Trade (Disclosure of Information) Bill

(Limited Text - Ministerial Extracts only)

Committee stage & Committee: 1st sitting & Committee: 1st sitting: House of Commons & Report stage & Report stage: House of Commons
Wednesday 16th December 2020 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Trade Policy (Greg Hands)]

Thank you, Dame Rosie, if I have the nomenclature correct. As we come to the end of the transition period, it is important that the Government make the best use of the information that they already hold to minimise any disruption that may result from the new border requirements that will apply irrespective of the nature of our trading relationship with the EU. More specifically, it is important that the Government use that information to develop a detailed picture of the flow of goods and people at key locations at the border. That will inform decision making right across Government, leading to better outcomes for businesses and citizens.

As Members will be aware, the clauses in the Bill have been scrutinised previously by the House during the passage of the Trade Bill. Members may recall that a key source of information within Government relating to both trade and border management is HMRC, which has significant responsibilities in relation to the movement of goods across the border. HMRC has specific statutory restrictions in relation to the sharing of information that it holds and, in the absence of an express legal gateway to permit sharing, the Government cannot make use of this data effectively.

The clause has therefore been introduced to allow HMRC to share the data that it holds with any other public or private body that carries out a public function related to trade for the purposes of that function. This power enables HMRC and bodies working with or on behalf of HMRC to share data with Departments, including, for example, the Cabinet Office, which, through the border and protocol delivery group, is leading Government preparedness for border readiness at the end of the transition period.

BPDG has established a border operations centre to monitor and manage flow at the end of the transition period and to support relevant authorities to better manage border controls and ensure that frictions to the flow of trade are minimised and negative impacts are mitigated. The border operations centre will use data provided by HMRC, alongside other Departments and public bodies, so that it can analyse and promote efficiencies in the flow of traffic in goods and services in and out of the United Kingdom. Access to HMRC data is crucial to developing this detailed commodity-level view of the flow of goods at the border.

Additionally, the clause will facilitate the sharing of information with other organisations, such as the World Trade Organisation and the World Customs Organisation, both of which the UK will be obligated to share data with as part of our international obligations for the purposes of trade. This is a necessary clause to ensure continuity as we come to the end of the transition period, as it will enable the efficient use of HMRC data to support the Cabinet Office’s role in minimising temporary disruption at the border that may result from our new trading relationship with the EU and enable the sharing of data with international organisations where necessary.

Measures have been included in the Bill to ensure the proper handling of the data and to safeguard and protect its use, with penalties for unauthorised disclosure, onward sharing or use. Moreover, Departments will comply with requirements of data protection legislation, including the general data protection regulation, when handling any personal data shared under this gateway, where it is deemed proportionate and necessary to do so. This clause is essential for the Cabinet Office and other bodies to ensure the continued smooth flow of goods.

Moving on to clause 2, alongside HMRC, to which clause 1 applies, more than 20 Departments and public bodies have either operational or policy responsibilities relating to the border, using over 100 IT systems between them. These Departments and public bodies collect and hold numerous types of information related to trade. However, as with HMRC, this information could typically be used only for very specific purposes, with statutory restrictions on the sharing of information with other Departments. These restrictions inhibit the Government identifying and utilising the full potential of their information to support trade policy and the flow of goods and services through the border. The restrictions also lead to inefficiencies, including duplicative requests to industry to share data.

The clause fixes that problem and will allow specified public bodies and Departments to share data where it supports the exercise of a Minister of the Crown’s functions relating to trade. By combining and analysing specific border data, the Government and the Cabinet Office, in particular, will be able to develop insights and analysis to support the Government as a whole to deliver better services. This will ensure that goods and trade to continue to flow when the UK becomes an independent trading nation at the end of the transition period. As with clause 1, this clause does not, however, grant any additional data collection powers to the Government. Instead, it seeks to create a discretionary gateway to enable more effective sharing of data that Departments and public bodies already hold.

Moving to clause 3, the Government rightly take the safeguarding of information and personally identifiable information, in particular, very seriously. As I hope I made clear in introducing clauses 1 and 2, the ability to share data under both gateways is discretionary. Individual Departments and public authorities providing data will need to be satisfied that data sharing is necessary to support functions relating to trade prior to sharing the data. Furthermore, as I mentioned when introducing clauses 1 and 2, any data shared by the data-sharing gateway that is being established will have to comply with data protection legislation, including the general data protection regulation and its principles, covering necessity, proportionality and minimisation to protect the rights of individuals.

