Birmingham Commonwealth Games Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Wednesday 24th July 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port]

I am grateful for that intervention. It allows me simply to give the assurance that in the findings of the committee to which I have referred those specific points have been considered, with figures identical to those that have been mentioned. The business side of things needs to be heard. VAT at 20% in this country compares with 12%, 6% or 7% in other European countries, and it loads the tax base here much more than there. It puts this country’s hotels at a disadvantage compared with those overseas. I am not denying these important considerations at all; I am simply saying that, by approving this measure, we could have a specific, properly looked at piece of work that would allow us to take all these factors into consideration and come to a conclusion that would be justified evidentially rather than simply being based on a feeling at this particular moment—on the last day but one of a Session, when, as noble Lords can see, sartorially I am dressed for other occasions.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I did not expect to enjoy a debate on raising tax but it was very entertaining. I thought that the noble Lords, Lord Hunt and Lord Griffiths, put their case very persuasively. I was going to mention the thin edge of the wedge but it has already been mentioned several times. The noble Lord, Lord Rooker, made a new suggestion about taking advantage of the absence of a Chancellor of the Exchequer. There might not be a Minister soon, and it would guarantee that there would not be a Minister if I did that. I am also grateful for the support of my noble friends.

Perhaps I might say something about the state of Birmingham’s finances and what Birmingham City Council is doing. As I mentioned in Committee, Birmingham and the West Midlands region will benefit, as the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, said, from a £778 million investment to stage the 2022 Commonwealth Games, with Birmingham City Council and a number of its key partners providing funding of £184 million—25%—of the Games budget.

Birmingham City Council has publicly committed to meet its financial obligations for the Games, and approved a four-year council budget at a full council meeting on 26 February this year, stating that there are sufficient reserves to cover the city’s share of the costs. It has already explained how it will meet its obligations without impacting on existing services. I refer noble Lords to Birmingham City Council’s publicly available Financial Plan 2019-2023. This states that,

“resources have been identified for this purpose that will be sufficient to meet these funding liabilities as they fall due”.

It might interest noble Lords to know that the Government have already committed to working constructively with Birmingham City Council, to the extent that there was correspondence on 7 December 2017 from the Chief Secretary to the Treasury to Birmingham City Council on reviewing existing legislative powers and listening to requests for new powers, should the case for additional funding be made.

As the noble Lord, Lord Griffiths, said, we are in frequent dialogue with Birmingham City Council but, to date, no detailed case has been put forward to evidence the need for an additional power. However, I understand that Birmingham City Council is now undertaking detailed work, with expert advice, on various options for revenue-raising to offset the costs of the Games, including the use of existing powers or the introduction of a new tax, such as a hotel tax. We and Her Majesty’s Treasury await the conclusion of that analysis and stand ready to look at the details of any proposals put forward by the council.

My honourable friend the Minister for Sport and Civil Society—I have her full title right this time—has spoken to the Chief Secretary to the Treasury about this. As I stated previously, matters of taxation are for HM Treasury to consider, with appropriate evidence, consultation and assessment of impact—for example, on tourism—as my noble friends Lady McIntosh and Lady Neville-Rolfe mentioned. I am grateful to my noble friends for their support.

We consider that these amendments are not an appropriate measure for the Bill, which, I remind your Lordships, is focused on providing the temporary operational powers required to deliver a successful Games, and they would pre-empt the outcome of the work already being undertaken by Birmingham City Council.

Birmingham Commonwealth Games Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Tuesday 9th July 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port]

That is the opposite stage instruction from:

“Exit, pursued by a bear”.


Never mind; that was too complicated.

To put it simply, if the Minister pours cold water on this, would he like to come up with one or two other proposals for how the local people can raise this £40 million?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I am grateful for those contributions. The noble Lord, Lord Rooker, and the right reverend Prelate are a difficult combination to face. The noble Lord was asking me to make a name for myself by opposing the Treasury and announcing a new tax from the Dispatch Box, while the right reverend Prelate said, “It’s only £1—that’s very little”. This is really a question of “Lead me not into temptation”, but I wonder how long that £1 would stay as £1.

The issue here relates to the actual amount of the budget for the Games and how it can be paid for. As we now know, there will be a £778 million investment, to be split approximately 75:25 between central government and Birmingham City Council and a number of its key partners. I was not quite clear what the noble Lord, Lord Griffiths, meant about the funding shortfall; I understand that the city council’s contribution to the Games budget was considered by a meeting of the full council earlier this year. The spending based on that budget will be tightly monitored across all the Games partners to ensure control—an issue which I know the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, talked about at Second Reading. We are confident that the budget announced is sufficient to deliver a strong Games for the city but I absolutely agree with the points raised at Second Reading, and earlier this afternoon by the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, saying that Parliament should be provided with more information regarding the Games budget. This will be forthcoming.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port]

I am grateful for this opportunity. I mentioned £40 million, as did my noble friend Lord Snape; the briefing papers that we received from Birmingham mentioned £40 million. It seems that when the local authorities calculate their 25%, they will be £40 million short of that. This provision is intended to bridge that gap.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I understand now. The 25% comes from Birmingham City Council and its partners; it also involves revenue raising in various ways so none of it is certain. However, my point remains that the city council is looking at different ways to do that and I will come on to that in a moment.

This is not a completely uncontroversial proposal. I do not want to go into the detailed arguments about the hotel levy today, but it is not quite as straightforward as some people may think. Tourism in this country pays a much higher rate of VAT than our competitors in Europe. In May, a report on tourism tariffs by the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Hospitality expressed reservations about the likelihood of tourism levies having a long-term, positive benefit on tourism infrastructure. The report concluded that:

“Further studies need to be commissioned on the economic impact and viability of a tourist tax”.


The noble Lord, Lord Rooker, suggested that this should be a pilot, which goes some way to answering that although it would be limited in scope. The noble Lord also mentioned the Scottish Government, who will consult this year on the principles of a locally determined tourist tax, prior to introducing legislation which would allow local authorities to apply such a tax. We will certainly be looking at the benefits of that.

I have to say that matters of taxation are for the Treasury to consider. Treasury Ministers have been in correspondence with Birmingham City Council regarding its options for meeting its required contribution to the Games. That is the right place for those discussions, not this Bill, which provides the framework for the successful operational delivery of the Games. The Government are aware that the city council is actively considering a number of options for local revenue raising, including within existing powers, and stand ready to look at the details of any proposals that the city council wishes to put forward.

I hope that is not cold water, though it may be lukewarm. I hope that noble Lords are reassured that the Government remain committed to working with the city council on its plans for delivering its required financial contribution to the Games. I would therefore be grateful if the noble Lord felt able to withdraw his amendment.

Free TV Licences for Over-75s

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Tuesday 11th June 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port]

They will have their moment to explain themselves. Will the Government look again at their responsibilities now that the BBC, using its independence, has taken its decision?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I am very sorry to hear that this might cause marital disharmony in the noble Lord’s household. To be serious, this is not a payout, as he called it. This is taxpayers’ money which is going to support the BBC. This was decided between the BBC and the Government in 2015. That agreement took into account the fact that the BBC licence fee was fixed with inflationary increases for five years, which was the first time that had happened. The deal on that and the increases in salaries—I absolutely take his point that that will not approach the £745 million we are talking about at the moment—was made in full knowledge of what it would mean. It was also agreed that the Government would phase this in, so the DWP has contributed to the BBC for it for the past two years, but that was agreed then. That is why we are disappointed that the BBC has taken this decision. There are some potential benefits. I accept that not all noble Lords agreed at the time, but it was passed into law in the Digital Economy Act 2017. It is the BBC’s decision, because Parliament gave it that decision to make.

