My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 153 in my name and that of my noble friend Lord Clement-Jones. Section 17(1) of the Data Protection Act 1998 states that personal data must not be processed unless an entry in respect of the data controller is included in the register maintained by the Information Commissioner. Effectively, processing personal data without registering and without paying a fee is, at the moment, a strict liability criminal offence. This ensures that all data controllers are aware of their most basic obligations and that a central register of who is processing personal data is maintained. It also provides a simple means of collecting notification fee income.
We have been made acutely aware during the debates on the passage of the Bill of the increased responsibilities that will be placed on the Information Commissioner and the need for her to have additional resources. This is one way of ensuring that she has those resources, provided she is able to keep the fees raised and does not have to hand over large amounts of those fees to the Treasury.
This is an important protection for data subjects, and the Government have asserted that they are strengthening the law to protect data subjects. If the requirement to register is removed, as will happen without this amendment, this will weaken those protections. In addition to protections provided by registration and the increased awareness of the other requirements around data protection as a result of registering, it allows for the Proceeds of Crime Act to be used to confiscate money generated by the unlawful processing of personal data by those who are not registered. This would be lost if this amendment is not adopted.
The amendment seeks to maintain the current position by requiring the Information Commissioner to register all data controllers. However, unlike the current requirement for more detailed information, the amendment requires that the data controller provides only the minimum of information—such as his name and address; if he has nominated a representative for the purposes of the Act, their name and address; and the principal activity or activities undertaken by the data controller.
The Minister may wish to pray in aid article 57(3) of the GDPR, which states:
“The performance of the tasks of each supervisory authority shall be free of charge for the data subject and, where applicable, for the data protection officer”.
We argue that this is a notification fee, not a task performed by the Information Commissioner, and a fee that would be levied on the data controller and not the data protection officer. I beg to move.