Data Protection and Digital Information Bill

Debate between Lord Bassam of Brighton and Lord Clement-Jones

Committee stage
Wednesday 24th April 2024 Grand Committee

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his exposition. He explained the purposes of Clauses 138 to 141 and extolled their virtues, and helpfully explained what my amendments are trying to do—not that he has shot any foxes in the process.

The purpose of my amendments is much more fundamental, and that is to question the methodology of the Government in all of this. The purpose of NUAR is to prevent accidental strikes where building works damage underground infrastructure. However, the Government seem to have ignored the fact that an equivalent service—LinesearchbeforeUdig, or LSBUD—already achieves these aims, is much more widely used than NUAR and is much more cost effective. The existing system has been in place for more than 20 years and now includes data from more than 150 asset owners. It is used by 270,000 UK digging contractors and individuals—and more every day. The fact is that, without further consultation and greater alignment with current industry best practice, NUAR risks becoming a white elephant, undermining the safe working practices that have kept critical national infrastructure in the UK safe for more than two decades.

However, the essence of these amendments is not to cancel NUAR but to get NUAR and the Government to work much more closely with the services that already exist and those who wish to help. They are designed to ensure that proper consultation and democratic scrutiny is conducted before NUAR is implemented in statutory form. Essentially, the industry says that NUAR could be made much better and much quicker if it worked more closely with the private sector services that already exist. Those who are already involved with LinesearchbeforeUdig say, first of all, that NUAR will create uncertainty and reduce safety, failing in its key aims.

The Government have been developing the NUAR since 2018. Claiming that it would drive a reduction in unexpected underground assets being damaged in roadworks, the impact assessment incorrectly states:

“No businesses currently provide a service that is the same or similar to the service that NUAR would provide”.


In fact, as I said, LSBUD has been providing a safe digging service in the UK for 20 years and has grown significantly over that time. Without a plan to work more closely with LSBUD as the key industry representative, NUAR risks creating more accidental strikes of key network infrastructure, increasing risks to workers safety through electrical fires, gas leaks, pollution and so on. The public at home or at work would also suffer more service outages and disruption.

Secondly, NUAR will add costs and stifle competition. The Government claim that NUAR will deliver significant benefits to taxpayers, reduce disruption and prevent damage to underground assets, but the impact assessment ignores the fact that NUAR’s core functions are already provided through the current system—so its expected benefits are vastly overstated. While asset owners, many of whom have not been consulted, will face costs of more than £200 million over the first 10 years, the wholesale publication of asset owners’ entire networks creates commercially sensitive risks, damaging innovation and competition. Combined with the uncertainties about how quickly NUAR can gain a critical mass of users and data, this again calls into question why NUAR does not properly align with and build on the current system but instead smothers competition and harms a successful, growing UK business.

Thirdly, NUAR risks undermining control over sensitive CNI data. Underground assets are integral to critical national infrastructure; protecting them is vital to the UK’s economic and national security. LSBUD deliberately keeps data separate and ensures that data owners remain in full control over who can access their data via a secure exchange platform. NUAR, however, in aiming to provide a single view of all assets, removes providers’ control over their own data—an essential security fail-safe. It would also expand opportunities for malicious actors to target sectors in a variety of ways—for instance, the theft of copper wires from telecom networks.

NUAR shifts control over data access to a centralised government body, with no clear plan for how the data is to be protected from unauthorised access, leading to serious concerns about security and theft. Safe digging is paramount; mandating NUAR will lead to uncertainty, present more health and safety dangers to workers and the public and put critical national infrastructure at risk. These plans require further review. There needs to be, as I have said, greater alignment with industry best practice. Without further consultation, NUAR risks becoming a white elephant that undermines safe digging in the UK and increases risk to infrastructure workers and the public.

I will not go through the amendments individually as the Minister has mentioned what their effect would be, but I will dispel a few myths. The Government have claimed that NUAR has the overwhelming support of asset owners. In the view of those who briefed me, that is not an accurate reflection of the broadband and telecoms sector in particular; a number of concerns from ISPA members have been raised with the NUAR team around cost and security that have yet to be addressed. This is borne out by the fact that there are notable gaps in the major asset owners in the telecoms sector signed up to NUAR at this time.

Clearly, the noble Viscount is resisting changing the procedure by which these changes are made from negative to affirmative, but I hope I have gone some way to persuade the Committee of the importance of this change to how the NUAR system is put on a statutory footing. He talked about a “handful” of data; the comprehensive nature of the existing system is pretty impressive, and it is a free service, updated on a regular basis, which covers more than 150 asset owners and 98% of high-risk assets. NUAR currently covers only one-third of asset owners. The comparisons are already not to the advantage of NUAR.

I hope the Government will at least, even if they do not agree with these amendments, think twice before proceeding at the speed they seem to be and without the consent or taking on board the concerns of those who are already heavily engaged with Linesearch- beforeUdig who find it pretty satisfactory for their purposes.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

My Lords, the Minister really did big up this section of the Bill. He said it would revolutionise this information service, that it would bring many benefits, has a green rating, would be the Formula 1 of data transfer in mapping and so on. We were led to expect quite a lot from this part of the legislation. It is an important part of the Bill, because it signifies some government progress towards the goal of creating a comprehensive national underground asset register, as he put it, or NUAR. We are happy to support this objective, but we have concerns about the progress being made and the time it is taking.

To digress a bit here, it took me back 50 years to when I was a labourer working by the side of a bypass. One of the guys I was working with was operating our post hole borer; it penetrated the Anglian Water system and sent a geyser some 20 metres up into the sky, completely destroying my midday retreat to the local pub between the arduous exercise of digging holes. Had he had one of the services on offer, I suspect that we would not have been so detained. It was quite an entertaining incident, but it clearly showed the dangers of not having good mapping.

As I understand it, and as was outlined by the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, since 2018 the Government have been moving towards this notion of somewhere recording what lies below the surface in our communities. We have had street works legislation going back several decades, from at least 1991. In general, progress towards better co-ordination of utilities excavations has not been helped by poor and low levels of mapping and knowledge of what and which utilities are located underground. This is despite the various legislative attempts to make that happen, most of which have attempted to bring better co-ordination of services.

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[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, what a relief—we are at the final furlong.

The UK is a world leader in genomics, which is becoming an industry of strategic importance for future healthcare and prosperity, but, frankly, it must do more to protect the genomic sector from systemic competitors that wish to dominate this industry for either economic advantage or nefarious purposes. Genomic sequencing—the process of determining the entirety of an organism’s DNA—is playing an increasing role in our NHS, which has committed to being the first national healthcare system to offer whole-genome sequencing as part of routine care. However, like other advanced technologies, our sector is exposed to data privacy and national security risks. Its dual-use potential means that it can also be used to create targeted bioweapons or genetically enhanced military. We must ensure that a suitable data protection environment exists to maintain the UK’s world-leading status.

So, how are we currently mitigating against such threats and why is our existing approach so flawed? Although I welcome initiatives such as the Trusted Research campaign and the Research Collaboration Advice Team, these bodies focus specifically on research and academia. We expect foreign companies that hold sensitive genomics and DNA to follow GDPR. I am not a hawk about relations with other countries, but we need to provide the new Information Commissioner with much greater expertise and powers to tackle complex data security threats in sensitive industries. There must be no trade-off between scientific collaboration and data privacy; that is what this amendment is designed to prevent. I beg to move.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

The Committee will be relieved to know that I will be brief. I do not have much to say because, in general terms, this seems an eminently sensible amendment.

We should congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, on his drafting ingenuity. He has managed to compose an amendment that brings together the need for scrutiny of emerging national security and data privacy risks relating to advanced technology, aims to inform regulatory developments and guidance that might be required to mitigate risks, and would protect the privacy of people’s genomics data. It also picks up along the way the issue of the security services scrutinising malign entities and guiding researchers, businesses, consumers and public bodies. Bringing all those things together at the end of a long and rather messy Bill is quite a feat—congratulations to the noble Lord.

I am rather hoping that the Minister will tell the Committee either that the Government will accept this wisely crafted amendment or that everything it contains is already covered. If the latter is the case, can he point noble Lords to where those things are covered in the Bill? Can he also reassure the Committee that the safety and security issues raised by the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, are covered? Having said all that, we support the general direction of travel that the amendment takes.

Data Protection and Digital Information Bill

Debate between Lord Bassam of Brighton and Lord Clement-Jones

Committee stage
Monday 22nd April 2024 Grand Committee

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

I am interested in the Minister’s point about the flexibility the Government see in this clause, but I am not sure who in the end has the responsibility to lead on that flexibility. Will it come from the commissioner or be driven by the Secretary of State’s considerations? The consultation duties seem very dependent on the commissioner’s view and I am not sure at what stage the Secretary of State would want to intervene to ensure that they have got this bit right. That is very important, because the balance is quite sophisticated.

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

The Minister used the expression “when the evidence emerges”, as did the noble Viscount, Lord Camrose, in another context last week. I would have thought that these organisations know what they are about, and they have provided some pretty comprehensive evidence about the impact on their businesses. Is that not a pretty good reason for the Government to think that they might not have this set of provisions entirely right, quite apart from the other aspects of this group of amendments? If that evidence is not enough—I read out the list of organisations—the Government are more or less saying that they will not accept any evidence.