Huawei

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Thursday 25th April 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, I am quite sure that the noble Lord would have asked a very pertinent and searching question, and no doubt he will do it eventually. The fact that much of what is happening is hidden behind this question of a leak limits the Minister’s ability to answer some of the questions, but no doubt the time will come for that. Today, £5 billion is quoted as the likely amount that Facebook will have to pay as a fine for the misappropriation of data and technological information in the last period. The Statement says that the review,

“is not about one company, or even one country”.

Are we not already in a complicated relationship with firms of this kind from America? Can we have a global set of assurances that all these sources of information will be adequately managed for the well-being of us all?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

The noble Lord is exactly right. As I said, this is not just about one country. The National Security Council looks at all these issues. The problem with a global network such as the internet is that threats can come from any country, and they may originate in one but attack through another. It is complicated. In this country, we have one of the best organisations to deal with this: the National Cyber Security Centre in GCHQ. The main thing to stress is that our security is pre-eminent, but we have to strike a balance with new and emerging economies and how we deal with them—and not just with regard to cybersecurity.

Radio: Local Commercial Stations

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Thursday 25th April 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

Of course, the noble Lord is right. Not only community radio but commercial radio has seen a massive increase since 2010, when the current regime was bought in. But according to Ofcom’s guidelines, the large commercial radio groups still need to have studios that originate programming within approved local areas. The approved local areas were brought in under the last Labour Government. They will not be able to originate content solely in London. We support local radio in a number of ways and are looking forward, for example, to introducing multiplexes soon for local DAB radio.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, I spent part of the recent break reading—or rereading—Seven Types of Ambiguity. It occurred to me that chapter 5 of that momentous work dealt with statements in the briefing I received from the radio industry putting forward its case:

“Through technology, stations have the ability to customise the news information they broadcast, irrespective of where the presenters are based”,


which means that we no longer have keep to the same number of stations open. These approved areas can be a pretext behind which we hide the diminution of jobs, of locally based services and of immediate contact with local communities, and can produce and customise in faraway places, with no reporters on site, things that sound as if they are near. Do the Government think that that is really what is behind the slackening of regulation affecting this sector of our life?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

The basic issue is that commercial analogue radio faces an enormous challenge from digital services, both online and terrestrial. The changes that have been made by Ofcom to localness were in accordance with listeners’ views. For example, only 17% of respondents to the survey and the consultation thought that locally based presenters were a factor which helped make their station feel local. Ofcom has a requirement to have content made in approved areas, which are local ITV areas, and local news must be produced either hourly or twice a day. If stations have local news only twice a day, they have to produce more locally made content. The greatest factor in whether people listen to local radio is—shock, horror—that it plays the music the listeners like; 72% of respondents said so.

Electronic Communications (Amendment etc.) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Tuesday 9th April 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, I looked behind me in vain for interventions from our side of the House. I am happy to provide as short a contribution to this debate as others, and very happy that my noble friend Lord Foster—if I may call him that—has made some of his usual penetrating comments that leave me free to look at things at another level. As the Minister said, this SI seems a simple matter of tidying up an area that had not been previously dealt with in full. I cannot comment on why some of this was not done earlier, but it is being done now. When I got it and saw the pages and pages of sheer drudgery that our very talented Civil Service has had to give its best time to, my heart sank.

It also occurred to me that debating it today is very ironical because the Prime Minister does not want a no-deal exit—neither do the Lords or the Commons. Nobody wants it, but we look as if we might be in danger of drifting into it. Once upon a time, a Roman emperor played the violin while the city around him burned. Now, our contemporary empress is fiddling in European capitals and burning our boats while she does it. We must ask ourselves very seriously whether this exercise of 500 or more statutory instruments being pushed through our procedures in this way has been beneficial to anybody.

I note the substantive point that the statutory instrument intends to deal with the,

“notification of personal data breaches by providers of publicly available electronic communications service”.

I have learned so many acronyms in reading for this debate—indeed, it has been on a par with “Line of Duty”, which I watch rather assiduously when I can. The replacing of “competent national authority” references with references to the “Information Commissioner” seems to tidy everything up. I looked and, as has been mentioned by others already, the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee drew attention to the facts about these calls. Indeed, it added an appendix to one of its committee meetings to ask technical questions of the Minister. He has answered those and I need not therefore repeat them.

With the ground adequately covered and tidiness brought to a fundamentally futile exercise, I am happy to rest the case there. I invite the Minister to say some reassuring words and answer our questions so that we can move on to other business.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I am grateful to both noble Lords for their points and detailed questions on a detailed SI.

The noble Lord, Lord Foster, castigated us for bringing these small changes forward at a late stage and asked why we did not bring them forward earlier. The noble Lord, Lord Griffiths, looked at the details, a substantial number of which need to be addressed, not only in legislation but in EU decisions, regulations and directives. That takes time, and we want to get it right. He also asked whether I can categorically assure him that he will not have to deal with these matters again. Of course I cannot give him that assurance, as he well knows, but the point is made and I accept it.

On a serious note, it is important to get these things right. I pay tribute to the civil servants in my department, who have worked very hard to try to do that. Most of the provisions in this statutory instrument are genuinely technical, changing the language so that it makes sense in the event that we leave the EU. Of course, this is a no-deal Brexit SI, so it is contingent on that.

The noble Lord, Lord Foster, asked some specific questions about his favourite subject—the BEREC regulations—such as why we did not bring them forward. The reason is that this SI repeals the 2018 BEREC regulation, which replaced the 2009 BEREC regulation. That regulation was repealed and replaced in December 2018, so it is now necessary to revoke the new 2018 BEREC regulation. It was not ready at the time of the previous SI, which is why we are doing that now. I hope that he can feel happy with that.

As far as the GDPR is concerned, we agreed the data SI in this House some weeks ago. The noble Lord referred to Article 81 on the suspension of proceedings, which is omitted from the UK GDPR. In a UK-only context, that provision becomes redundant, because it is right that breaches of the UK GDPR are brought before UK courts. Of course, amendments to the retained GDPR were debated by this House in February 2019.

Public Service Broadcasters

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Thursday 28th March 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My noble friend is absolutely right. This is one problem with US subscription services. They spend a huge amount on content. Netflix spent £4.6 billion on content in 2017 and Amazon spent £3.4 billion, but only £150 million of that was UK-made TV, whereas the public service broadcasters spent £2.6 billion on UK content.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, I welcome the Minister’s replies to questions thus far put, but in the speech that occasioned the Question the Ofcom commissioner talked about competition and collaboration between the public service broadcasters and the great platforms that we are talking about—the FANGs. In other words, this is not just about competition between public service broadcasters and these various bodies; collaboration needs to happen between them. She points to certain instances such as “King Lear” and “Dracula” that are evidence of such collaboration already taking place.

I must not outlast my welcome, but I have one tiny thing to finish. Apart from BritBox—this thing that is coming between ITV and the BBC—I have recently been made aware of other boxes that are the result of piracy and people taking the market away from all the bodies that we have thus far discussed. What kind of eye are we keeping on such activities in this ever-emerging field?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

The noble Lord is right that there has already been a lot of collaboration. Collaboration exists between Netflix and other subscription video on demand services and the public service broadcasters. That will continue and is being encouraged. Illegal boxes are illegal. They will be prosecuted within the law because they take away the benefits that public service broadcasting brings to ordinary citizens and consumers in this country.

