I hope I will give further comfort to the noble Lord.
The HMRC data-sharing powers allow a sharing of income information for the landlord’s purposes under this policy only. If the landlord shares the information with anyone else, powers in the Bill could see criminal proceedings brought against them.
It may be that noble Lords have in mind that local authorities already contract their services out to private companies to collect personal information on income, and that they may do the same for the operation of this policy. Those authorities which contracted out services would have very clear rules in place about that function. The powers in the Bill do not cover that function. I therefore assure noble Lords that we take data security very seriously.
Amendment 80 would remove the subsection which allows HMRC to disclose information to a public body which has been given an intermediary function between HMRC and local housing authorities. I thank the noble Lords, Lord Kennedy and Lord Beecham, for this amendment, as it gives me an opportunity to provide greater clarity over the subsection’s purpose. The intention is to enable data sharing by HMRC and local authorities for the purpose of income verification in the most appropriate way. The clause enables the function to be passed to a public body to act as a gatekeeper of information.
We are developing our thinking around how this function would operate in practice if it is needed. We want to retain flexibility in the Bill so that we can put processes in place to help local housing authorities implement the policy in a streamlined and efficient way. This may involve the creation of a public body to carry out that function on behalf of others.
The aim of this provision is to make the process as simple as possible to implement if HMRC needs to share information. I hope that noble Lords will understand that, should it be necessary to do it via a public body, that option should be available.