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

Will the Minister write and unpack exactly what the balance of opinion was? We are talking about pretty crucial stuff here. It is not always a question just of numbers; it is quite often a question of weighting the arguments. The Minister should write to us and tell us how they came to that conclusion, because the case was clearly being made during the consultation, but the Government have effectively ignored it.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

In this tripartite geography that the noble Lord described, the power—

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

It is a trifecta, actually—that is a betting term.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

I am not a gambling man. It is an interesting term. The Minister is suggesting that power rests equally among those three elements but it does not. The Secretary of State is the all-powerful being and the commissioner is there to ensure that regulation works effectively. How will this operate in practice? There is no advisory body here; it is the Secretary of State having a discussion with the commissioner and then, on the balance of some of the consultation information that comes in, making a decision. That will not enable the sector, the market and those providers to be engaged.

Data Protection and Digital Information Bill

Debate between Lord Bassam of Brighton and Lord Clement-Jones

Committee stage
Wednesday 17th April 2024 Grand Committee

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

Perhaps the Minister could in due course say what evidence would help to persuade the Government to adopt the article.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

I want to help the Minister. Perhaps he could give us some more detail on the nature of that consultation and the number of responses and what people said in it. It strikes me as rather important.

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[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

My Lords, this group has three amendments within it and, as the noble Lord, Lord Vaux, said, it is a disparate group. The first two seem wholly benign and entirely laudable, in that they seek to ensure that concerns about the environmental impacts related to data connected to business are shared and provided. The noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, said hers was a small and modest amendment: I agree entirely with that, but it is valuable nevertheless.

If I had to choose which amendment I prefer, it would be the second, in the name of my noble friend Lady Young, simply because it is more comprehensive and seems to be of practical value in pursuing policy objectives related to climate change mitigation. I cannot see why the disclosure of an impact analysis of current and future announcements, including legislation, changes in targets and large contracts, on UK climate change mitigation targets would be a problem. I thought my noble friend was very persuasive and her arguments about impact assessment were sound. The example of offshore petroleum legislation effectively not having an environmental impact assessment when its impacts are pretty clear was a very good one indeed. I am one of those who believes that environmental good practice should be written all the way through, a bit like a stick of Brighton rock, and I think that about legislation. It is important that we take on board that climate change is the most pressing issue that we face for the future.

The third amendment, in the name of my noble friend Lady Jones, is of a rather different nature, but is no less important, as it relates to the UK’s data adequacy and the EU’s decisions on it. We are grateful to the noble Lords, Lord Vaux of Harrowden and Lord Clement-Jones, for their support. Put simply, it would oblige the Secretary of State to complete an assessment, within six months of the Bill’s passing,

“of the likely impact of the Act on the EU’s data adequacy decisions relating to the UK”.

It would oblige the Secretary of State to lay a report on the assessment’s findings, and the report must cover data risk assessments and the impact on SMEs. It must also include an estimate of the legislation’s financial impact. The noble Lord, Lord Vaux, usefully underlined the importance of this, with its critical 2025 date. The amendment also probes

“whether the Government anticipate the provisions of the Bill conflicting with the requirements that need to be made by the UK to maintain a data adequacy decision by the EU”.

There is widespread and considerable concern about data adequacy and whether the UK legislative framework diverges too far from the standards that apply under the EU GDPR. The risk that the UK runs in attempting to reduce compliance costs for the free flow of personal data is that safeguards are removed to the point where businesses and trade become excessively concerned. In summary, many sectors including manufacturing, retail, health, information technology and particularly financial services are concerned that the free flow of data between us and the EU, with minimal disruption, will simply not be able to continue.

As the noble Lord, Lord Vaux, underlined, it is important that we in the UK have a relationship of trust with the European Commission on this, although ultimately data adequacy could be tested in the Court of Justice of the European Union. Data subjects in the EU can rely on the general principle of the protection of personal data to invalidate EU secondary and domestic law conflicting with that principle. Data subjects can also rely on the Charter of Fundamental Rights to bring challenges. Both these routes were closed off when the UK left the EU and the provisions were not saved in UK law, so it can be argued that data protection rights are already at a lower standard than across the European Union.

It is worth acknowledging that adequacy does not necessarily require equivalence. We can have different, and potentially lower, standards than the EU but, as long as those protections are deemed to meet whatever criteria the Commission chooses to apply, it is all to the good.

However, while divergence is possible, the concern that we and others have is that the Bill continues chipping away at standards in too many different ways. This chipping away is also taking place in statutory instruments, changes to guidance and so on. If His Majesty’s Government are satisfied that the overall picture remains that UK regulation is adequate, that is welcome, but it would be useful to know what mechanism DSIT and the Government generally intend using to measure where the tipping point might be achieved and how close these reforms take us to it.

The Committee will need considerable reassurance on the question of data adequacy, not least because of its impact on businesses and financial services in the longer term. At various times, the Minister has made the argument that a Brexit benefit is contained within this legislation. If he is ultimately confident of that case, what would be the impact on UK businesses if that assessment is wrong in relation to data adequacy decisions taken within the EU?

We are going to need more than warm words and a recitation that “We think it’s right and that we’re in the right place on data adequacy”. We are going to need some convincing. Whatever the Minister says today, we will have to return to this issue on Report. It is that important for businesses in this country and for the protection of data subjects.

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, these amendments have been spoken to so well that I do not need to spend a huge amount of time repeating those great arguments. Both Amendment 195A, put forward by the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, and Amendment 218 have considerable merit. I do not think that they conflict; they are complementary, in many respects.

Awareness raising is important to this, especially in relation to Amendment 218. For instance, if regulators are going to have a growth duty, which looks like it is going to happen, why not have countervailing duties relating to climate change, as the noble Baroness, Lady Young, put forward so cogently as part of Amendment 218? Amendment 195A also has considerable merit in raising awareness in the private sector, in traders and so on. Both have considerable merit.

Data Protection and Digital Information Bill

Debate between Lord Bassam of Brighton and Lord Clement-Jones

Committee stage
Monday 15th April 2024 Grand Committee

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

Perhaps the same correspondence could cover the point I raised as well.

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, I am immensely grateful to the noble Lords, Lord Anderson and Lord Bassam, for their interventions. In particular, given his background, if the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, has concerns about these clauses, we all ought to have concerns. I am grateful to the Minister for the extent of his unpacking—or attempted unpacking—of these clauses but I feel that we are on a slippery slope here. I feel some considerable unease about the widening of the disapplication of principles that we were assured were immutable only six years ago. I am worried about that.

We have had some reassurance about the right to transparency, perhaps when it is convenient that data subjects find out about what is happening. The right to challenge was also mentioned by the Minister but he has not really answered the question about whether the Home Office has looked seriously at the implications as far as the human rights convention is concerned, which is the reason for the stand part notice. The Minister did not address that matter at all; I do not know why. I am assuming that the Home Office has looked at the clauses in the light of the convention but, again, he did not talk about that.

The only assurance the Minister has really given is that it is all on a case-by-case basis. I do not think that that is much of a reassurance. On the proportionality point made by the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, I think that we are going to be agog in waiting for the Minister’s correspondence on that, but it is such a basic issue. There were two amendments specifically on proportionality but we have not really had a reply on that issue at all, in terms of why it should have been eliminated by the legislation. So a feeling of unease prevails. I do not even feel that the Minister has unpacked fully the issue of joint working; I think that the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, did that more. We need to know more about how that will operate.

The final point that the Minister made gave even greater concern—to think that there will be an SI setting out the bodies that will have the powers. We are probably slightly wiser than when we started out with this group of amendments, but only slightly and we are considerably more concerned. In the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

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[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, has done us a service by raising this issue. My question is about whether the advice given to date about redaction is accurate. I have not seen the Home Office’s guidance or counsel’s analysis. I have taken advice on the Police Federation’s case—I received an email and I was very interested in what it had to say, because we all want to make sure that the bureaucracy involved in charging and dealing with the CPS is as minimal as possible within the bounds of data protection law.

Section 35(2)(b) of the Data Protection Act simply requires the police to ensure that their processing is necessary for the performance of their tasks. You would have thought that sending an investigation file to the CPS to decide whether to charge a suspect seems necessary for the performance of that task. Some of that personal data may end up not being relevant to the charge or any trial, but that is a judgment for the CPS and the prosecutor. It does not mean, in the view of those I have consulted, that the file has to be redacted at vast taxpayer cost before the CPS or prosecutor have had a chance to see the investigation’s file. When you look at sensitive data, the test is “strictly necessary”, which is a higher test, but surely the answer to that must be that officers should collect this information only where they consider it relevant to the case. So this can be dealt with through protocols about data protection, which ensure that officers do not collect more sensitive data than is necessary for the purposes of the investigation.

Similarly, under Section 37, the question that the personal data must be adequate, relevant and not excessive in relation to the purpose for which it is processed should not be interpreted in such a way that this redaction exercise is required. If an officer thinks they need to collect the relevant information for the purpose of the investigation, that seems to me—and to those advising me—in broad terms to be sufficient to comply with the principle. Conversely, if officers are collecting too much data, the answer is that they should be trained to avoid doing this. If officers really are collecting more information than they should be, redactions cannot remedy the fact that the collection was unlawful in the first place. The solution seems to be to stop them collecting that data.