Clause 3 provides an additional safeguard on top of all the others by creating a criminal offence if information relating to a person’s identity, or information from which a person’s identity might be deduced, is shared in contravention of clause 2. I hope that will provide further assurance, if it is required, that the data shared through the gateway will be handled appropriately.

[Jonathan Edwards (Carmarthen East and Dinefwr) (Ind)]

I am interested in clause 3. To whom are the Government concerned that the information might be shared inappropriately? Who would be the recipients of that information?

[Greg Hands]

I think the hon. Gentleman’s question was about what kind of people would be inappropriate; it would be people to whom the legislation will not apply. We are talking about a discretionary power to share data to assist a Minister in functions relating to trade. In addition, the criminal power, as I understand it, is in the Bill specifically to prevent any individual person’s identity from becoming either known directly or deduced through the data that has been produced. Clause 3 puts in place an additional power to prevent that data from becoming known. I do not really want to speculate, Dame Rosie, but I can imagine a whole series of people and bodies that might have inappropriate access to an individual’s data as they pass through a border. I think we can all imagine the sort of people who may not have either your, mine or the Government’s best interests, or the interests of international trade, at heart.

Clause 4 contains the sunset elements of this Bill. As the House will be aware, the Trade Bill is currently passing through the other place and is now unlikely to receive Royal Assent before the end of the transition period. As I hope I made clear in introducing clauses 1 and 2, it is essential that we are able to provide a gateway to enable the sharing of trade-related data that the Cabinet Office requires before the end of this period as it takes on border-monitoring functions. To ensure that we can do that in time, the Bill replicates clauses 8 to 10 of the Trade Bill, which has been referred to at least twice so far. Clause 4 is therefore required to facilitate the expiry of clauses 1 to 3 of this Bill if similar clauses are passed in the Trade Bill, and will thereby ensure that the UK statute book is kept in good working order.

Clause 5 sets out the interpretation of key terms for the purposes of the Bill. Specifically, it provides interpretation of the terms “the data protection legislation”, “enactment”, “the investigatory powers legislation” and “Minister of the Crown”. The interpretations are intended to ensure that the reader of the Bill has clarity in respect of and understands the use of those terms in the Bill.

Finally, Clause 6 sets out the territorial extent of the legislation, when it will come into force and its short title. Subsection (1) sets out the territorial extent of the provisions:

“This Act extends to England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.”

This is a standard clause in any Bill to specify the extent of the its measures.

I note that the Government have worked closely with the devolved Administrations on these provisions as part of work on the Trade Bill, to ensure that the data- sharing gateways can also assist them with their devolved functions—I have already mentioned traffic management around ports as a classic case of where a devolved Administration have a legitimate and correct interest in ensuring that data will flow and therefore that trade flows. In that spirit of working closely together, the Government made two commitments to the devolved Administrations in relation to data sharing under clause 9 of the Trade Bill when it was in Committee in the Lords, and I will repeat them today. First, the data shared under clause 9 of that Bill will be used by the border operations centre and the Cabinet Office to develop strategic insights. The Cabinet Office is committed to sharing strategic analysis related to the flow of data where it will support the more effective management of flow through the border. Cabinet Office officials will continue to work closely with counterparts in the devolved Administrations to ensure that relevant analysis and information can be shared to support devolved functions relating to trade and management of the border. Secondly, the UK Government commit to consulting the devolved Administrations before any devolved authorities are added to or removed from the list of specified authorities that can share data under clause 9 of the Trade Bill.

I turn to the remaining subsections of clause 6. Clause 6(2) of the Trade (Disclosure of Information) Bill provides for the Bill to come into force on the day of Royal Assent. Clause 6(3) simply provides that the Bill, once enacted, will be cited as the Trade (Disclosure of Information) Act 2020. I hope that the House agrees that clause 6, and therefore all six clauses, should stand part of the Bill.

--- Later in debate ---

[Christine Jardine (Edinburgh West) (LD)]

I will not take the House’s attention for long. Again, I find myself in agreement. The Liberal Democrats have serious reservations about the original Trade Bill, but we recognise that, through no fault of this House, the Bill has to be expedited. We need some form of data protection and for our authorities be able to use the data effectively, so we are prepared not to go along with this Bill, but to accept that we need it and that we need it by 1 January. We are in this situation simply because the negotiations with the European Union have not gone in the way that the Government had assured us they would and because the situation has not been handled by the UK Government as expertly as we might have hoped.

