Baroness Barker
Main Page: Baroness Barker (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)
Baroness Neville-Rolfe
The Information Commissioner will enforce these new regulations and has the power to issue fines of up to £500,000 against organisations that breach the law. However, my noble friend is right that it is also important to know how to prevent nuisance calls: register with the TPS; report numbers when they come through; and help your elderly relatives to do so. Ofcom is working with the TPS to improve things. This is a complex area and we have to move forward gradually on a number of fronts.
Baroness Barker (LD)
What steps are the Government taking to block the loophole that companies use to get around the TPS by making calls from call centres that are based abroad?
Baroness Neville-Rolfe
As I said, talks are going on between the TPS and Ofcom, but the new CLI rules that come in next week apply to all UK-registered marketing operations even if they operate from abroad. However, we are also working internationally with other regulators—the equivalent of our Information Commissioner—in the US, India, China and so on. Indeed, I am going to China myself in the summer, and this subject needs to be raised there.