I assume—maybe I am completely wrong—that the Minister will utter “suitable guidance” in response to the noble Baroness’s amendment and say that there is no need to amend the legislation, but, if there is no need to do so, I hope that they revise the guidance, because the Police Federation and its members are clearly labouring under a misapprehension about the way the Act should be interpreted. It would be quite a serious matter if that has taken place for the last six years.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

My Lords, we should be very grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan of Cotes, for her amendment. I listened very carefully to her line of argument and find much that we can support in the approach. In that context, we should also thank the Police Federation of England and Wales for a particularly useful and enlightening briefing paper.

We may well be suffering under the law of unintended consequences in this context; it seems to have hit quite hard and acted as a barrier to the sensible processing and transfer of data between two parts of the law enforcement machinery. It is quite interesting coming off the back of the previous debate, when we were discussing making the transfer of information and intelligence between different agencies easier and having a common approach. It is a very relevant discussion to have.

I do not think that the legislation, when it was originally drafted, could ever have been intended to work in the way the Police Federation has set out. The implementation of the Data Protection Act 2018, in so far as law enforcement agencies are concerned, is supposed to be guided by recital 4, which the noble Baroness read into the record and which makes good sense.

As the noble Baroness explained, the Police Federation’s argument that the DPA makes no provisions at all that are designed to facilitate, in effect, the free flow of information, that it should be able to hold all the relevant data prior to the charging decision being made by the CPS, and that redaction should take place only after a decision on charging has been made seems quite a sensible approach. As she argued, it would significantly lighten the burden on police investigating teams and enable the decision on charging to be more broadly informed.

So this is a piece of simplification that we can all support. The case has been made very well. If it helps speed up charging and policing processes, which I know the Government are very concerned about, as all Governments should be, it seems a sensible move—but this is the Home Office. We do not always expect the most sensible things to be delivered by that department, but we hope that they are.

Data Protection and Digital Information Bill

Debate between Lord Bassam of Brighton and Lord Clement-Jones

Committee stage
Wednesday 27th March 2024 Grand Committee

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, very briefly, I thank the Minister for unpacking his amendments with some care, and for giving me the answer to my amendment before I spoke to it—that saves time.

Obviously, we all understand the importance of transfers of personal data between law enforcement authorities, but perhaps the crux of this, and the one question in our mind is, what is—perhaps the Minister could remind us—the process for making sure that the country that we are sending it to is data adequate? Amendment 121 was tabled as a way of probing that. It would be extremely useful if the Minister can answer that. This should apply to transfers between law enforcement authorities just as much as it does for other, more general transfers under Schedule 5. If the Minister can give me the answer, that would be useful, but if he does not have the answer to hand, I am very happy to suspend my curiosity until after Easter.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

My Lords, I too can be brief, having heard the Minister’s response. I thought he half-shot the Clement-Jones fox, with very good aim on the Minister’s part.

I was simply going to say that it is one in a sea of amendments from the Government, but the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, made an important point about making sure that the country organisations that the commissioner looks at should meet the test of data adequacy—I also had that in my speaking note. The noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, was making a good point in terms of ensuring that appropriate data protections are in place internationally for us to be able to work with.

The Minister explained the government amendments with some care, but I wonder if he could explain how data transfers are made to an overseas processor using the powers relied on by reference to new Section 73(4)(aa) of the 2018 Act. The power is used as a condition and justification for several of the noble Lord’s amendments, and I wonder whether he has had to table these amendments because of the original drafting. That would seem to be to be the most likely reason.

Data Protection and Digital Information Bill

Debate between Lord Bassam of Brighton and Lord Clement-Jones

Committee stage
Monday 25th March 2024 Grand Committee

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

From looking at the wording of the Members’ explanatory statements for wishing to leave out Clauses 9 and 36, I do not think that the Minister has addressed this, but does he accept that the Bill now provides a more lax approach? Is this a reduction of the standard expected? To me, “vexatious or excessive” sounds very different from “manifestly unfounded or excessive”. Does he accept that basic premise? That is really the core of the debate; if it is not, we have to look again at the issue of resources, which seems to be the argument to make this change.

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

If that is the case and this is a dilution, is this where the Government think they will get the savings identified in the impact assessment? It was alleged in the Public Bill Committee that this is where a lot of the savings would come from—we all have rather different views. My first information was that every SME might save about £80 a year then, suddenly, the Secretary of State started talking about £10 billion of benefit from the Bill. Clarification of that would be extremely helpful. There seems to be a dichotomy between the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, saying that this is a way to reduce the burdens on business and the Minister saying that it is all about confident refusal and confidence. He has used that word twice, which is worrying.

Data Protection and Digital Information Bill

Debate between Lord Bassam of Brighton and Lord Clement-Jones

Committee stage
Wednesday 20th March 2024 Grand Committee

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, I keep getting flashbacks. This one is to the Data Protection Act 2018, although I think it was 2017 when we debated it. It is one of the huge achievements of the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, to have introduced, and persuaded the Government to introduce, the age-appropriate design code into the Act, and—as she and the noble Baroness, Lady Harding, described—to see it spread around the world and become the gold standard. It is hardly surprising that she is so passionate about wanting to make sure that the Bill does not water down the data rights of children.

I think the most powerful amendment in this group is Amendment 290. For me, it absolutely bottles what we need to do in making sure that nothing in the Bill waters down children’s rights. If I were to choose one of the noble Baroness’s amendments in this group, it would be that one: it would absolutely give the assurance and scotch the point about legal uncertainty created by the Bill.

Both noble Baronesses asked: if the Government are not watering down the Bill, why can they not say that they are not? Why can they not, in a sense, repeat the words of Paul Scully when he was debating the Bill? He said:

“We are committed to protecting children and young people online. The Bill maintains the high standards of data protection that our citizens expect and organisations will still have to abide by our age-appropriate design code”.


He uses “our”, so he is taking full ownership of it. He went on:

“Any breach of our data protection laws will result in enforcement action by the Information Commissioner’s Office”.—[Official Report, Commons, 17/4/23; col. 101.]


I would love that enshrined in the Bill. It would give us a huge amount of assurance.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

My Lords, we on the Labour Benches have become co-signatories to the amendments tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, and supported by the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, and the noble Baroness, Lady Harding. The noble Baroness set out very clearly and expertly the overarching purpose of retaining the level of protection currently afforded by the Data Protection Act 2018. Amendments 2 and 3 specifically stipulate that, where data controllers know, or should reasonably know, that a user is a child, they should be given the data protection codified in that Act. Amendment 9 takes it a stage further and includes children’s data in the definition of sensitive personal data, and gives it the benefit of being treated to a heightened level of protection—quite rightly, too. Finally, Amendment 290—the favourite of the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones—attempts to hold Ministers to the commitment made by Paul Scully in the Commons to maintain existing standards of data protection carried over from that 2018 Act.

Why is all this necessary? I suspect that the Minister will argue that it is not needed because Clause 5 already provides for the Secretary of State to consider the impact of any changes to the rights and freedoms of individuals and, in particular, of children, who require special protection.

We disagree with that argument. In the interests of brevity and the spirit of the recent Procedure Committee report, which says that we should not repeat each other’s arguments, I do not intend to speak at length, but we have a principal concern: to try to understand why the Government want to depart from the standards of protection set out in the age-appropriate design code—the international gold standard—which they so enthusiastically signed up to just five or six years ago. Given the rising levels of parental concern over harmful online content and well-known cases highlighting the harms that can flow from unregulated material, why do the Government consider it safe to water down the regulatory standards at this precise moment in time? The noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, valuably highlighted the impact of the current regulatory framework on companies’ behaviour. That is exactly what legislation is designed to do: to change how we look at things and how we work. Why change that? As she has argued very persuasively, it is and has been hugely transformative. Why throw away that benefit now?

My attention was drawn to one example of what can happen by a briefing note from the 5Rights Foundation. As it argued, children are uniquely vulnerable to harm and risk online. I thought its set of statistics was really interesting. By the age of 13, 72 million data points have already been collected about children. They are often not used in children’s best interests; for example, the data is often used to feed recommender systems and algorithms designed to keep attention at all costs and have been found to push harmful content at children.

When this happens repeatedly over time, it can have catastrophic consequences, as we know. The coroner in the Molly Russell inquest found that she had been recommended a stream of depressive content by algorithms, leading the coroner to rule that she

“died from an act of self-harm whilst suffering from depression and the negative effects of online content”.

We do not want more Molly Russell cases. Progress has already been made in this field; we should consider dispensing with it at our peril. Can the Minister explain today the thinking and logic behind the changes that the Government have brought forward? Can he estimate the impact that the new lighter-touch regime, as we see it, will have on child protection? Have the Government consulted extensively with those in the sector who are properly concerned about child protection issues, and what sort of responses have the Government received?

Finally, why have the Government decided to take a risk with the sound framework that was already in place and built on during the course of the Online Safety Act? We need to hear very clearly from the Minister how they intend to engage with groups that are concerned about these child protection issues, given the apparent loosening of the current framework. The noble Baroness, Lady Harding, said that this is hard-fought ground; we intend to continue making it so because these protections are of great value to our society.

Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Bill

Debate between Lord Bassam of Brighton and Lord Clement-Jones

Report stage
Wednesday 13th March 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, despite the shortness of this debate, we have had some very fine and inspiring speeches. We on these Benches wholly support the amendment moved by the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell. Indeed, like the noble Lord, Lord Robertson, I find it extraordinary that we do not have this already on the statute book. Given the importance of pluralism and freedom of speech in our media, the thought of foreign Governments impacting on our media in the way that is currently threatened seems quite extraordinary.

My main purpose is to associate myself with the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth. When he moved his regret amendment, he talked about the ownership by the UAE of a UK quality newspaper. I have spent the last 10 years campaigning for the release of Ryan Cornelius from a Dubai jail. He was unjustly imprisoned on trumped-up fraud charges, and his sentence was arbitrarily extended by 20 years in 2018, just as he was due to be released. He now faces the prospect of many more years in jail. I am all too aware of the reality that lies behind the pleasant-looking tourist Dubai. Parliament should definitely have its say before a UK newspaper falls into the hands of such a Government. All this is a result of the activities of a member of the royal court of Dubai, so it very close to home in the UAE. Not only do we as a party on these Benches wholly support this amendment, but I personally feel very strongly about the need for it.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

My Lords, I think the whole House is grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, for the way in which she set out the arguments behind her amendment, and for the clarity, force and power of her voice in putting those arguments forward. We are also grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, for the way in which he has argued his case—not once, but twice, and several other times too, when he has been given the opportunity; I always enjoy his interventions. I am enormously grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Robertson, for bringing breaking news to your Lordships’ House.

It might seem slightly ironic to some that we on the Labour Benches are trying to come to the rescue of the Daily Telegraph, but there is a much more important principle at stake here. It is an obvious place to start but let me begin with first principles: Labour believes in a free and fair press without state interference. We also believe in the accurate presentation of news and in freedom of expression, which is particularly important in the context of RedBird’s attempted takeover. Our view on this matter is not shaped just by the Telegraph Media Group takeover proposal currently being considered by the Secretary of State; we would have similar concerns if other titles were subject to bids from other states. When the Minister explains to the House the Government’s intention, can he clarify the position, too, of not just newspapers but other publications? That is not to say that we do not have real concerns about the proposed sale of the Telegraph Media Group. We very much welcomed the Secretary of State initiating the investigations by the regulators. Now that their reports have been submitted, we hope that a decision will be taken in a timely way and as soon as possible, and in a way that is consistent with the quasi-judicial nature of the process.

For the avoidance of doubt, this is not to say that we oppose foreign investment in this country; we believe that inward investment in our economy is vital. The noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, spoke eloquently on that point, as did the noble Lord, Lord Kamall. However, foreign ownership of UK media organisations raises broader questions around the accurate presentation of news and, in certain cases, the free expression of opinion. Both of these, as many noble Lords have said, are vital to the long-term health of the print media sector and, more importantly, to our democracy.

I listened very carefully to the noble Baroness’s introduction and the other speeches. We have to give them all credit for the way in which they addressed the issue. I listened particularly to the noble Lord, Lord Robertson, because of his expertise, and his former role and continuing interest in security matters. While I am giving out thanks, I also thank the Minister, who helpfully found the time to meet me and my noble friend Lady Jones of Whitchurch this afternoon to discuss this important issue.

As we have seen with other legislation, most progress is often made when groups from across your Lordships’ House have open, frank discussions and then work together to agree solutions. I understand that for various reasons the text of Amendment 67 is not necessarily what all its supporters would have wanted. For that reason, and for a number of others that I will set out, we are not convinced that it presents the right response to this serious matter. Our view is that a free and fair press should be without state interference, which means without undue influence from our own state as well as others.

It is correct that the Secretary of State should take an interest in cases which raise concern on competition and plurality grounds, but her responsibilities are rightly constrained by legislation, and her ability to comment is limited by the quasi-judicial role she is playing. Where security concerns may arise, the Secretary of State will no doubt receive confidential briefings on the potential implications of different outcomes. In our view, that process must be allowed to play out. That the CMA and Ofcom have reported to the Secretary of State this week points to the well-established merger regime that has been in place in this country for some time. As part of their investigations, those independent regulators draw on expert advice and are able to obtain appropriately handled confidential information, including material that may be highly commercially sensitive. On the basis of all that information, they may then come to a judgment regarding the suitability of a takeover proposal and advise the Secretary of State accordingly. Parliament has empowered the Secretary of State and those regulators. In our view, that is an appropriate level of state interest in sensitive matters.

Amendment 67 proposes that once the regulators have carried out their work and the Secretary of State has come to a decision, it should be for Parliament to approve that decision. While we generally support parliamentary scrutiny of the Executive and their decisions, we are not convinced that the mechanism envisaged by the amendment is suitable in the light of the sensitive security and commercial information that would have to be shared to inform debate and determine the outcome of votes in both Houses.

My impression from earlier discussions with the Minister and his colleagues in other departments is that a better approach would be for the Government to acknowledge the strength of feeling in this House and commit to bringing back their own text at Third Reading. If the Minister is able to make that commitment, I hope that colleagues on all Benches will be minded to accept that offer and work with Ministers, as we will offer to do, in the coming weeks to find a satisfactory outcome.

We have enormous sympathy with the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, on this issue. We do not feel able to support her proposition in the form it is with us today. We know it has been brought forward with the very best of intentions, intentions we support, and because we share those, we urge the Minister to respond positively to finding a way forward over the next few weeks.

Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Bill

Debate between Lord Bassam of Brighton and Lord Clement-Jones

Report stage
Monday 11th March 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

My Lords, as the Minister described, this group has government amendments, from Amendment 2 to Amendment 38, which add greater transparency to the process adopted by the CMA in disclosing information about cases involving SMS status firms where the challenger companies have an interest. We are pleased with the Minister’s amendments and, broadly speaking, happy to give them our support, as they respond to points that a number of noble Lords made at earlier stages of the Bill about the need for greater transparency and openness.

The SMS companies are in a position of significant market strength vis-à-vis the challenger firms and have a clear interest in seeing the bigger picture when disclosure is made of information that is of material interest. By obliging the publication of the notices and orders, rather than summaries of the documents, we feel that challenger companies will have greater access to key information that may impact on their market performance. Our amendments, from Amendment 4 to Amendment 39, attempt to achieve a similar result; I suspect that Ministers will argue that their amendments have greater elegance and a similar effect.

I turn to government Amendment 54 and our own Amendment 5. We are clearly of a similar mind and share concerns about commercial confidentiality so that, where reasonable, the redaction of documents can take place. We differ in our approach simply by suggesting that there should be a system for registering the documents that are relevant; the Minister might like to think about that at a later date. In essence, this is an operational issue so, to satisfy our concerns, perhaps he can put on record that there will be an effective system for the registration of documents and a notification process that enables the challenger firms to understand better what information has been disclosed to the CMA in the course of its inquiries. On that basis, we will be content not to move our amendments, and we thank the Government for responding to the concerns behind them.

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, this is a very straightforward group, and I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, and the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, on having persuaded the Government to move further on the transparency agenda. I like the description given by the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, of the government amendment being more elegant. It is nice to think of amendments being elegant; it is not often that we think in those terms. We very much support the new amendments with some of the caveats that he made.

Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Bill

Debate between Lord Bassam of Brighton and Lord Clement-Jones

Committee stage
Wednesday 7th February 2024 Grand Committee

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

My Lords, this is the starter before the main course on subscription contracts, but it is important none the less. I can reveal to the Committee that our Amendments 169 and 193 are mere probing amendments designed to test whether the Government have confidence in the Bill’s subscription provisions providing sufficient protection for digital platforms that host copyrighted content, mainly on-demand videos. A number of companies have raised this issue with us, arguing that they will be seriously out of pocket if they have fully to reimburse those who have accessed paid-for content during a cooling-off period. It is our feeling, and a view widely shared, that, although the Bill restates a lot of current consumer law on subscriptions, it does not restate many of the obvious and probably necessary exemptions that the noble Lord, Lord Black, clearly identified. We need to cover those.

At present, if I sign up to a streaming service, it is made apparent that, the moment I consume content, my statutory rights change. The Bill appears to restate some principles but not others, and it creates a lack of certainty for both sides. Some of the companies argue that they will have to pay out refunds in cases where they would not under current law. This runs the risk of creating unrealistic expectations for consumers.

The amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, ask similar questions of the Minister and seek to explore how the subscription contract is paid for if it is used during the cooling-off period and then cancelled. They also seek to understand what information a trader must publish in those circumstances. The noble Lord made a good point about charging.

Turning to the amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Black, he skilfully highlighted for the Committee the problems that will be caused by the way the legislation is phrased. Having heard the noble Lord, I am more on his side than I was at the outset. I am not a regular Daily Telegraph reader, nor a great fan, and this is the second time in a week I have had to plead on its behalf—this is becoming rather strange politically. I am a Guardian person, and I can see the problem replicated across the whole news world. I do not think the onerousness of the burden is justified in this case. It could be an endemic problem.

