Data Protection Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom and Lord Paddick

Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 15th November 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom (Con)]

My Lords, I hope I will not add to the troubles of the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, when I say that I am troubled by a couple of his amendments, Amendments 108B and 180A. The former suggests that the Government should not be permitted to,

“amend, repeal or revoke the GDPR”.

I know the Government will have responsibility for the provisions of the GDPR, but these are surely provisions for which the regulations either are or are not. They are European Union regulations, and I would not have thought the Government would have the power to amend or repeal them.

I am also confused, as so often, by the fact that we have already discussed whether Clause 15 should stand part of the Bill but are now considering an amendment to it. No doubt that is just one of the usual vagaries that leads to my confusion about the procedures of this House.

I move on to Amendment 180A, which suggests that the Secretary of State must consult not only the commissioner but data subjects. I am not sure how on earth he could find out who those data subjects were in order to consult them. Therefore, due to practical concerns, I hope the noble Lord will not press the amendment to a Division.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I will briefly comment on Amendment 108B. Taking up the position of the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom, is it not the case that if we leave the European Union, the GDPR will then become, by means of the repeal Bill, part of UK law and therefore could be changed, which is why the amendment makes sense?

However, while I agree with the argument of the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson of Balmacara, that if parts of the GDPR were amended, repealed or revoked after we have left the EU, this may affect the adequacy decision of the European Union. Presumably, if the European Union makes changes to the GDPR it would be advantageous for the Government to be able to respond quickly by means of secondary legislation to those changes to ensure that we can continue to have adequacy—that is, when the change is on the EU side rather than on the UK side. Perhaps the Minister will clarify that.

Digital Economy Bill

Debate between Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom and Lord Paddick

Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard - continued): House of Lords
Thursday 2nd February 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Paddick]

My Lords, I support the amendment but not necessarily for the reasons articulated by the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson. Our concern is that if the Government started to appoint members of the British Board of Film Classification and therefore it was not independent of government, we would have a situation in which the Government would potentially be involved in deciding which films or material should be censored or not, which is not a path we would like to go down, particularly in the current climate of populism and the historical issues that that raises.

[Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, has just given the speech that I was rather expecting the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, to give. The amendment suggests that the Government should be completely out of the running of the BBFC, yet in his very interesting and important remarks, the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, said that he was a bit concerned that the Government should think it right for this private company, over which the Government have very little power, to have such responsibilities.

The noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, was right to say that the current position is that the BBFC appoints itself. The council of management is chosen from leading figures in the film industry; that council chooses the president and the director, and then they do this important work. If we are to change that, we need some evidence that either there is a risk of the Government interfering in these decisions or that these decisions are being got wrong in some respect. I am not aware that these decisions are being badly taken. As far as I can tell, the BBFC is doing a pretty good job, and until we are clear what regime we want to go to, I would rather leave the law as it is.