[Greg Hands]

I will, if I may, respond to those points. I thank Members for making them and for participating in this Committee debate.

Taking the points in turn, the hon. Member for Sheffield Central (Paul Blomfield) asked about instances covered by clause 2(7). As he noted, reference to investigatory powers legislation is absent from the Trade Bill. That is a minor drafting error. I should have made that clear. An equivalent change will be made to the Trade Bill in due course during its passage.

The hon. Gentleman asked a series of more general questions about borders and ports and I will try to answer those as best I can, recognising that almost all of his questions are within the remit of other Departments, rather than the Department for International Trade.

The hon. Gentleman asked how the border operations centre will assist the movement of medicines and vaccines. That will be a key part of the priorities that we have set for the border after 1 January, to ensure that vital goods continue to flow quickly and efficiently. I will give an example of the sort of data that would be within scope for the border operations centre, assuming that the Bill becomes law. The ability to analyse customs declarations, transit declarations, export declarations, safety and security declarations and things such as highways data would, I think, allow medicines and vaccines to be moved more quickly and more efficiently than would otherwise be the case without the data.

--- Later in debate ---

[Stewart Hosie]

If the Minister is right that removing the disapplication would restrict the Government’s ability to collect the data they need, will he tell the Committee what data that is currently protected the Government wish to access or have a hold of that they would not otherwise be able to get?

[Greg Hands]

That is a very reasonable question, but I will stress what I said earlier: it is not possible at this stage to anticipate what specific restrictions may apply to the additional public bodies, otherwise we would have put on the face of the Bill which other public bodies could be added in due course. We have not put those on the face of the Bill, but we have said that it is perfectly possible that, during the conduct of these operations, it will become clear that there is other data out there that would assist the Government in ensuring that trade flows well at the border. We want to ensure that those other bodies could quickly come within scope, through the delegated procedures that we have laid out in legislation, and therefore it would not be appropriate to put a general restriction on those bodies. It is best to rely on the overall restrictions in the legislation to ensure that we have robust data protection.

[Richard Fuller (North East Bedfordshire) (Con)]

The hon. Member for Dundee East (Stewart Hosie) has raised an issue that would become more relevant if the sunsetting of this legislation does not take hold. If this legislation sunsets, most of us will be fairly comfortable with it. However, there is an opening here, with the combination of subsections (7) and (11) of clause 2, and subsection (1)—that sets out the purpose—which is that it would be right for Parliament to have some review of the application of this in practice. Can my right hon. Friend give an assurance, if there is no sunset within six months, that he will come back to the House to reassure us that those potential areas of concern have not been breached?

[Greg Hands]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point. I must say that if the Trade Bill has not received Royal Assent within six months, I will certainly be under scrutiny in this House, for a piece of legislation that has now been with us for three and a half years. I can give him that assurance. Obviously, the intention is that this will sunset when the Trade Bill receives Royal Assent. We do think that the overall restrictions on the use of the data, and the discretionary nature of the power, are appropriate in this place. But it is also quite right for the Government to make allowance for the fact that it may come to light that extra data will be needed, and we do not want to have what might be viewed as unnecessary restrictions on the use of that data being added now as it becomes useful to us during the course of January. Our intention, however, is that the legislation should sunset as early as possible, with the Trade Bill receiving Royal Assent.

Clause 2(8) makes explicit the requirement for any data sharing conducted under the proposed gateway to comply with data protection legislation, including GDPR. Government Departments sharing data under this gateway will also be expected to comply with robust data governance practices, including completing data protection impact assessments and ensuring that data sharing agreements are in place. Furthermore, clause 3 creates an offence for the disclosure of any information in contravention of clause 2 where a person’s identity is specified in the disclosure or can be deduced from it—the point raised by my hon. Friend the Member for North East Bedfordshire (Richard Fuller).

I hope my remarks have reassured the hon. Member for Dundee East on both the importance of clause 2(7) and the steps that the Government have taken to ensure the safeguards are in place where data is shared under this gateway. I hope that his intention is not to press his amendment. I urge the Committee to support clauses 1 to 6.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 1 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clauses 2 to 6 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

The Deputy Speaker resumed the Chair.

Bill reported, without amendment.

Third Reading

Motion made, and Question proposed, That the Bill be now read the Third time.—(Greg Hands.)