Data Protection and Digital Information Bill

Lord Lucas Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 22nd April 2024 Grand Committee

Moved by

[Lord Lucas]

199: Clause 109, page 133, line 21, leave out “(2D)” and insert “(2F)”

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, in moving Amendment 199, I will also speak to the other amendments in this group. In so doing, I declare an interest as the principal proprietor of the Good Schools Guide; we make a lot of use of cookies on our website.

I am completely in favour of what the Government are doing in this part of the Bill as an attempt to reduce cookie consent pollution. It is a tiresome system that we all go through at the moment. The fact that it is tiresome means that, most of the time, we just click on it automatically rather than going through to the details. In a way, it is self-defeating. What the Government are trying to do will very much improve the quality of people’s response to cookies and will make them more aware, in situations where they are asked for consent, that this is important.

However—this will be the request at the end of my speech—between Committee and Report, I would really like to sit down with any noble Lords who are interested and are representatives of the relevant industry to discuss how we should deal with cookies that relate to supporting advertisement delivery. A lot of the web relies on advertisements for the revenue to support itself. By and large, for a lot of sites that you are not asked to pay but from which you get a lot of value, that value is supported by advertising. As a website, if you are going to charge someone for delivering advertising, you have to be able to prove that the advertisement has been delivered and to tell them something about the person to whom you are delivering it. In this process, you are not interested in having individual information. What you want is collective information; you want to know that you have delivered 24,000 copies of this advertisement and know what the audience looks like. You absolutely do not want to end up with personal information.

Within that envelope—absolutely excluding the sorts of cookies that chase you around the internet saying, “Do you want a deckchair?”, just because you bought one two days ago—this is a vital part of the way the internet works at the moment. In Amendments 199 to 201, I suggest ways in which the clauses could be adapted to make sure that that use of cookies—as I say, it does not involve the sharing of personal information; it very much involves collective information—is allowed to continue uninterrupted.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Garden of Frognal) (LD)]

My apologies to the noble Lord but his microphone does not seem to be working. I wonder whether he could speak more clearly.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

I am sorry. I assumed that my microphone was on.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Garden of Frognal) (LD)]

It is but I do not think it is working. I do not know whether anybody else is having problems with it.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

Okay. It does not quite reach me up here; I could sit down if that would be helpful.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Garden of Frognal) (LD)]

No, carry on.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

I will try to line up with it better. Amendments 202 to 205 flag concerns with proposed new Regulation 6B, which sets out to remove cookie banners automatically when the technology is available. The concerns very much relate to that last phrase: “when the technology is available”. How will this work? How is it to be managed? There is only a thin layer of controls on the Government in the way that they will use these new powers; it is also unclear how this will affect consumers and advertisers. There could be some far-reaching effects here. We just do not know.

I am looking for, and hope the Government will agree to, wide consultation because, on something such as this, it is never true that everybody knows everything. You want to put the consultation out to a lot of different people with a lot of different experiences of how to use the net to make sure that what you are doing will have the sort of effects that you want. I want to see proper, thoroughgoing impact assessments, including of the impact on competition and on the economic health of participants in the net. I would like to see a real analysis of the readiness of the technology, not just an assumption that, because somebody likes it, it will work, but a real, critical look at whether the technology is actually up to what it is hoped it will do, and proper testing, so that, in giving the Government the carte blanche that they have asked for with these clauses, we do not end up letting ourselves in for a disaster.

As I said, most of all, I am looking for a meeting between now and Report, so that I can go through these things in detail, and we can really understand the Government’s position on these matters and, if necessary, discuss them further on Report. I beg to move.

[Viscount Chandos (Lab)]

My Lords, I will speak briefly in support of the amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, to which I am pleased to have added my name. I apologise for not being able to speak at Second Reading, but I understand from other Members of the Grand Committee that an occasional guest appearance and a different voice are welcome.

I declare an interest, as set out in the register, as a director of RSMB Ltd, a company specialising in the methodology of audience measurement, cross-media measurement and data integration. More fully, I am nominated and remunerated by the advertising group Havas, which owns the company jointly with Kantar Media.