Festival of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in 2022

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Monday 18th March 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, while I have great sympathy with my noble friend, I have just said that the delivery body will be independent of Ministers. However, I am sure it will take note of what my noble friend said.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, I grant that there must be this arm’s-length relationship between the organisation of the festival and the Government. However, when the body that oversees the festival is set up, can we find a way of ensuring that it is reminded that this is neither 1851 nor 1951 and that Britain is a much more diverse country now than it was then, so that we can celebrate diversity in the course of this festival? If we are looking for someone to lead and spearhead those who organise this festival, as the noble Baroness said, may I recommend someone who I know will be free from the summer and who has proven organisational ability and a great inspirational character, namely Mr Warren Gatland?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

This is meant to be a cultural festival—

Public Authorities: Algorithms

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Thursday 14th March 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I am not an expert, but I am sure that the noble Lord can go back to his school days and remember from his study of Greek that Euclid was producing algorithms in 300 BC —he will remember that this was for finding the greatest common divisor of two numbers. Essentially, an algorithm is a set of rules that precisely defines a sequence of operations. Today, they are used mainly by computers for calculations, machine learning and artificial intelligence.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, clearly, I must voice the general opinion expressed in other ways in appreciation of the Minister’s reply to a very pernickety noble friend of his, who is sitting on the Bench behind him. We have heard reports of information that will come from the data ethics people in the summer, and we have a White Paper on online harms coming very soon and then a period of consultation. I always seem to be stuck at the Dispatch Box acknowledging that the answer to the question I really want to ask will come in months’ or perhaps years’ time. The noble Lord who put the question is quite right: things are happening in the field of technology now, with all those local councils and police forces using algorithms to forecast possible courses of action and take policy decisions in light of what they think will happen. We are told that consultative experiences are about to happen, but is it “when” or “if”? It would be good if the Minister could somehow bypass or short-circuit the labyrinthine things that are happening elsewhere and give us some reassurance that certification for things which are already happening in the field and shaping our future can be looked at critically.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

It is not completely fair to say that nothing has happened. In areas where personal data is used, for example, that has to be used lawfully under the aegis of the Data Protection Act. The Information Commissioner recently said that she was minded to issue guidelines on the use of data in respect of children. The Information Commissioner is a powerful regulator who is looking at the use of personal data. We also have the Digital Economy Act, and we have set up the Data Ethics Framework, which allows public bodies to use the data which informs algorithms in a way that is principled and transparent. Work is going on, but I take the noble Lord’s point that it has to be looked at fairly urgently.

Online Safety

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Tuesday 26th February 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I do not want to give anything away but the noble Baroness has set out many of the reasons for bringing forward the White Paper. I agree with how the public feel. It is a question of building trust in these big companies if the benefits are to continue. We will cover education in the White Paper—that has already been talked about—including for parents. The UK Council for Internet Safety has already developed a framework to equip children and young people for digital life and a practical guide for parents, but we will see more on that subject in the White Paper.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, the White Paper has been amply referred to; we all look forward to it. I was at a seminar led by the Secretary of State the other day, where he made very high claims for it. He said that things have never been done like this before—that is, in a way that will have an impact on the whole world of IT. He set his standards very high indeed so we will be watching to see whether the proposals match his great statements. I worry that whatever we propose from within our own geography, not just on social media but on global social media, will depend on similar responses from other parts of the world. We have an international treaty to limit nuclear weapons. Knowing what we now know, is it not time that we started an initiative to bring the international community on board and into the conversation, recognising that this is a universal problem that needs a global response?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I agree, which is why we are already consulting with our international partners. There are different views of how the internet should be taken forward, but for child protection and the more egregious things that social media companies do, there is an issue of internationalism, not least how regulations are enforced. That is something we are considering, and one of the benefits of doing it in the traditional way of having a Green Paper, a White Paper and then legislation is that we will continue to have consultation with noble Lords, which we are prepared to listen to. We will set out the views of where we think we are going, but we are open to consultation as well.

Libraries: Closures

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Tuesday 19th February 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I was not aware of that, but I will ensure that the Minister for Arts, Heritage and Tourism is made aware, if he is not already. It is sad when local authorities sell public artworks, but I accept that they have difficult decisions to make, and that is what local authorities are for. The important thing is that decisions that affect local communities should be taken locally.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, this is a question in which all Members of this House can take a personal interest. Each of us could give testimony on what libraries have meant to us. When they were small, our children relied on them often, and even in the age of social media, it is the same thing all over again with our grandchildren. When local authorities have had to cut their budgets by 60% in recent times, closing libraries offers an easy way of saving money, but simply to say that the Government have outsourced responsibilities to local authorities is not good enough to address this question.

Even if the DCMS has not conducted its own impact assessment, the unions have, and without repeating the statistics, it is a horrendous picture of dissatisfaction from those working in libraries at the service they are obliged to offer the public with fewer and fewer resources. Do the Government not feel it appropriate to put this further up the priority list and address this question with urgency, for the good of us all, and our families?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

It is very easy to blame the Government when devolved decisions are not to the liking of people living elsewhere, such as noble Lords. I accept that when difficult decisions have to be made, they cause issues. We support local libraries by providing things such as wi-fi. Through Arts Council England we provide the Libraries Opportunities for Everyone Innovation Fund, the private finance initiative and the Libraries Taskforce; all are examples of DCMS centrally supporting the library service. I accept that local authorities have had to make difficult decisions. Libraries actually have been retained and it is worth bearing in mind that many local authorities have refurbished or opened new libraries. Therefore, it is a question of priorities and what a local authority thinks is important for its area.

Data Protection (Charges and Information) (Amendment) Regulations 2019

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Monday 18th February 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, this seems a sensible measure and the issues have been well rehearsed. There was one area where there was some confusion in my mind, and I hope that noble Lords will not mind my bringing it to their attention now. I, too, am looking forward to not having to pay £40—that is good news, but in exempting Members from both Houses, candidates and so on from the need to pay that charge, we recognise that many of us have other duties and obligations not related to our being Members of this House. We are in employment, we run things and so on, and we handle people’s data other than in the sense that has been described. I guess they will have to pay their £40 or whatever it is, but my confusion lies in the hinterland between those two modes of operation: information gained in respect of activities of one kind can without too much imagination become useful in respect of those of another kind. I wonder whether some thought has been given to handling that kind of confusion and, if so, how. It would be helpful if the Minister could say something about that; otherwise, this seems like common sense and we would have no hesitation in wanting it to go forward.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who have responded. This statutory instrument is unique among those I have dealt with recently in having gained a speedy and generally favourable response; I am grateful for that.

I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord McNally, for his welcome. He spoke about financing political parties and the need to give advice—as indeed did the noble Baroness, Lady Ludford. I can say that the House authorities will take that on board and provide some clear advice, taking into account the new requirements if this statutory instrument is passed; I am very pleased about that.

I acknowledge—the noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, was right about this—that the approach to funding the ICO was originally set by the Digital Economy Act, which was superseded by the Data Protection Act. The method of funding the ICO, and the question of whether it is adequate, have been occupying us for several years. I am pleased that we have finally resolved it. The noble Baroness is right that we decided to do it this way and not as part of the GDPR. Supervisory authorities can be funded in a number of ways. The reason for doing it this way was that it did not involve much practical change from the ICO funding arrangements under the Data Protection Act 1998 and a register is not necessary.

The noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill, talked about an ocean of calm within a broader picture that is possibly not so calming. I agree with her that it is a small but important issue. It is right to deal with an issue that promotes—or at least does not prevent—demographic engagement; and a commitment was made when the regulations were debated last year that we would look at this and take it forward. It is important to carry forward what we said; I take on board her points about the issues alluded to in the DCMS Committee’s report, as outlined this morning. Generally speaking, we have not yet had time to analyse it in great detail but, together with the Cabinet Office, we will be taking forward a lot of these issues around disinformation and its effect on elections, particularly through the online harms White Paper, which will be coming out soon.

