Data Protection and Digital Information Bill

Debate between Viscount Stansgate and Baroness Harding of Winscombe

Committee stage
Wednesday 17th April 2024 Grand Committee

[Baroness Harding of Winscombe (Con)]

My Lords, I want to speak briefly in support of, first, the amendments in the name of my noble friend Lord Holmes, which would recreate the office of the Biometrics and Surveillance Camera Commissioner.

As I have done on a number of occasions, I shall tell a short story; it is about the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority. Noble Lords may wonder why I am starting there. I remember very clearly one of the first debates that I participated in when I was at university—far too long ago. It was at the Oxford Union, and Dame Mary Warnock came to speak about what was then a highly contentious use of new technology. In this country, we had that debate early; we established an authority to oversee what are very complex scientific and ethical issues. It has remained a settled issue in this country that has enabled many families to bear children, bringing life and joy to people in a settled and safe way.

This data issue is quite similar, I think. Other countries did not have that early debate, which I remember as a teenager, and did not establish a regulator in the form of the HFEA. I point to the US, which was torn apart by those very issues. As the noble Lord, Lord Vaux, has just set out, the public are very concerned about the use of biometric data. This is an issue that many sci-fi novels and films have been made about, because it preys on our deepest fears. I think that technology can be hugely valuable to society, but only if we build and maintain trust in it. In order to do that, you need consistent, long-standing, expert regulation.

Like the noble Lord, Lord Vaux, I do not understand why the changes that this Bill brings will make things better. It narrows the scope of protection to data protection only when, actually, the issues are much broader, much subtler and much more sophisticated. For that reason and that reason alone, I think that we need to remove these clauses and reinstate the regulator that exists today.

[Viscount Stansgate (Lab)]

My Lords, I find myself in a fortunate position: we have made progress fast enough to enable me to go from one end of the Room to the other and play a modest part in this debate. I do so because, at an earlier stage, I identified the amendments tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Holmes, and I very much wish to say a few words in support of them.

Reference has already been made to the briefing that we have had from CRISP. I pay tribute to the authors of that report—I do not need to read long chunks of it into the record—and am tempted to follow the noble Lord in referring to both of them. I sometimes wonder whether, had their report been officially available before the Government drafted the Bill, we would find ourselves in the position we are now in. I would like to think that that would have had an effect on the Government’s thinking.

When I first read about the Government’s intention to abolish the post of the Biometrics and Surveillance Camera Commissioner, I was concerned, but I am not technically adept to know enough about it in detail. I am grateful for the advice that I have had from CRISP and from Professor Michael Zander, a distinguished and eminent lawyer who is a Professor Emeritus at LSE. I am grateful to him for contacting me about this issue. I want to make a few points on his and its behalf.

In the short time available to me, this is the main thing I want to say. The Government argue that abolishing these joint roles will

“reduce duplication and simplify oversight of the police use of biometrics”.

Making that simpler and rationalising it is at the heart of the Government’s argument. It sounds as if this is merely a tidying-up exercise, but I believe that that is far from the case. It is fair to accept that the current arrangements for the oversight of public surveillance and biometric techniques are complex, but a report published on 30 October, to which noble Lords’ attention has already been drawn, makes a powerful case that what the Government intend to do will result in losses that are a great deal more significant than the problems caused by the complexity of the present arrangements. That is the paper’s argument.

The report’s authors, who produced a briefing for Members’ use today, have presented a mass of evidence and provided an impressively detailed analysis of the issues. The research underpinning the report includes a review of relevant literature, interviews with leading experts and regulators—