Data Protection Bill [ Lords ] (Seventh sitting)

Gareth Snell Excerpts

Thursday 22nd March 2018 Public Bill Committees

[Darren Jones (Bristol North West) (Lab)]

I welcome new schedule 1, in the name of my right hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill and my hon. Friends the Members for Ogmore and for Sheffield, Heeley. I should declare that I was first on Facebook as a 19-year-old. Now, as a 31-year-old, I can declare that I do not think there is anything on there that I am embarrassed of.

[Gareth Snell (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

Lucky you.

[Darren Jones]

I reserve the right for other hon. Friends to remove content from their social media.

I wanted to refer to the issue of data ownership. When we think of the world in terms of things that we own, there are legal bases for that ownership. We have a legal right to the houses that we buy, once the mortgage has been paid off, and we have a legal right to the clothes that we buy. However, we have no legal right to the ownership of the data about us or the data that we generate. In the context of people making money off the back of it, that feels fundamentally incorrect.

Even the language that we use suggests that the relationship is not balanced. The idea that Facebook is my data controller, and that I am merely its data subject, suggests that the tone of the conversation is incorrect. I support the fundamental principle of ownership, because I think that we need to have a much more fundamental debate about who owns this stuff. Why are people making money off the back of it? If they do things with our property that is against the law, or that incurs us a loss, we should have the right to enforce that principle.

We have seen that not just in the context of the personal data that we might create about the things we like to buy or the TV programmes we like to watch. Sir John Bell, in the report “Life sciences: industrial strategy”, talked about the value of NHS data. We are in a unique position in the world, because of our socialist healthcare system, where we have data for individuals in a large population across many years. That is extremely valuable to organisations and others. We on the Science and Technology Committee are doing reports at the moment on genomics data in the health service and on the regulation of algorithms. I recommend those reports, when they are published, to Members of the Bill Committee.

We need to try to avoid allowing, for example, health companies—I will not name any particular ones—to come into this country, access the data of NHS patients, build and train algorithms, and then take those algorithms to other parts of the world and make enormous profits off the back of them. But for the data that belongs to the British people, those businesses would not be able to make those profits.

Data Protection Bill [Lords] (Sixth sitting)

Gareth Snell Excerpts

Tuesday 20th March 2018 Public Bill Committees

[Margot James]

The right hon. Gentleman has made great play of the former Prime Minister’s statement. I remind him that that statement was given six years ago. Much has changed since. My hon. Friend the Member for North Devon tried to make the point that, although we cannot rule out that egregious conduct is still going on in the press, as I imagine there is in virtually every other sector of society, we can agree that much has changed and improved. That is why the Government have changed their direction. I hope that satisfies the right hon. Gentleman.

[Gareth Snell (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Streeter.

On that point, the Minister accepts that egregious activity could be taking place across the industry but does not think that the proposal is the appropriate vehicle for dealing with it. She believes that the digital charter is the appropriate vehicle, but what evidence is she using to ensure that that addresses the egregious activity?

[Margot James]

I want to correct one thing that the hon. Gentleman said: I did not say that that activity was taking place across the industry; I said that it was still taking place. Indeed, we have heard the horrendous allegations made by John Ford, albeit referring to behaviour that predates 2011. He alleges that it is still going on. I am not denying that it probably is still carrying on in pockets, but I would not say that it is widespread.

Press self-regulation has changed significantly in recent years with the establishment of IPSO, which follows many of the principles set out in the Leveson report. As so few publishers have joined a regulator recognised under the royal charter, commencement of section 40 would have a chilling effect on investigative journalism, which is so important to a well-functioning democracy.