The noble Lord, Lord Griffiths, mentioned that Peers have other duties; he asked about the way this exemption would apply in relation to their duties in the House of Lords and elsewhere. He is quite right that, if they are a data controller and have other duties that are not subject to an exemption, they would be required to pay the charge. I will mention this to the House authorities when they issue their advice and hopefully they can be clear. Ultimately, the Data Protection Act says that you must have lawful authority to handle personal data and it is up to you to make sure that is the case; if you handle personal data—other than data that has some limited exemptions provided in the Act—then you will have to pay the charge.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port]

I wonder if I could ask for a little more resolution on the matter. My mind is filled with pictures of activities that I myself have engaged in where, by doing work for which I am remunerated, I gain some kind of control of people’s data or the use of it, and at the same time I can be involved in an area where I am exempt from all that. Because of the homogeneity of the activities, one paid and one not, it is not difficult to see that the dividing line between what qualifies and what does not might be difficult to establish, even with the good will of the authorities of the House who write the best guidance that has ever been written.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

If the guidance does not produce clarity in the noble Lord’s mind, then I think the answer is to avail himself of the ICO’s telephone hotline, which is there specifically to answer questions such as the ones that he has asked. He will be able to give them the specific examples of where he is unable to be clear. That applies generally to people in public office such as him but also, importantly, to other small businesses; there is a specific small-business hotline that is there exactly to answer questions like his. I hope that has covered most of the issues.

Broadcasting (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Wednesday 6th February 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

We are not—as noble Lords might have realised—reading about this only in the papers, although we do read them. We have had extensive consultation—not perhaps the public consultation where all pros and cons are publicised, as the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, would prefer. But noble Lords should be under no illusions: we have had extensive consultation on this situation and this specific SI, not only with Ofcom, which has been instrumental in drafting the SI to address the problems of regulation of television services—how they should be construed and defined—but with the sector. We have organised round tables at ministerial and official level. We have included AETN, AMC Networks, BBC Studios, Channel 4, Discovery Channel, Disney, ITV, NBCUniversal, Nordic Entertainment Group, Sky, Sony, WarnerMedia, Viacom and Viasat. We have met these and further broadcasters on a bilateral basis, because a lot of these discussions are commercially sensitive, depending on what they are going to do with their establishments to meet the problems of Brexit. I reiterate that this is an issue about Brexit, not about this SI, which is about the regulation—making sure that a regulatory system exists if we have no deal.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port]

I say simply that to have mentioned in the memorandum that this impressive list of people had been consulted in various ways might have allowed us to finish in record time, as the hope for that had been expressed.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I take that point, although I would not bet on it myself. On that point, I emphasise that the ministerial round tables took place not just once but regularly between August 2016 and March 2017, led by the Secretary of State, and in March and July in 2018, led by the Minister. But I take the point about explaining that. The difference between this and the SI we talked about the other day is the commercial sensitivity of the decisions that have to be made in moving head offices, the effect on the workforce, and so on.

I will address the general issue of whether we are being complacent about relying on the ECTT. We acknowledge that it might be possible that some services will require two licences—one for the purposes of the AVMSD, and one for Ofcom—because this is the case for services which are available in both ECTT and non-ECTT countries. In the way that these services are received—by satellite—it is difficult to exclude some countries from the distribution. There are about 500 Europe-facing services out of the 1,200 that Ofcom currently licenses. To date, we are aware of about 130 licences moving. It is fair to say that broadcasters are concerned about the risk of dual regulation, and are reluctant to rely on the ECTT—it is considered an untested convention, as EU law has been in place for so long. Nevertheless, I am sure noble Lords would agree that we should not ignore conventions and international agreements that we have signed up to, nor should the other countries which have signed them.

Broadcasting: Public Sector Content

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Monday 4th February 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I agree that PSB content is important—in fact, 83% of people think that children’s provision by public service broadcasters is important. Ofcom’s consultation on the rules for prominence and proposed changes to the linear EPG includes a proposal for prominence for children’s PSB channels. Ofcom already has the powers to review and revise the code, so any final decision on changes to the linear prominence regime is a matter for it.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, it is unusual for both of my questions, carefully prepared, to have been answered before I put them, but that will not stop me asking the Minister to repeat the assurance he gave that, if the Ofcom report suggests that legislation is necessary, the Government will do it.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I can do better than that. I will repeat what the Secretary of State said to the DCMS shadow Secretary of State:

“The Government has made clear that if the Ofcom report concludes that there is a problem with the current prominence regime that needs fixing with the legislation, then we will look to bring that forward”.

Florence Nightingale: Bicentenary

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Monday 28th January 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, as the DCMS Minister, I am aware of course that it is Data Privacy Day. Council of Europe Convention 108 is the only binding international instrument which is signed by 54 states, including Russia. Data Privacy Day celebrates the anniversary of its signing in 1981 and I agree with my noble friend that it is an important day. She is right that Florence Nightingale was an important statistician, and she was the first female member of the Royal Statistical Society in 1858. The national data guardian legislation that my noble friend took through the House as a Private Member’s Bill is excellent because it promotes trust in health data so that we can gain the maximum benefit from it.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords—

[The Lord Bishop of London]

My Lords, as the noble Baroness rightly said, Florence Nightingale not only cared for the sick and wounded but was a statistician, thus providing the foundation of our infection control today. Does the Minister agree that the best tribute to Florence Nightingale is to ensure that nurses today have enough time and resources to continue their own professional development, which contributes not just to the National Health Service but to the health and economic status of this country?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I completely agree with the right reverend Prelate: we want more nurses and we want to encourage nurses to join the profession and, importantly, to stay in it. My right honourable friend the Secretary of State has recently launched his long-term plan, which addresses in part the problem of the lack of nurses.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port]

My Lords, I would not have wanted to give way to any Bishop other than the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of London, who has extensive experience of her own in this very field. We have noted the body of people who will be organising the celebration—quite properly—and we look forward to those celebrations, but they have insisted that if we are to honour nursing properly, we should be looking forward rather than back. Some 40,000 health service nursing vacancies need to be filled. Might something as simple as reinstating bursaries for nurses become government policy? Others have thought about it; I am sure that the Minister will want to say something positive about it, too.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

Of course, that is not directly relevant to the DCMS, but I am aware that it is an issue. That is why the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, who was previously Secretary of State at the DCMS, established a DHSC-led nurse supply board to drive progress with health bodies on a range of measures, including a national recruitment campaign, action to encourage nurses who have left the NHS to return to practice, and a programme to encourage nurse retention and to look at situations where suitable nurses might be turned away by disproportionate language controls. We are addressing the issue. The one thing on which I think we all agree is the tremendous benefit that the nursing profession brings to us and countries abroad.

Electronic Communications and Wireless Telegraphy (Amendment etc.) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Wednesday 23rd January 2019 Grand Committee

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port]

We will have to have a consultation about that in order to find out who forms which view about Dante’s Inferno.

There are two focal points to my remarks. I wanted to ask about the data adequacy agreement but the Minister has answered that. I also wanted to ask: who regulates the regulator? I was very interested indeed to read about Ofcom. While I in no way have the level of expertise of other noble Lords who have spoken, just reading the text—I know how to do that—what hit me between the eyes begged questions: is this regulation or supervision? Are we talking about harmonisation? I have sat in on several debates to try to gauge what is happening in consideration of these statutory instruments and I am beginning to form the view that between where we are now and where we expect to be if all goes according to plan, in several instances there will be a lessening of the oversight and direction that we have currently through our membership of the European Union.

For example, I listened to the debate on nuclear safeguarding yesterday. I was not convinced by either the debate or the material I read that the concerns being expressed would be adequately met. It was a similar case as regards non-native invasive species. Again, I was left with questions which may be answerable: I am not an expert in these fields. However, simply because we are under pressure to agree to these statutory instruments, we must not go on driving them through in such a way that in the end the accumulation of feeling about what we are achieving is that we are making too much haste and should have a bit less speed. I know that there are just 70-something days and the pressures that we are under, but in the end we will have to live with what we decide now.

All of those Acts of Parliament were carefully gone through. I have just one brief observation to make about Ofcom because the others have been made. Most of my consideration was on paragraph 10, but I will not cover that at all. However, in paragraph 7, I find that again and again what Ofcom is required to do while we are a member of the European Union “may” turn into something later. The indicative mood turns into—what? Is it the optative or is it the subjunctive? The word “may” allows itself to be interpreted either way. The optative reflects the mood of wishful thinking while the subjunctive reflects the mood of doubtful assertion. I am truly interested in knowing whether Ofcom’s different field of endeavour and focal points amount to it having the same quality and weight of oversight that it currently enjoys and whether the subjective element which is being introduced by the verbs I have described allow for a different way for it to operate or a different mood to be generated. I do not know, because the words do not allow me to make a deduction and I have certainly not heard this mentioned or dealt with in our discussion thus far.

