitation that we have, so we think that there is a really good balance. I am relatively confident from hearing the contributions that have been made that noble Lords will be loath to prevent this opportunity to identify fraud and crime if, following the affirmative resolution procedure, both Houses thought that that was a fit and proper thing to do. I hope that on that basis, and with the assurance that noble Lords opposite have done so much to underline about the need for care, attention and scrutiny, that the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford, will think that he has done his valiant best and can rest content that his duty is done.