As the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, so clearly set out in his introduction, these simple and uncontroversial amendments would bring greater clarity and certainty to the key measurement of users, readers and audiences of digital websites and platforms. By including the measurement of aggregate audiences online in the list of cookies that would not require specific consent, these amendments would protect and enhance the interests of both consumers and businesses: consumers because, as the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, said, with the maintenance of advertising revenue funding, websites that provide news, entertainment and a wealth of other services would otherwise cost those consumers much more in subscriptions; and businesses, as through the quality of anonymised, aggregated data, they can build better offers to consumers and advertisers, as well as increase their financial resilience.

The Minister brings profound knowledge and understanding of this field, so he well knows how important the digital advertising market is and how innovative and respected UK companies are in the global industry. That applies not only to the websites, platforms and advertisers but to the research, quality audit and measurement companies specialising in this area. These amendments would support this growing and productive high-tech data, research and measurement sector in reinforcing its world-leading position.

As in so many industries and sectors of the economy, long-term stability is vital to rapidly evolving digital markets. Including these amendments in the Bill, rather than relying on secondary legislation and regulation to flesh out details in the future, will enhance that stability.

Likewise, the amendments relating to the implementation of centralised opt-out controls are intended also to promote that long-term stability, as well bringing enhanced transparency and scrutiny. The interests of consumers and businesses are not in conflict with each other in relation to audience measurement and data quality. They are constructively interactive.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Harlech (Con)]

I take the noble Lord’s point. We are working with industry and will continue to do so. For the benefit of the Committee, we are, as I said, happy to write and explain the points of view, including those from Data: A New Direction. In response to the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, power ultimately lies with Parliament via the affirmative resolution procedure for the Secretary of State power.

I will go back to the amendments we were discussing. This regulation applies to complex and technical markets. The very reason we have taken a delegated power is so that the new exemptions can be carefully created in consultation with all affected stakeholders. As I explained, the Bill includes a requirement to consult the Information Commissioner, the Competition and Markets Authority and any other relevant stakeholders, which would include trade associations and consumers or web users.

Amendment 201 would widen the application of the “strictly necessary” exemption. Currently, it applies only to those purposes essential to provide the service requested by the user. Amendment 201 would extend this exemption so that it applies to the purposes considered essential to the website owner. We do not think this would be desirable, as it would reduce a user’s control over their privacy in a way that they might not expect.

For the reasons I have set out—and once again reaffirming the commitment to write to noble Lords on how the weighting was worked out—I hope my noble friend and the noble Baroness will not press their amendments.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

Might I also hope for the meeting that I referred to?

[Lord Harlech (Con)]

My Lords, my noble friend makes a good point. I can promise all Members that there will be thematic meetings between Committee and Report.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful for that assurance from my noble friend.

On the first amendments, clearly, we are dealing with something that is quite tricky and technical. My noble friend sees these amendments in a different light to me. It is possible that my drafting may be imperfect; that has never happened before, of course, but there is always a first time. Therefore, I seek an opportunity to look at this issue in detail. It is absolutely not my objective to engage the objections; this is something where my noble friend’s objections are valid. My amendment is not intended in any way to allow tracking or profiling. If I am wording things imperfectly or imagining something that just cannot be achieved in practice, the best way to deal with these matters would be to hammer them out in a technical discussion, not in Committee. I would happily look to an opportunity to do that between Committee and Report.

When it comes to new Regulation 6B and its ramifications, as the debate has gone on, I have found myself favouring more and more the amendment in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch. This is an uncontrolled bit of power that we are looking to give the Government, with some serious implications. It should not be done. We should wait until the technology is available and then do something when we can really take our time to look at the options. Again, this is something that we will have a chance to talk through.

It is really important that, in doing what seems to be convenient—as my noble friend put it, it is about getting rid of an irritation and making the whole process of giving permission much more effective; I am absolutely with him on that—we make sure that we are not letting ourselves in for some greater dangers. I personally want to make sure of that. The oldies among us—most of us, I suspect—will remember when Google said, “Don’t be evil”. I wish that it had kept to that.

For now, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 199 withdrawn.