Digital Economy Bill

Debate between Lord Brennan of Canton and Lord Field of Birkenhead

3rd reading: House of Commons & Legislative Grand Committee: House of Commons & Programme motion No. 3: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Monday 28th November 2016 Commons Chamber

[Frank Field (Birkenhead) (Lab)]

I am grateful for the new clause because it follows a private Member’s Bill that I introduced. Following Liverpool’s example, Wirral carried out automatic registration for free school dinners and the school premium, and that resulted in £750,000 more coming into the area to target those poorest families.

[Kevin Brennan]

My right hon. Friend is correct. I was about to say that I wanted to praise him and, again, my hon. Friend the Member for Washington and Sunderland West for their work on that matter. We hope that the Government will support this sensible new clause.

I turn to amendment 3—our final amendment, you will be glad to know, Madam Deputy Speaker, in the group. In the aftermath of the care.data scandal, it is vital that patients are able to have trust in the confidential nature of the health service and to feel confident in sharing sensitive information with health care professionals. Part 5 of the Bill—clause 29 in particular—appears to permit an unprecedented sharing of confidential information. We are extremely concerned that if the information-sharing powers cover information held by bodies providing healthcare services, patient confidentiality could be undermined.

Amendment 3 would ensure that identifiable information held by healthcare bodies in connection with their functions would be exempt from the information-sharing powers in clause 29, thereby upholding current protections for confidentiality. We believe that the Bill should be amended to ensure that patient confidentiality is protected by clarifying that the Bill does not give power to public authorities to disclose any identifiable healthcare information. That would bring clause 29 into line with clause 56, which addresses information sharing specifically for research purposes. That was amended by the Government in Committee to prevent any erosion of the status quo for sharing healthcare data for research purposes. We believe, as does the British Medical Association, that similar protections should be extended to cover part 5. I look forward to the Minister accepting that amendment, along with all the other measures in the group.