I want to hear what the Minister has to say because we need some light and dark, some nuanced thinking, about the way subscriptions work. This is not the way to bear down on the subscription trap, which I think we are all keen to deal with. This does not help us at all in that regard.

I was originally going to say of the last two amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Black, which seek to create a two-year implementation period, that I was not particularly convinced, but having heard the argument, I have reversed my view. If we do not have a solution, I suspect those two amendments could be very helpful in trying to resolve some of the problems this is creating. There is merit in those amendments.

We need to approach this issue in more forensic detail. I want to hear what the Minister has to say, because I do not want us to further undermine the news market. We live in a time when there is less ability and facility to report than we are used to. Moving from broadsheets to online content is changing the way in which the news world operates. My son works in the news world, and he understands these things far better than I do. We need solutions, and the way the legislation is currently phrased does not provide us with one that protects the value and importance of news in an open democracy such as ours.

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, this has been very interesting debate. There is a common theme—that these clauses are a very blunt instrument. At one end of the spectrum, we have the amendments in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, which attempt to get to grips with what this is all about and whether these clauses are fit for purpose; and at the other end we have had clear demonstrations that they are not. I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Black, in particular, for his comprehensive and persuasive introduction. I started off fairly convinced of the case—I did not sign all his amendments, but I signed two clause stand part notices—but, like the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, I am now pretty convinced that the clauses are not quite fit for purpose. For the digital economy, we need to be much more wary about how the prescribed cooling- off period works.

I started off thinking that this is an issue that only the subscription and video-on-demand side should be concerned about, but having listened to the noble Lord, Lord Black, I realised that there is a much wider set of interests. The noble Lords, Lord Lucas, Lord Vaizey and Lord Bassam, described a much wider landscape that should be concerned.

I started by considering the disruption to subscription video-on-demand services—the so-called streamers. That is why I signed the notice from the noble Lord, Lord Black, opposing Clause 262 standing part. All the representations I received pointed out that this is really business-critical for UK operators such as Netflix and Disney+. I think the noble Lord, Lord Vaizey, used the expression binge-watch; if you can do that and get a refund, why bother keeping your subscription? We need to make sure that those services are safeguarded.

A number of noble Lords pointed out that Ministers in both the Commons and this place have expressed concern, saying that they understand the issue and are going to consult; but in the meantime, there is a huge amount of uncertainty. We potentially have it in black-letter law that the cooling-off periods are as set out in the Bill. We do not know what kind of consultation will take place, what kind of flexibility might be operated, and so on. In the meantime, we have a perfectly workable set of consumer contract regulations, which the parties would be happy to apply. That was very much the case the noble Lord, Lord Black, rightly made.

Important principles are set out in the CCRs, such as that consumers can request that the supply of digital content begins before the end of the 14-day cancellation period. So it is perfectly possible to have a provision that safeguards both the service provider and the consumer in these circumstances, but that principle is not imported into the Bill. I do not know why. On Monday, I asked the Minister what consultation had taken place. I have used the expression “blunt instrument”, but these are really important new provisions. The noble Lord, Lord Bassam, was absolutely right: they are based on the best of intentions, but they are so blunt that they will be a real problem for some of our digital services.

I hope the Minister will not regard our proposals as “not invented here”, and that the Government will not motor on with these provisions without taking a long, hard look at them. This is one of those circumstances where we would all be a lot happier if we reverted to a regulation-making power, got rid of some of these clauses and had a proper super-affirmative provision in the Bill, for example, enabling a discussion about all these aspects of subscription contracts. We heard about the absolute unhappiness with the impact on charities and gift aid when discussing the previous group; that demonstrates the total bluntness of these provisions. I do not think anybody will be very happy with them —the charities, the streaming businesses, the subscription media services or the dating services. There is a huge amount of unhappiness, which I hope the Minister will respond to.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, I apologise. If the Minister is undertaking this consultation and looking at a provision of that description, can he also describe which power, in the part of the Bill we are dealing with, will give the Secretary of State the ability to do that, as well as the process by which it would be introduced and the timing?

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

The noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, partly covered the point that I was going to ask about. I want some more detail about how this waiver will operate. That is where the noble Lord and I are coming from. Perhaps the Minister can flesh that out a bit more, because it is important. I am delighted that the notion of a waiver will be consulted on, but the question of how it works will be important, too.

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, it could answer the Regulation 37 question.

Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Bill

Debate between Lord Bassam of Brighton and Lord Clement-Jones

Committee stage
Monday 5th February 2024 Grand Committee

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

Is it therefore envisaged that the Government will give extra support to local trading standards officers, so that they will have these take-down powers? That seems to be the implication of what the Minister is saying—that it is not just Ofcom or the CMA but that there will be local enforcement as well, so there will be that combination.

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

Just to add to that question, is the Minister saying, “It’s going to happen but we just need to get the procedures right and add them”? Is that really all we are waiting for?

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, I cannot think of a better introduction to an amendment than the different speeches we have heard. I belong to many of the organisations that have been mentioned. We all have a personal interest in so many of the organisations that depend on subscriptions.

The noble Lord, Lord Mendoza, talked about the impact of the possible loss of gift aid; the noble Lord, Lord Harris, on the issue of why gift aid could be lost; the noble Lord, Lord Vaizey, about the importance of subscriptions going forward; and the noble Baroness, Lady Young, about the different kinds of relationship this represents. To round it off, the noble Baroness, Lady Harding, started to hold the Minister’s feet to the fire with the questions that need asking. This amendment has been comprehensively and extremely well spoken to.

We have all had the NCVO briefing, which has a galaxy of different organisations all making the point that the Government really need to create an exemption. This is a very elegant solution that I hope the Government will adopt but, as the noble Baroness, Lady Harding, said, the Government need to reassure us that this was not intended as part of the new subscription regime. I very much hope that, at this moment, the Minister and the department are cooking up a solution as good as the one that the noble Lord, Lord Mendoza, has put forward, or that they are simply going to accept this. In terms of the arguments made, this has been a slam dunk. I would have thought that accepting the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Mendoza, is a total no-brainer, otherwise I can see Report stage being carnage.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

My Lords, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Mendoza, for scripting such a simple and clear amendment. We are acting as co-signatories, and it seeks, very simply, to exempt third sector charities from the effective limitations on subscription contracts in the Bill.

I appreciate that there have already been several attempts to find a solution to this conundrum, including amendments in the Commons. I understood that Ministers were not particularly attracted to this solution, which seeks to list charity membership subscriptions which qualify for gift aid as an excluded contract pursuant to Clause 253. We were a bit reassured by the letter that Kevin Hollinrake, the Minister in another place, wrote to the National Trust, setting out the Government’s position. He said that it was not their intention to create uncertainty about how different legislation might apply. His letter, dated 23 November, also said that cross-departmental work was being undertaken to consider whether clarification would be beneficial. Having listened to everybody this evening, it is pretty clear that it would be beneficial.

If this approach does not meet the happiness threshold for Ministers, this debate is the opportunity for the Minister to explain where the Government’s internal departmental thinking has got to and what other solutions might be available. The Minister argued in his letter to the National Trust that Chapter 3 of Part 4 is unlikely to apply because there is no contract to be deemed a subscription contract. Given the net value of gift aid to charities—for the National Trust it is £47 million, English Heritage is £100 million et cetera—we think there needs to be clarity. We cannot leave a degree of uncertainty. It certainly does not appeal to us to do that at this stage, given the law of unintended consequences. We cannot rely on an assurance that it is deemed unlikely that the legislation would have the effect that many of the charities that we have been talking to have said it would. The charities need certainty and clarity as well.

If it is not this amendment, what amendment will be brought forward? As the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, said, carnage could definitely occur on Report if we do not get a ready-made solution. It needs to be put right and put right now.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

I want to clarify what the Minister just said. Does he plan to come back with a solution on Report? Otherwise there is going to be jeopardy. If the Bill goes through and the Government anticipate doing something after that, charities are going to be in a really difficult position. Presumably the Minister is pledging to come back with a full solution on Report.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

Before the Minister replies to that point, what is it about the amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Mendoza, that is so objectionable? I heard the Minister say that charities are not usually excluded from the effects of legislation in the way that the amendment suggests, but I do not see why they could not be made exempt for this particular purpose.

Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Bill

Debate between Lord Bassam of Brighton and Lord Clement-Jones

Committee stage
Monday 29th January 2024 Grand Committee

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, it has been very interesting to listen to noble Lords on this amendment. I am getting a strong sense of déjà vu from our debates on the then Online Safety Bill.

The noble Viscount, Lord Colville, made a devastating case for the deletion of the Secretary of State’s power, and the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, made a superb case for the inclusion of parliamentary oversight over the guidance. The fact is that, just as we argued in our debates on the then Online Safety Bill, there is far too much power for the Secretary of State in this Bill. This example is the most egregious, but there are so many other aspects that one could argue with, and have argued with—the noble Viscount reminded us of his earlier amendments—such as the conditions for an undertaking to have an SMS designation; the turnover condition; the permitted types of conduct requirements; the period during which the DMU must decide which terms to include in the final transaction under the final offer mechanism; the amount of penalties imposed by the DMU on individual undertakings; and the DMU’s statement of policy on penalties. That is a heck of a lot of different powers for the Secretary of State and, as I say, power over guidance is the most egregious of them.