I said that I would not detain noble Lords for long and I shall not. I am normally an optimistic person and I end my short interventions by saying that I look forward to the next one. However, I sit down on this occasion in a more desultory manner, not sure that I do.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I am sorry that the noble Lord is not looking forward to my reply—he would not be the only one. Let me answer some of his points.

He asked how many hours have been put into the production of the SI. I cannot tell him exactly, but we have been working on it for about 18 months to allow for the engagement of stakeholders and other government departments and the appropriate legal checks. The consultation might not be to everyone’s liking in the sense that it was not formal, but it was real and I shall share some more information with the Committee about who turned up. It was real and, for the reasons that the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, gave, we may be vindicated in our decision not to include another regulator on top of Ofcom. I think I have covered that.

When the noble Lord, Lord Griffiths, talks about whether it is regulation or supervision and a lessening in oversight, the point to bear in mind is that telecoms have always been regulated by national regulators. The EU Commission has a very particular role in this connected with EU matters—namely, the single market. It is obvious that if we are no longer in the EU and the single market, not only will that supervisory function not be performed by the EU because we will not be in it but there will not be a harmonisation problem.

Gambling: Children

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Tuesday 15th January 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I certainly will look at that. We are looking at treatment for all problem gamblers and for children in particular. That is why I am pleased that the NHS long-term plan is committed to expanding dedicated support for those experiencing problems with gambling. As the noble Lord says, GambleAware is setting up a new clinic in Leeds. We will see how that goes, and we are working with the NHS to see if more treatment centres are needed.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, we have had a number of questions relating to gambling in recent times. Indeed, there is another Question tomorrow relating to advertising, which is why I would like to ask a question elsewhere in the arena, as it were. I have seen the figure of 450,000 mentioned—it comes in the Gambling Commission report—but a different interpretation is put on it according to where people come from. I have a briefing paper here from Sky Betting & Gaming that puts an entirely different interpretation on the figure and even questions the way in which it is being used by those in favour of clamping down. So my question is—and this has come up in debates again and again—is it not time, in all these consultations and studies that are being done, that we had a serious, focused look at compiling evidence upon which comments can be made? At the moment, there is far too much of a fissiparous nature that allows people to draw whatever conclusions they like. I just wanted to use that word; I am sorry, it just came to me. I wanted to put the Minister on the back foot. Secondly—

Internet Safety

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Tuesday 4th December 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I completely agree that it is important that UKCIS helps to contribute to online safety. That is why we expanded its role from concentrating just on child internet safety to include, as the noble Baroness mentioned, hate crime, serious violence and extremism. As far as resources are concerned, the previous body—the United Kingdom Council for Child Internet Safety—has demonstrated that getting together a mix of tech companies, public bodies and government achieves good results. That is not the only thing we are doing. The online harms White Paper, which is coming by the end of the winter, will address some of the other issues, one of which will have to be funding.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, as the Minister said, the body we are speaking about has developed from being concerned specifically with children to having a more generic nature. It has a complex set of relationships with various departments of government, including health, the Home Office and education, especially the part dealing with young people’s mental health. It is a complicated structure. In the consultation, a lack of direction in the previous body was bemoaned. Can the Minister assure us that there is a sense of direction and purpose, appropriately monitored, in this voluntary body? Given that we have extended the remit from just children to a generic range of interests—and given that in the past month or so in this House, children and obesity, knife crime, bullying, gambling, image and performance-enhancing drugs and the internet have all been discussed—can the Minister assure me that the needs of children are not being diminished as a result of being wrapped up into a more generic body?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

On the noble Lord’s first question, there has just been a board meeting and the council has reaffirmed the areas of focus: first, online harms experienced by children; secondly, radicalisation and extremism; thirdly, violence against women and girls; fourthly, serious violence; and fifthly, hate crime and hate speech. So there is a definite desire to address these very important matters. As I said in my previous Answer to the noble Baroness, we will look at other areas in the online harms White Paper.

There is absolutely no doubt that children are still a prime concern, as the composition of the board shows. The director of BBC Children’s, the CEO of Childnet, the Children’s Commissioner, the CEOs of Internet Matters and the Internet Watch Foundation, the lead for the National Police Chiefs’ Council, the head of child safety online for the NSPCC and the deputy director of child protection for the Scottish Government are all members of the board and they will certainly make sure that children’s issues are at the forefront of their work.

Gambling Industry

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Tuesday 27th November 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, for most people—the vast majority of people—gambling is not a problem; problem gambling is less than 1%. But I take my noble friend’s point that, for a small number of people, gambling can be a problem, and advertising could contribute to it. There is no reliable evidence on the extent to which it contributes, but we are putting tough new guidance into advertising to protect vulnerable people, including children. A large advertising public service campaign is being put out to promote responsible gambling. But advertising is one of the things we are considering, so I shall take my noble friend’s point on board.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, on previous occasions when we have looked at gambling and fixed-odds betting terminals were considered, there was a perceptible measure of support for the rather humble measures we proposed, which have now been accepted. I suspect that the mandatory rather than the voluntary levy would command equal support from all Benches. Although I am repeating the Question asked by the right reverend Prelate, I ask again: how long do we have to wait for studies in an industry that generates an enormous amount of money—so much so that one person can have a pay rise of £45 million? It would not be onerous to ask for a mandatory rather than a voluntary levy, which I am sure is the next step that as a House we should responsibly be advocating.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

The question is why you would want to introduce a mandatory levy. At the moment, GambleAware gets more than the money it asks for. It says it needs £10 million a year, and it is getting an extra £5 million from penalty payments, so it is getting more than it asks for. As I said, if we find that there is a need for more money and the voluntary system is not producing it, we will consider other options.

Pornographic Websites: Age Verification

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Monday 5th November 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I agree that there are areas of concern on social media sites. As the noble Baroness rightly says, they are not covered by the Digital Economy Act. We had many hours of discussion about that in this House. However, she will be aware that we are producing an online harms White Paper in the winter in which some of these issues will be considered. If necessary, legislation will be brought forward to address these, and not only these but other harms too. I agree that the BBFC should find out about the effectiveness of the limited amount that age verification can do; it will commission research on that. Also, the Digital Economy Act itself made sure that the Secretary of State must review its effectiveness within 12 to 18 months.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, once again I find this issue raising a dynamic that we became familiar with in the only too recent past. The Government are to be congratulated on getting the Act on to the statute book and, indeed, on taking measures to identify a regulator as well as to indicate that secondary legislation will be brought forward to implement a number of the provisions of the Act. My worry is that, under one section of the Digital Economy Act, financial penalties can be imposed on those who infringe this need; the Government seem to have decided not to bring that provision into force at this time. I believe I can anticipate the Minister’s answer but—in view of the little drama we had last week over fixed-odds betting machines—we would not want the Government, having won our applause in this way, to slip back into putting things off or modifying things away from the position that we had all agreed we wanted.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I completely understand where the noble Lord is coming from but what he said is not quite right. The Digital Economy Act included a power that the Government could bring enforcement with financial penalties through a regulator. However, they decided—and this House decided—not to use that for the time being. For the moment, the regulator will act in a different way. But later on, if necessary, the Secretary of State could exercise that power. On timing and FOBTs, we thought carefully—as noble Lords can imagine—before we said that we expect the date will be early in the new year,

Public Sector Television Content

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Thursday 25th October 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I pretty much agree with that. The Secretary of State said last month that,

“the government will support PSBs to ensure they continue to thrive, and stay prominent, as part of a healthy, sustainable and dynamic media landscape”.

