Digital Economy Bill (Ninth sitting)

Calum Kerr Excerpts

Committee Debate: 9th sitting: House of Commons
Thursday 27th October 2016 Public Bill Committees

[Louise Haigh]

The point is vital and it is the point that was made earlier in our proceedings. Unless we get this right at this stage, it will become a scandal that the Government will then have to deal with and it will hold back progress on sharing data, as we saw with the care.data scandal. We do not want to see the Government embroiled in another scandal like that and we hope that they heed our warnings in order to avoid one in the future.

The objective behind the register is that it could be considered an amnesty for all existing data-sharing projects, with the disclosure assisting understanding of the problem and improving public trust. Let us not kid ourselves that the Bill covers the only data sharing that happens across Government. In a recent interview with Computer Weekly, the new director of the Government Digital Service, Kevin Cunnington, said:

“The real work is going on in”

places such as “Leeds and Manchester”—I would disagree with him on that point for a start, because we are not fans of Leeds in Sheffield—

“as well as London. We need to be part of that. The example I use is where DWP now runs a whole set of disability benefits. It would be incredibly helpful if DWP had selected and consensual access to some of”—

those people’s—

“medical data. Right now, NHS Digital and DWP are having that conversation in Leeds and we’re not in the conversation. Why wouldn’t GDS be in a conversation like that? If we’re going to be, we’ve got to be in Leeds—we can’t do that from here.”

We know that that conversation is happening between the DWP and the NHS—despite assurances that sharing of health and social care information is not happening across Government—only because a random official mentioned it in a random interview, so I ask this question again: does the Minister have an audit of data-sharing agreements and arrangements across Government, or is it the case, as I fear it is, that not only do the public not know which data are shared across Government, for what purpose and how they are stored, but Ministers do not know either?

[Calum Kerr (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (SNP)]

The hon. Lady is making an excellent point. What this cuts back to is the underlying theme of transparency. Rather than the Government acting in a paternal way—“We’ll do what is best for the citizens”—they should be transparent and make it clear to citizens why and where data are being used.

[Louise Haigh]

That is exactly the kind of attitude that underpins these elements of the Bill: “Trust us. We’ll sort it out. Give us your data. No problem. We’re going to share them freely and fairly.” The Government may well do. The problem is that the public do not have that trust in them. As I said on Tuesday, this is not a party political point. The previous Labour Government were not up to scratch in handling data either. This is not a party political attack at all. It is a genuine attempt to get these proposals in the best shape possible, to aid Government digitisation and deliver efficient public services.

Just as the Government give taxpayers a summary of how their tax money has been spent so they should give citizens information on how they have used data on them. If there is transparency through a register, there can be an informed conversation about whether a data disclosure will solve the problems that it claims to. There has been data sharing to prevent fraud for decades and a complete absence of audited and accurate results from that work. Arguing that current data sharing has not prevented fraud and so there should be more data sharing equates to doing the same thing over and again and expecting a different result.

The amendment is vital to restore and build on public trust in the Government handling of data. It is not in my nature to call on my constituents to trust this Government, but if they enacted the amendment, I absolutely would. I would be able to tell my constituents in good faith that they were right to trust their data to this or any future Government, because they and the data community could see exactly how and why their data were being used and exert some control over it. If the Government do not heed this lesson now, I am afraid that they will learn the hard way when things go the way of care.data or worse, as they inevitably will.