The way in which the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, expressed this was exactly right. We will come on to parliamentary scrutiny in our debate on the next group, but the word “accountability” is crucial. Of course the regulator should be independent but, at the same time, it should be accountable. This is not just a licence to roam beyond the bounds; it is the right and duty of Parliament to have oversight of the regulator, which is exactly what this amendment would provide for. You have only to look at the draft that was put together of the Overview of the CMA’s Provisional Approach to Implement the New Digital Markets Competition Regime to see just how broad the Secretary of State’s powers over the way in which the CMA carries out its functions will be. That is why this is such an important amendment.

I very much hope that the Minister will hear our voices. This is a really important area of the Bill. As the Minister can see, it is something about which, having had the experience of the then Online Safety Bill, we feel very exercised.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

My Lords, this is the beginning of an important couple of debates about accountability. The breadth and the import of what noble Lords have said so far underlines how much we value that. We on the Labour Benches are co-signatories to both amendments in this group—the first, Amendment 76 in the name of the noble Viscount, Lord Colville, and the second, led by the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell.

Put simply, if the CMA is to be a regulator genuinely independent of government and accountable to Parliament, these amendments should stand. As it is, the legislation seems to suggest that, before the CMA can take any initiative on guidance, it first has to receive the approval of the Secretary of State. This is surely not only a time-consuming process but a wholly inefficient way of conducting business. I can well understand and appreciate why the Government desire to understand how the CMA intends to implement its regulatory policy, but do they really require such a firm and strong hand in the process? As it is, the CMA will be in constant consultation, discussion and interaction with government Ministers, and I do not see why, in the final analysis, approval has to come from the Secretary of State.

Can the Minister tell us how the regulatory regime compares with others? Do regulators like the Charity Commission, Ofcom, Ofwat, the Electoral Commission et cetera all require approval from the Secretary of State before issuing guidance? How does this process contrast with these other regulators? Is there a standard practice, or does it vary across regulatory frameworks? We need something that will work for this particular part of our economy, and it has to be built on trust and understanding and not reliant on the heavy hand of the centre of government coming in and ruling things in or out of guidance which the experts, in the form of the CMA and the DMU, have reflected and consulted on.

We obviously support the amendment of the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, which, as I said, we co-signed. Consulting the relevant parliamentary committees seems a wholly sensible solution and step. These committees are powerful entities, as we know, full of expertise and insight, and they provide a layer of accountability that Parliament rightly expects. After all, the CMA is a creature of Parliament and of legislation that we will put through this House.

I am sure there are plenty of examples of where legislation, particularly secondary legislation, has benefited from the input and oversight of Select Committees and other committees of both Houses. The points made about lobbying the Secretary of State were important and powerful. We need maximum transparency, and we need openness in this process; otherwise, suspicion will abound, and we will always have cynics who say that Secretaries of State are very much in the pockets of business and commercial interests. We do not want that in this legislation; we want something that works for the market, for the competitive interests in the digital world, and particularly for consumers.

Ministers would do well to listen carefully to what the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, said. She is an experienced parliamentarian, but, more than that, she was the chair of a regulator, so she understands exactly the import of the pressure that can come from central government and how it can best be managed.

These amendments are important for us in order to secure accountability in this market and in the way in which the various institutions work and operate together. I happily lend my support to both of them.

Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Bill

Debate between Lord Bassam of Brighton and Lord Clement-Jones

Committee stage
Wednesday 24th January 2024 Grand Committee

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, this has been a really interesting and helpful debate, with a number of noble Lords answering other noble Lords’ questions, which is always pretty useful when you are summing up at the end. One thing absolutely ties every speaker together: agreement with the letter to the Prime Minister from the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, on behalf of her committee, about the need to retain the JR principle throughout the Bill. That is what we are striving to do.

It was extremely interesting to hear what the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, had to say. He answered the second half of the speech by the noble Lord, Lord Tyrie. I did not agree with the first half but the second was pretty good. The “whiff” that the noble Lord, Lord Tyrie, talked about was answered extremely well by the noble Lord, Lord Lansley. It was a direct hit.

The interesting aspect of all this is that the new better regulation framework that I heard the noble Lord, Lord Johnson, extolling from the heights in the Cholmondeley Room this afternoon includes a number of regulatory principles, including proportionality, but why not throw the whole kitchen sink at the Bill? Why is there proportionality in this respect? It was also really interesting to hear from the noble Lord, Lord Faulks, who unpacked very effectively the use of the proportionality principle. It looks as though there is an attempt to expand the way the principle is prayed in aid during a JR case. That seems fairly fundamental.

I hope that the Minister can give us assurance. We have a pincer movement here: there are a number of different ways of dealing with this, in amendments from the noble Lords, Lord Holmes and Lord Faulks, and the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, but we are all aiming for the same end result. However we get there, we are all pretty determined to make sure that the word “proportionate” does not appear in the wrong place. In all the outside briefings we have had, from the Open Markets Institute, Foxglove and Which?, the language is all about unintended consequences and widening the scope of big tech firms to challenge. What the noble Lord, Lord Vaizey, had to say about stray words was pretty instructive. We do not want language in here which opens up these doors to further litigation. The debate on penalties is coming, but let us hold fast on this part of the Bill as much as we possibly can.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Faulks, for his neat and precise analysis of the position in which we find ourselves in the discussion on this group of amendments. This debate is a prequel to that which will follow on penalties, and we should see it in that light; the two things are very much connected, as the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, made clear. Like him, I completely agreed with the noble Lord, Lord Vaizey, when he warned about using stray words. Proportionality is probably one of the most contested terms in law, and in all the 25 years or so that I have been in this House, I must have heard it in all the legal debates we have come across.

These are the first amendments seeking to restore some of the Bill’s original wording, which, as we have heard, was changed late in the day in the Commons. We are yet to receive a full explanation from the Minister of the reasons for that. The noble Lord, Lord Faulks, asked why, and we on these Benches pose the same question. Were Ministers lobbied into this and, if so, why? We support Amendments 16 and 53 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Faulks, which, as he outlined, seek to restore the original wording of the Bill, taking out the word “proportionate”, removing proportionality as the determining factor behind a CMA pro-competition intervention and reinserting the word “appropriate”.

We have two, possibly three, sets of solutions to the problem that the Government have set. However, we also have added our names to Amendments 17 and 54, in the names of the noble Baronesses, Lady Stowell and Lady Harding, and the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, with the intent of ensuring that clarifying that the condition for conduct requirements imposed by the CMA to be proportionate does not create that novel legal standard for appeals of decisions and the confusion that will flow from that. In our view, as the noble Baroness, Lady Harding, says, the original wording strikes the right balance, roughly speaking, whereas the Government’s version would weaken the intent of this part of the Bill.

The formulation of the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, relies on prevailing public law standards—in other words, standards that are commonly understood. We take the view that we all need to know what rules we are working to, and if the Bill introduces or creates a new standard then that certainty is removed. Of course, when it comes to the issue of pre-emption, we will need to resolve the best way forward on this issue at the next stage of the Bill. For my part, I think that reversion might be the best route, but no doubt by negotiating round the Committee we can come up with a workable solution.

The amendments of the noble Lord, Lord Holmes, particularly Amendments 220 and 222, offer another way through it. However, on the face of it, for us they are useful in the context of reminding our Committee that guidance will need to be produced on the operation of this regime as it covers financial penalties and the countervailing benefits exemptions.

We have heard a lot about the new regime being flexible and participatory as a framework for regulation, and we agree with that principle. However, we think that, with this particular change, the Government strike at the heart of that and bring in a measure of uncertainty that is unwise, frankly, in this particular process. The intervention of the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, was very telling. What he told the Committee was extremely important and we should listen very carefully to what was said in that exchange of correspondence. He rather shot the Government’s fox.

In conclusion, the Minister has a bit of a difficult job on his hands here. He may feel the weight of the Committee against him. I rather hope that he can offer us a measure of reassurance and perhaps help us come to a point where the whole Committee can agree a sensible reversion or an amendment that makes the Bill as workable as it seemed when it was first drafted.

Online Safety Bill

Debate between Lord Bassam of Brighton and Lord Clement-Jones

Committee stage
Thursday 25th May 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

My Lords, when I brought an amendment to a police Bill, my local football club said to me that it was anticipating spending something like £100,000 a year trying to create and develop filters, which were commercially available, to stop its footballers being able to see the abuse that they were getting online. It did that for a very sensible commercial reason because those footballers’ performance was affected by the abuse they got. I want to know how the noble Lord sees this working if not by having some form of intervention that involves the platforms. Obviously, there is a commercial benefit to providers of filters et cetera, but it is quite hard for those who have been victims to see a way to make this useful to them without some external form of support.