If Ofcom, which is the expert on this, makes it clear that there is a problem that needs fixing by legislation, we will look to bring that forward.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, I have the same quote from September 2018 in front of me, and I am delighted to hear that the Government are aware of the urgency of this. Three months before that report, Ofcom indicated that legislation would be necessary to achieve the objectives we have all agreed about. Post Brexit, where will such legislation figure in the queue of legislation ganging up on us, in order to do justice to the sense of urgency that has already been accepted?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I would like to say that it will have prominence, but obviously I cannot give a guarantee today. Brexit will involve a lot of legislation. The fact is, we understand the urgency, that the media landscape is changing and how technology is changing. The old linear EPG is not fit for purpose. It is not for me to say where it will fit in the legislative programme because that is not my responsibility, but we understand the issues. We are waiting for the Ofcom report following its consultation, which has now finished; I believe it is due early in 2019.

Online Anonymity

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Tuesday 23rd October 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

“Do as you would be done by” is a sensible basis for progressing. However, there are people who would not subscribe to that—I think “evil” is the correct word for them—and we have to take those into account. The Law Commission is looking at the body of law which allows the authorities to trace people to make sure that it is effective. It will publish its first report at the beginning of November. We will make sure that the law is capable of pursuing those who will not follow the precept mentioned by the noble Lord.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, in such instances as we are imagining in a Question like this, there are the individuals who, under the cloak of anonymity, use the internet for purposes that may be legitimate or not, but there are also the platforms that host those messages. I believe that in Germany a mechanism is used to make it mandatory on the part of platforms to shut down harmful messages within a certain time beyond which fines are imposed and measures taken. Might the Minister and Government consider such a device?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

The noble Lord is right. I believe that the law in Germany is that one has to take down abusive content within eight hours once the host has been informed of it. There is some doubt whether that complies with EU law. Nevertheless, it is something we will look at, because the social media code of practice also includes such measures, which at the moment are voluntary. Many of the large and well-known media sites try to comply with such things; the problem is that new sites appear and gain huge scale very quickly and do not always behave in the same way. The whole point of the White Paper which will be published in the winter is to look at areas where we might need legislation.

Sport: Performance-Enhancing Drugs

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Monday 23rd July 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I cannot think of a better example than that of the noble Lord, as a 1964 Olympic sprinter: he proves the point that role models are very important. It is important that those who receive honours are suitably checked so that they behave correctly—that is, not only legally but also in an ethical and moral sense.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, we have rightly talked about education and we congratulate the Government on significantly increasing the amount of money available to UKAD. However, there is the whole question of anticipating the development of such practices and preventing them. Such briefing as I have been able to put together suggests that internationally, there is a movement of illicit drugs and substances across borders. Can the Minister help us to understand whether, after the momentous events we are about to experience in coming out of Europe, the sharing of intelligence and the availability of cross-border information will apply in this particular area of endeavour?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

Criminal activities are subject to the negotiations that will take place and the Home Office is responsible for those. On doping in sport, we already have an international system based on WADA which I do not think will change just because we are coming out of Europe. This is an international problem that extends far beyond the borders of Europe. However, I take the noble Lord’s point that it is very important that we continue with that system and I see no reason why we should not be able to.

Distributed Ledger Technologies

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Wednesday 18th July 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

As I said, the evaluations are at too early a stage to say. Projects are being undertaken, however, and the Department for International Development is one of those undertaking a proof of concept at the moment.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, we have heard that various studies and evaluations are taking place. It is an extraordinarily complex area but it seems to me, even as a lay person, that its outcomes will be amazingly innovative and helpful. I, of course, must leave the technology to others, but if any questions raised by these evaluations need a closer ethical and moral look, will somebody be monitoring the situation to make sure they are referred to the data ethics body we have talked about?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I agree with the noble Lord. Most technology has ethical concerns, particularly the internet and the fact that, by definition, it is cross-border. We not only have to get our own regulatory house in order, and think of these ethical considerations, but we have to work internationally to try to get consensus. The point about distributed ledger technologies is that they build trust without always having regulations because everyone has the same copy of the same data, which provides a great advantage.

Gambling: Fixed-odds Betting Terminals

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Tuesday 10th July 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, on a day when those in the party opposite are endeavouring to contain their disarray within the bounds of public decorum, will the Minister cast his mind back to the day alluded to by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of St Albans when euphoria was released along the Benches around the House at the news that the limit was to be fixed at £2? I do not think that anyone in that debate was under the impression that it would take as long as is now being suggested. All the arguments were rehearsed and great enthusiasm was expressed. Is the Minister convinced, on looking at the respective interests of the revenues—not the employment—of the gambling industry and the well-being of the 14% of problem gamblers produced by these machines, that the right decision has been taken?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I am not clear to what decision the noble Lord refers. When we made the announcement that the revenue forgone from FOBTs would be made up by remote gaining duty, we said that the Chancellor would introduce that at the relevant Budget. We want it to be revenue neutral and so the remote gaming duty has to be in place to make up for the forgone revenues. We said that at the time. We are implementing this as quickly as we can. A process has to be gone through and we are keen to get on with it.

Digital Government (Disclosure of Information) Regulations 2018

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Monday 25th June 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I am grateful to one of the two speakers for remaining and for the points that both have made. If the noble Lord, Lord Griffiths, thinks that was a rant, compared to the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, he is an amateur; I thought he was very reasonable and measured in what he said. I shall go through his points as quickly as I can.

The noble Lord, Lord Griffiths, was correct to point out that we need to help where we can. The measure is to enable public authorities to share information. A key criterion for the Digital Economy Act was that it had to be for the benefit of individuals and households. The noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, suggested that, because things were in the wrong order—I will address some of his points shortly—we should withdraw the codes, wait for the Information Commissioner to issue her code and lay the codes again in six to nine months. That will mean that all the good work that is done, which the noble Lord, Lord Griffiths, identified, in using public information to help individual households that are vulnerable or suffering will effectively be put off. For example, on the fuel poverty measure, that would be another winter when we could not use the information to help the public.

On some of the issues raised by the noble Lord about the information shared, I remind him that the information is permissive: it does not have to be shared; it just allows public authorities to do that. They have very clear outlines of what they are able to do; they must have information sharing agreements. The measure merely allows public authorities to do it; there is no compulsion on any of them. It must also be in accordance with the Digital Economy Act and the Data Protection Act. That will give individuals the right—and mean that they can trust—that their information will not be misused, because it is subject also to the GDPR.

In talking about the difference between the Digital Economy Act and the Data Protection Act the noble Lord was a bit confused about paragraph 9. I was surprised—I thought it seemed pretty clear, but I accept that it could be made simpler. What it is really getting at is that the Digital Economy Act referred not just to living people, as the Data Protection Act does, but also includes bodies corporate and distinguishes between the information in those. So we are saying that there is a distinction, and they therefore need to apply both, but when it comes to the information referred to, and referring to individual living people, the Data Protection Act will apply and so will the General Data Protection Regulation. I will send a letter to the noble Lord outlining that paragraph to see if we can explain it. I doubt we will be able to do it in words of one syllable but we will try to make it a bit clearer for him and I will put a copy in the Library. I accept that it is not immediately obvious to a normal person.

I am glad that the noble Lord, in contrast, said that the codes were “clear, succinct and admirable”. I point out, however, that these are not for small businesses but for public authorities. The only time that they would involve a private business is when the private business has been contracted by a public authority to deliver something.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port]

I am grateful to the noble Lord for that clarification—of course, I should have been clear about that myself—but in my small business I did have registration responsibilities, so under one of the codes I would have had to bear some of these things in mind; so there was just a hint of relevance about what I said.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I am grateful for that reminder.

There has been an awful lot of consultation around this. In many ways, this is a model: it has taken about two years of open, public policy-making. The codes were in place in draft while the Act went through Parliament, so parliamentarians of both Houses were able to discuss the codes. They have been amended as a result of that and made clearer, and we have also put in some increased transparency and some review mechanisms. They were consulted on again after the Act was passed: we had a formal consultation again on the codes that are with us today. That included organisations that might have thought to have worried about it, such as privacy groups, so a lot of stakeholders were involved in that.

Coming eventually to the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, his speech was based on a briefing by the only organisation, I think, which had any worries about this. The overwhelming majority of stakeholders that were involved in the consultation were very supportive of these codes.

The noble Lord asked about the statistical methodology. I cannot remember exactly what it was, but I will write to the noble Lord.

The noble Lord, Lord Griffiths, also asked how we will keep track of all this. Of course, there will be a register in place, open and fully searchable by the public. The Information Commissioner has a power of audit, which will be used to keep track of all the data that is shared, and the audit logs will be kept for all data shared under the powers.

The noble Lord talked about transparency: how are we going to monitor and track the impact of this data sharing? Review boards will be established to oversee any non-devolved and England-only information sharing pilots that are set up, and there will also be a review board to advise Ministers and make recommendations on the establishment of new objectives, if there are any. The membership of those review boards will come from across the various data holding departments, as well as the ICO and representatives of civil society. Lastly, the ICO has said that she will carry out an independent review of all the Part 5 powers in two to three years.

Historic Cathedrals

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Monday 14th May 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, as I said, we accept that the cost of repairing and maintaining these significant and marvellous old buildings is enormous, so I am glad that 57 of our wonderful cathedrals were able to benefit from the First World War fund. At the moment there are no new plans for new funding aimed specifically at cathedrals—but, of course, the listed places of worship scheme continues, as does the HLF scheme under which cathedrals and other places of worship can apply for maintenance.

Further to that, we are currently exploring new models of financing the repair and maintenance of church buildings through a pilot scheme under the Taylor review. Although the review did not talk specifically about cathedrals, the lessons from it can apply. I know, for example, that my noble friend has already been to see the Chief Secretary to the Treasury to put the case for more funding.

As for Lincoln, a couple of weeks ago I spent some time looking at what was going on at Hereford. In due course, diary permitting, I will be very pleased to go to Lincoln as well—as long as I can go on the roof and have a look.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, I speak as one who for 21 years had responsibility for the place fondly known around the world as the “Cathedral of Methodism”. For 17 of those years I was also an ecumenical canon and a member of the Cathedral Council at St Paul’s, collaborating closely with Westminster Abbey. Earlier in this Session, we heard Questions about the importance of the tourist industry for our economy generally. Certainly the number of visitors who flock through our cathedrals is a significant part of that activity—but, as the Minister hinted, much of that is concentrated in London. Would the plea of a Methodist to endow the cathedrals of this country for the established Church add weight to any decisions that the Minister might be led to make?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I feel that I am really on the noble Lord’s ground here and that I am visiting, as it were. However, I assure him that we are looking not just at the established Church but at other places of worship, particularly those that are listed. There are many examples of places where money, particularly from the First World War cathedrals fund, has gone—it has been spread all around the country.

Brexit: Digital Single Market

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Tuesday 8th May 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I completely agree with the noble Lord that the creative industries and digital are a very important part of our economy. We are the leaders in Europe—7.9% of our GDP is digital, with the next biggest, I think, being France, at 3.9%. We acknowledge that this has to be part of the wider negotiations on the single market. We are undertaking a great deal of analysis to make sure that we understand the implications of those negotiations.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, analysis, study, the eventual bringing to our attention of possible ways forward—is the Minister able to help us in a shorter term than that, given that nearly two years have passed since all this began? I know that he will use the word “shortly” or “soon”, but can he give us an idea of when we will have a fix on this? The greatest part of our trade is led by our activities in this sphere. All the talk is about trade, yet this issue has the potential to damage a significant part of our trading arrangements. Has not enough advice been given by the House of Commons DCMS Committee in its recent report? Urgency is what we seem to be lacking.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I have to disagree with the noble Lord: urgency is not lacking, and considerable work is going on. Clearly, when we are about to undertake some of the most important negotiations that we have had for decades, we would not want to outline exactly what our negotiating position was before we did it. We absolutely take on board what the noble Lord and the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, have said and understand the importance of the digital area. That will take place within the broader single market negotiations.

Gambling Advertising

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Thursday 3rd May 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

The important thing is what is effective. I know that many people have strong opinions on gambling, as they do on smoking and alcohol. The fact is that the evidence does not support some of the claims made. The Binde report said that the impact of advertising on problem gambling rates is likely to be,

“neither negligible nor considerable, but rather relatively small”.

On the noble Lord’s point regarding a compulsory levy, we have said many times that if the gambling industry does not provide the requisite amount to support measures to deal with problem gambling, we will consider a mandatory levy.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

It appears to many of us incredible that there should be reported to be relatively undisquieting developments in the field of gambling—certainly, the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, has hinted at that. Are the Government aware of and disturbed by moves towards what is called the normalisation of gambling or, as the Committee of Advertising Practice put it, the “trivialisation” of gambling? Is not the movement of gambling towards being like the air we breathe a worrying thing that might lie beyond the ability of statisticians to quantify? Will the Government look urgently and proactively for such evidence rather than waiting for the results of a consultation?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

Yes, absolutely. We are looking proactively. We issued a call for evidence; the consultation hinted at areas where there was a lack of evidence. I believe that GambleAware will produce more evidence later this year. We of course accept that there are issues to do with protecting vulnerable people and children. That is why these matters have been addressed in the consultation, and our response will follow in due course.

Undersea Cables

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Thursday 8th March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

The noble Lord raises an important point. As far at the Sunday Times report is concerned, I can say that the reporter was unable to access any secure section of the facility. The essential point about this is that there is resilience in the system. There are 11 landing sites, for example, for transatlantic cables, in different places. Because of the resilience of the system, when one particular cable is broken the system continues. As far as prosecution is concerned, most of the breaks in the cables—and there are a considerable number each year; about 30 to 40 each year—are as the result of accidents. That is why it is not normally necessary to prosecute. However, these are civil actions because the cables belong to individual companies. It is up to them to seek damages.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, the DCMS is a wondrous part of our governing system; within it, so many amazing things come together for consideration. I had not realised until looking at this Question that 97% of global communications come via cables, when I had fondly imagined that satellites took up a lot more than that. But my question is to ask why a Question that relates to security is being handled by the DCMS at all. I have come to enjoy the company of the Minister and to admire his competence across such a wide range of fields of interest, but perhaps he can reassure the House that the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport will indeed be in the closest possible relationship to the Department of Defense to reassure us on the questions of security as maintained in this Question.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I am speechless. The reason why DCMS is answering this Question is that we are responsible for co-ordinating the resilience of the telecoms sector in the UK. Telecoms is one of the UK’s 13 critical sectors and we are in close touch with other departments, particularly the Home Office, which is responsible for GCHQ, and the Ministry of Defence. I am not the only Minister who has answered on this; in December my noble friend Lord Howe answered a similar Question.

Charities, Social Enterprises and Voluntary Organisations

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Tuesday 20th February 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I agree with the noble Lord. I do not think there is any suggestion of further regulation of civil society, as such, but we expect all organisations which deal with the public to obey the law. That includes charities but also all civil society. It is one thing that can be considered in the new consultation on the civil society strategy that we are going to launch soon.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for bringing to our attention the connection between the activities of the Charity Commission and bodies like it and recent incidents of which we are all too well aware. I have long and profound experience of Haiti and could make my question centre on that, but that is not where the Question laid before us is. Granted, in times of heightened anxiety, such as this, we are all tempted to put regulatory strangleholds on those at the top, whether an NGO, the Charity Commission or even the Government. However, is not the best way of ensuring improvement—so that these things do not happen again—to have adequate procedures as near to the place where these incidents happen as possible, and proper ways of monitoring those activities? Is that not better than finding other rules and regulations simply at the top?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, there is lot of sense in what the noble Lord said. One of the things we want to do is to strike a balance. We should remember that all these organisations do good work; that is what they are in business for. We have to be careful about things such as safeguarding. I take the noble Lord’s point about making it near the action, as it were. One thing we are doing is convening two summits, one to focus on international aid charities, which will be jointly chaired by the Secretary of State for International Development, and another, chaired by the Minister for Sport and Civil Society, to concentrate on domestic charities, to look at what we can do to strengthen the safeguarding capability and capacity of charities working across that area. The fact remains that charities and organisations like them do good work on the ground.