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

I absolutely take what the noble Lord is saying, and I am not saying that the platforms do not have responsibility. Of course they do: the whole Bill is about the platforms taking responsibility with risk assessment, adhering to their terms of service, transparency about how those terms are operating, et cetera. It is purely on the question of whether they need to be reporting that content when it occurs. They have takedown responsibilities for illegal content or content that may be seen by children and so on, but it is about whether they have the duty to report to the police. It may seem a relatively narrow point, but it is quite important that we go with the framework. Many of us have said many times that we regret the absence of “legal but harmful” but, given where we are, we basically have to go with that architecture.

I very much enjoyed listening to the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett. There is no opportunity lost in the course of the Bill to talk about ChatGPT or GPT-4, and that was no exception. It means that we need to listen to how young people are responding to the way that this legislation operates. I am fully in favour of whatever mechanism it may be. It does not need to be statutory, but I very much hope that we do not treat this just as the end of the process but will see how the Bill works out and will listen and learn from experience, and particularly from young people who are particularly vulnerable to much of the content, and the way that the algorithms on social media work.

Electronic Trade Documents Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Bassam of Brighton and Lord Clement-Jones

3rd reading
Wednesday 22nd March 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, I add my thanks to those of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd. I certainly learned a great deal about the Law Commission process for scrutinising Bills, and a lot of that was due to the fact that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, was an expert and wise chair of our Committee. Great thanks are due to him and to the Minister. It is rather unusual to have a Minister sitting in on the Committee, but he was very welcome nevertheless, along with the noble Lord, Lord Harlech. I also thank the other members of the Committee who kicked the tyres very effectively on the Bill. Of course, I particularly thank Professor Sarah Green and the Law Commission.

The whole purpose of the Bill is to make digital trade a reality. We sometimes think that our job is done when a Bill goes through and we can think about something else, but it is important that progress is made on the single trade window which will result from this Bill. Can the Minister tell us when the first phase of the single trade window might happen? Will it happen in November 2023? After all, it is a very important part of what we should expect. It is quite complex. It is described as a multi-department programme, which probably sends quivers down the spines in Whitehall. It would be very good to hear that the Bill is going to come into effect very quickly and will lead in the very short term to greater digital trade, but it is a very good Bill and we have scrutinised it pretty effectively.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

My Lords, it falls to me to add my general congratulations to the Minister, to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, for his work on this, to the Bill team and the advisers who were behind them and, in particular, as the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, said, to Professor Sarah Green, who led the way in the evidence and cleared a great pathway for us. The Law Commission should be congratulated on constructing this legislation to which none of us wanted to effect an amendment, and we succeeded in that through many hours of deliberation and consideration, so that is something to be proud of in itself.

I want to add to a point the noble Lord, Lord Clement- Jones, usefully began. Many Bills meander their way through Parliament and disappear, sinking without a trace. I suspect this Bill might do that as well, but it does not deserve to. This is a really important piece of legislation which we should not just be proud of but make something of. Some estimates suggest we can save something like 50% in costs by moving to forms of electronic trade. That is not to be sniffed at in an intensely competitive international trading world. This piece of legislation, which puts us in the lead on electronic trade, is something we should celebrate.

I raised in Committee with the Minister that we should ensure we have a strategy which means that this Bill gets the opportunity to do what it says it is about: facilitating electronic trading. I asked the Minister about this when we were in Committee. He said:

“Following the Bill being passed, many of the precise steps taken to implement and fully harness the benefits of the Bill will be for business and industry to determine.”


That is fine, but we need a clear pathway and strategy from the Government for us to be able as a trading nation to reap the benefits of this legislation. I would like to hear from the Minister—it is something I am sure the House will want to come back to at some point—what that strategy might look like. He later said that there is

“a role for government to play”,—[Official Report, Electronic Trade Documents Bill [HL] Special Public Bill Committee, 20/2/23; col. 17.]

which is the case. However, we and Singapore are the only two trading nations with the benefit of this legislation in prospect.

I congratulate the Government on bringing this forward. It is a fine piece of legislation. It may not be controversial, but it is potentially of great value. I hope this Government can aspire to give this piece of legislation the value it deserves.

Electronic Trade Documents Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Bassam of Brighton and Lord Clement-Jones

Lords Special Public Bill Committee
Monday 20th February 2023 Other Business

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

I see. The only part of the Bill that we received contrary evidence on was mates’ receipts. If that is the only matter that there was an argument on, we have done pretty well on the Bill so far. I thank our chair for his expertise, which helped us enormously as we went through the Bill; we kicked the tires fairly firmly. I congratulate our Minister, who switched hats seamlessly during the Recess and is now the spokesperson in this area; his versatility clearly knows no bounds. I thank him for his letter, which cites case law that makes the status of mates’ receipts very clear. We also owe the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, quite a bit for unpacking, with his trade expertise, the issues in Clause 1 today and throughout the passage of the Bill.

I am personally quite satisfied, although I have some trepidation. Professor Sir Roy Goode is no mean authority, but we must conclude that the Minister is correct in quoting case law, and I think our chair is very satisfied with how Clause 1, and the documents cited in Clause 1(2), are set out. So I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, but it is useful that we have explicitly said that we are satisfied in that respect.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

I feel provoked to speak. I shall not detain the committee long. I entirely echo what the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, said. The letters from all parties have been extremely helpful, and the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, has played a blinder in trying to draw out the detail, which has helped all of us. This is obviously a very necessary Bill, and I am sure that, in the fullness of time, it will ensure that we as a nation are well placed in the world of electronic trade and electronic trade documentation. I do not have any particular misgivings about the Bill, but I shall of course listen very carefully to what is said in the other clause stand part debates.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, I will be brief. As all noble Lords described, this approach was overwhelmingly supported by our witnesses to the committee. All of them emphasised that MLETR is a model law, not a prescription for law. Possession of digital documents is absolutely the essence of the Law Commission’s approach to the Bill, and it has been entirely justified. The noble Lord, Lord Lansley, talked about something being capable of possession, which essentially makes this clause a gateway, like Clause 2, leading it to common law to establish possession. This approach was entirely supported by everything that we heard during our inquiry. We fully support that Law Commission approach.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

My Lords, clearly, the issue of possession and exclusive control was the nearest we came to controversy in our sessions on the Bill. But the convocation of professors arraigned before us was unanimous in the view that this is the way to approach the issue. The seminars on this which the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, gave us added to our conviction that this was the right way. No doubt, it will establish the benchmark for other jurisdictions to follow.

I have one question. My eye alighted on the word “indorse” in Clause 3(1). Normally, this would be “endorse”. As I understand it—my English is not the best in the world—the difference is pretty marginal, but one relates specifically to financial terminology. I wanted to understand this better, because it is an unusual word that is not often used. Apart from that, I have nothing to add.

Product Security and Telecommunications Infrastructure Bill

Debate between Lord Bassam of Brighton and Lord Clement-Jones

Report stage
Wednesday 12th October 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

The view of these Benches is that throughout the passage of the Bill it has been clear that a strong case has been made for better protection for landowners against the power of telecoms operators. However, the ADR process that the Government are providing under Clause 68 is non-binding. Telecoms companies need to show only that they have considered it to avoid costs. This will not make them engage with the spirit of the process, and we expect telecoms companies to take matters to court as quickly as possible instead, with all the consequences that entails of costs on both sides.

As the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, stated, to address this the Government should make ADR compulsory for any dispute and issue guidance about reasonable terms. Properly enforced, we believe it would reduce operators’ reliance on litigation through the courts, which sometimes takes the rather oppressive form of threats, and encourage better behaviour by both parties. Given the potential benefits to both parties and the wider public interest, it is difficult to see the case for this process remaining advisory. In principle, we very much support Amendments 25, 26 and 27, so well advocated by the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, the noble Lord, Lord Cromwell, and the noble Earl, Lord Devon.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

My Lords, this has been an interesting short debate. It was an interesting debate in Committee and I congratulate the noble Baroness on retabling her amendments. I do so because I am not completely convinced by the Government’s arguments here. There are real concerns from some that the tribunal system favours operators due to the experience and size of their legal teams. They are very powerful organisations and we should not overlook that. The legal system is there to protect all from overweening power. I understand that the ADR system is intended to prevent cases going to tribunal and court, with all the costs that come with that, and, given the timescales involved, there is clearly a benefit to reaching agreements under an alternative framework. However, if it is voluntary, where is the incentive for its use?

I shall ask one final question; I think this is the most important point. If ADR as a voluntary means of dispute resolution does not work, what will the Government do? Will they step in again and reconsider this issue? Will they give careful consideration to making it mandatory, because then it would have a more powerful effect?

I do not think this issue will go away. I do not find the Government’s arguments entirely compelling and the noble Baroness has made a very good case. I look forward to hearing what the Minister has to say.

Legislative Reform (Renewal of National Radio Multiplex Licences) Order 2022

Debate between Lord Bassam of Brighton and Lord Clement-Jones

Monday 4th April 2022 Grand Committee

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, I cannot believe that this is going to be a mass event. I thank the Minister for his introduction to the LRO and welcome the commitment to digital radio represented by this LRO. However, as we noted during recent Oral Questions, we are all looking forward to the government response to the Digital Radio and Audio Review of last October, which has not yet been published. Perhaps the Minister would reveal a little more than he did about when we can expect it to be forthcoming—“spring” or “summer” would do; “shortly” is a word he might wish to deploy as well.

There are some questions to be answered, which I hope will appear in the response and which are relevant to today’s LRO. I recognise that the BEIS Select Committee asked some of these, but I want to go a little further. Clearly, IP radio is coming in in force, especially with smart speakers and voice assistants now beginning to replace dedicated radio sets. I for one will be interested in what the Government have to say about prominence and algorithmic curation of playlists, station selection and content, and how this will fit with the new statutory competition framework for the Digital Markets Unit.

Last week, representatives from news media and publishing, including radio, highlighted the need for the Government to introduce statutory powers for the DMU to help tackle the threat of tech platforms, but over the weekend there were reports that this may be dropped from the Queen’s Speech. Does the Minister recognise the urgency of putting in place such powers in regulating online gatekeepers such as smart speakers and voice assistants? What proposals will there be in the next parliamentary Session to address the significant current risk to media plurality and broadcasters’ business models from the digital platforms linked to these devices?

In June 2021, the then Secretary of State for DCMS announced plans for a broadcasting White Paper, which would address a range of issues, including regulation of commercial radio and prominence of UK radio services online and on smart speakers. When is this White Paper expected and will it address these issues?

However, surely key in all this is that spectrum for the multiplexes is a scarce commodity, and demand for it will depend on how much commercial radio DAB is replaced by IP broadcasting. Should not any renewal of the DAB multiplex licences have been set in context with the response to the review on this, particularly in terms of the competition issues associated with any renewal and the pressures on the two multiplexes? In addition, is not the potential change to mandatory licence conditions to include the necessity to include DAB+ relevant in terms of the pressure on the two systems, as well as the ability to satisfy demand for space on the multiplexes?

Similarly, I note the commitment mentioned by the Minister not to switch off FM services before 2030, despite digital reaching 66% of listening. Is not the future of FM relevant to the renewal of the multiplex licences? Will this be covered by the response to the review?

There seems little price competition in the grant of licences. In other areas, such as mobile telephony spectrum, we have seen a bidding system—why not in this area now that digital radio technology is well established?

The general impression is that the Government might have jumped the gun in this area, but in other areas relating to commercial radio they are dragging their heels. What can the Government say in response to all these concerns, many of which are shared by the commercial radio industry?

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

My Lords, we too welcome the order, which secures the future of popular radio stations including Absolute Radio, Classic FM and Times Radio, and will ensure that, as a product of the renewal of the UK national digital radio multiplex licences, we have stability and certainty for the next decade, as the Minister said.

As I understand matters, the Government are giving Ofcom the power to renew the two commercial radio multiplex licences, Digital One Ltd and Sound Digital Ltd, which, as the Minister explained, are due to expire in 2023 and 2028 respectively. This move will mean that audiences across the UK can enjoy uninterrupted access to the huge range of radio content available from the country’s national commercial broadcasters through their digital devices on a free-to-air basis. Well-known stations on the Digital One Ltd multiplex include Absolute Radio, Capital and Smooth. Listeners can find the likes of Jazz FM and talkRADIO on the Sound Digital Ltd multiplex. That is all to the good.

As I understand it, the first of the two licences is due to expire in November next year. Rather than going continually through the bidding process every five years, the Government seem to have decided to spare both sides the time and cost of doing so. That too is welcome.

As has been said, the Commons BEIS Committee has published its report on the order. This confirms that it meets all the relevant tests that would be expected. We welcome the fact that those have been properly gone through, and we consider the policy to be proportionate. It has been subject to appropriate consultation, and that too is to be welcomed.

We support the change and recognise the enduring value of radio in general terms. Who does not love “The Archers”, “Desert Island Discs”, Jazz FM, BBC 6 Music—I could go on? All these bring great pleasure to us.

Trade Bill

Debate between Lord Bassam of Brighton and Lord Clement-Jones

Committee stage
Tuesday 13th October 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I wholeheartedly support the amendments tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Freyberg, to protect the healthcare data generated by the NHS as well as the safety and rights of the patients and citizens it exists to serve. I commend the way in which he introduced these amendments.

I have spoken on Second Reading and earlier in Committee about the need for data adequacy to ensure that personal data transfers to third countries outside the EU are protected in line with the principles of the GDPR. By the same token, we must protect NHS data, especially given the many transactions between technology, telecoms and pharma companies concerned with NHS data. Harnessing the value of healthcare data must be allied with ensuring that adequate protections are put in place in trade agreements if that value is not to be given or traded away.

Amendments 71 and 72 would introduce clauses to the Bill to help guarantee patient safety where the data-driven medicines and medical technologies feature in a trade agreement. These are products and services that are bound to grow in number and novelty in the future, as a direct result of both the ongoing Covid-19 health emergency and the accelerated use of new technologies. Given the number of healthcare-related amendments that have been discussed in Committee, it is very clear that there are fundamental concerns about protection of the NHS and the safety, efficacy and cost of the healthcare services that it delivers. There is the potential for the Government to lose control at precisely the moment they propose to take it back. That is why I have put my name to, and support, Amendments 71 and 72.

In July, in the case of Schrems II, the European Court of Justice ruled that the privacy shield framework, which allows data transfers between the US, the UK and the EU, is invalid. That has been compounded by the recent ECJ judgment this month in the case brought by Privacy International. In future, data exporters will have to rely on standard contractual clauses. Relying on standard contractual clauses in healthcare is simply not acceptable. Relevant to Amendment 72 in particular, there is a common assumption that, apart from any data adequacy issues, data stored in the UK is subject only to UK law. This is not the case: in March 2018, the US Government enacted the Clarifying Lawful Overseas Use of Data Act, or CLOUD Act, which allows law enforcement agencies to demand access to data stored on servers hosted by US-based tech firms, such as Amazon Web Services, Microsoft and Google, regardless of the data’s physical location and without issuing a request for mutual legal assistance. In practice, data might be resident in the UK, but it is still subject to US law.

Data cannot, therefore, simply be considered UK sovereign, and it is notable that Amazon Web Services gave a full response to more than 1,259 subpoenas, search warrants and court orders between January and June of this year. AWS’s own terms and conditions, which form part of its agreements with the UK Government, do not commit to keeping data in the region selected by government officials if AWS is required by law to move the data elsewhere in the world. Key and sensitive aspects of government data, such as security and access rules, usage policies and permissions, may also be transferred to the US without Amazon having to seek advance permission. Similarly, AWS has the right to request customer data and provide support services from anywhere in the world.

The Cabinet Office Government Digital Service team, which sets the Government’s digital policy, gives no guidance on where government data should be hosted. It simply states that all data categorised as official —the vast majority of government data, but including law enforcement, biometric and patient data—is suitable for the public cloud, and instructs its own staff simply to use AWS, with no guidance given on where the data must be hosted. The costs of AWS varies widely, depending on the region selected—and the UK is one of the most expensive regions. Regions are physically selected by the technical staff, rather than the procurement team or the security team. I should say that Amazon Web Services has a contract with NHSX, so that should be set in this context.

The free flow of data across borders, in principle, is of crucial importance, as the noble Lord, Lord Freyberg, said. However, I hope this example illustrates that control of policy and regulation as to what that data is and who it is shared with should be retained by the UK Government. In fact, that is not even enough existing control over government data. In particular, retention of control over health data, health service planning, and research and innovation is vital if the UK is to maintain its position as a leading life sciences economy and innovator. That is what these amendments would ensure.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Freyberg, is to be congratulated on bringing these amendments to the forefront of our discussions and considerations, not least because, as he said, at the heart of them is an attempt to guarantee patient safety. That should be a paramount reason for giving them the active consideration we are.

As the noble Lord, Lord Freyberg, said, there is a significant value to NHS data for a number of reasons: expanding research, testing technology, better under- standing of diseases and, of course, improving treatments. The fiscal value of NHS data cannot be underlined strongly enough—imagine its value if an insurance company were to find, for instance, access to data concerning test, track and trace.

The value of all this data is estimated to be around £10 billion a year, but, as I have mentioned before, the Bill in its current form could allow UK data to be moved to servers in America and stop the NHS being able to analyse its own health data without paying royalties. We should not pretend that tech companies and US drug giants do not recognise the value of all this data; the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, has given ample voice to that argument.

Last year, it was revealed that pharma companies Merck, Bristol Myers Squibb and Eli Lilly paid the Government for licences costing up to £330,000 each, in return for anonymised health data. The Government, as has been said earlier, have also given Amazon access to healthcare information, and DeepMind was given access to the data of 1.6 million patients at the Royal Free Hospital.

As we have touched on before in a previous group, Labour supports protecting the NHS, including its data and publicly funded health and care services, from any form of control from outside the UK in trade deals. I have already pulled out the inconsistencies in the Government’s position. They say the NHS is not on the table in trade talks, but they will not put protections on the face of the Bill. What have they got to hide? They do not want to improve scrutiny mechanisms for trade agreements, and I think we should be concerned and highly worried about that.

I am not the only one to recognise this: more than 400 doctors and health professionals have urged the Government to amend the Bill and ensure that health services are not on the table in future trade deals. They have also argued that free trade deals risk compromising the safe storage and processing of NHS data. Let us commit in statute to protecting our beloved NHS in trade deals and making sure we can use valuable data to provide the most cutting-edge care for patients here in the UK.