BBC: Unfair Pay

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Tuesday 9th January 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for repeating that Answer to an Urgent Question given in another place. I must say, as I take part in this exercise for the first time, that I had expected in an Urgent Question to hear a note of urgency. While I sense a little self-congratulation about measures that have been brought in and reforms that have been introduced, as regards the BBC I do not sense that deep desire to achieve objectives that are in line with public expectations at large, deeply held and urgently sought. Of course, the measures that are mentioned must continue, but 2020 seems a long way away. We understand that the BBC must look after its own internal affairs, but can the Government assure us that, with some urgency, all appropriate measures will be applied to encourage, goad and pressurise it to come forward with a solution to these questions, so that the beacon referred to can serve as a benchmark against which to measure progress in other sectors of our public life?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I stress that the Government absolutely support urgent action on this. Of course, it was this Government who brought in the requirement for the BBC to publish salaries over £150,000, which is one of the reasons why we are talking about this issue today. The Statement makes it quite clear that the Government expect the BBC to act in accordance with what we have expected it to do as regards the gender pay gap. We understand that when you have a deep-seated and probably long-established problem, it takes some time to deal with and it is a difficult management issue. But let us be under no illusions—the Government expect the director-general and the new unitary board to deal with that. They are the people who have responsibility for that. We are pleased that the EHRC will look at this. For individuals, it has been illegal to pay people unequally because of their gender for over 40 years, and we expect all companies—not only the BBC but especially the BBC, which is a public institution —to obey the law.

Communications Act 2003 and the Digital Economy Act 2017 (Consequential Amendments to Primary Legislation) Regulations 2017

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Wednesday 6th December 2017 Grand Committee

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port]

From the noble Lord’s tone of voice, I honestly thought that it was a sunnier experience than that. Between that and a hypothetical happy future, when other things may or may not happen, I will stick to what is in front of us.

It all seems logical to me. I guess the simplicity of the proposals led to this being referred to me, with my simple mind. I understand perfectly that with the developments in electronic communications we have to have methods appropriate for handling the expansions of systems across the land. I note that the speed and effectiveness of dispute resolution becomes a possible consequence of decisions taken. The balance to which the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, referred is indeed mentioned in these documents and is being sought. I am in no position to judge whether the view expressed that suggested movement back towards landowners is true, but I am sure the Minister will answer that question.

There is a consultation. I note that there is to be no impact assessment because there is no impact, it seems. It is nice to have read that at least six times in these papers. I commend all those who have gone through all the legislation, both past legislation in general and localised legislation from across the land. It is a job for somebody and I pay tribute to the nameless people who have done this trawl. It even goes into the county of my birth—Dyfed in south Wales—where I was rather disturbed to find that “statutory undertakers” are now to be called “operators”. In my life’s work as a Methodist minister, I had rather a lot to do with statutory undertakers and I am sorry that they have been defined out of existence.

There is a logic running through this. It is simplicity itself. It tidies up what is in front of us. I have no hesitation in supporting these measures.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I am grateful for both noble Lords’ comments. On the question from the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, on the code of practice, it is not yet published. Extensive consultation was carried out. It is a bit difficult to speculate on its content, but it is important to remember that the code of practice is not binding and cannot change the balance that the law delivers. We spent some time considering that balance. It is certainly true that one of the points of the code was that it should enable operators to do things that were taking too long. There is certainly no intention to change that balance. We absolutely understand the need for operators to access land more easily and more speedily, but preferably on a consensual basis. That was the whole object. These regulations are to do with the occasions, which we hope will not be very often, where agreement cannot be reached, so we can go to a tribunal that has expert surveyors and people like that on it, rather than the county court, which is not expert. I say to the noble Lord that we have no intention and there was no desire to change the balance between landowners and operators. We will have to see what the code of practice says. It is not binding, but if need be we can talk to him when it comes out. We expect to commence the code in December. Ofcom has assured us that the code will come out before it comes into force.

We do not know the timings for the European ECC. If it is acceptable to the Committee I will look at some of the questions the noble Lord asked and do some research into them. We might not know the answers. I do not have them to hand, but if we do know I will come back to the noble Lord.

I am pleased that the noble Lord, Lord Griffiths, was able to come in at the end of this long process. He had one of the more happy experiences. I am very grateful to him. With that, I beg to move.

Data Protection Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Monday 13th November 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, if the House will indulge me, having heard someone who described herself earlier as a foot soldier in her army of volunteers, I can now identify her as a beaver in the battalion of dam building. It seems that by broadening all that falls under the term, “legal claims”, and, of course, on the advice of the Bar Council, some common sense is being alluded to here and therefore we have no hesitation in joining our forces to those we have heard so ably expressed.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Lord Ashton of Hyde) (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Baroness for making her debut in the Committee stage and to the noble Lord for his comments. By way of background, because I find it quite complicated, it is worth reminding ourselves that article 9 of the GDPR provides processing conditions for special categories of data. In particular, the processing necessary for,

“the establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims”,

is permitted by article 9(2)(f). It is directly applicable and does not allow any discretion to derogate from it in any way. Article 10 of the GDPR, which relates to criminal convictions and offences data, takes a different approach. It requires member states to set out in their law conditions relating to the processing of said criminal convictions and offences data in order to enable many organisations to process it. Paragraph 26 of Schedule 1 therefore seeks to maintain the status quo by replicating in relation to criminal convictions data the processing condition for the special categories of personal data contained in article 9(2)(f).

Government Amendment 65, referred to by the noble Baroness, responds to a request we have had from stakeholders to anglicise the language currently used in that paragraph. The Government strongly agree about the importance of ensuring that data protection law does not accidentally undermine the proper conduct of legal proceedings, which is why we have made this provision. We submit that Amendments 63A and 64A are unnecessary. They are predicated on the false premise that government Amendment 65 in some way changes the scope of paragraph 26. It does not, it simply anglicises it. However, even if different wording were to be used in Amendment 63A to that used in Amendment 65, we are certain that the Commission would take a dim view of member states attempting to use article 9(2)(g), the substantial public interest processing condition, to expand article 9(2)(f) in the way that Amendment 63A proposes. In the light of that explanation, I would be grateful if in this case the noble Baroness would withdraw her amendment.

Review of Gaming Machines

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Griffiths of Burry Port

Tuesday 31st October 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, while I am grateful to the Minister for repeating that Statement, I confess it leaves me perplexed. The recent review and other sources have yielded facts enough: 430,000 gamblers with an addiction, up by a third in three years; a further 2 million problem gamblers at risk of developing an addiction; £1.8 billion lost on these machines each year, an increase of 79% in the last eight years; and a gambling industry whose yield, or the amounts it wins in bets, has increased to £13.8 billion from £8.36 billion in 2009, having spent a mere £10 million towards a voluntary levy last year on education and treatment. Some 450,000 children gamble at least once a week.

My question is simple: granted that we are armed already with factual and proven information, what is to be gained by having this consultation? Will the Government let us know clearly what they are probing for by holding this further consultation, and can they assure me that, with the grass-cutting season nearly over, it is not an exercise for lobbing things into the long grass?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, that is not an unexpected question. I can assure the noble Lord that we are not putting this into the long grass. He is absolutely right that there was a six-week evidence-gathering session. The evidence gathered has convinced us of the need to take action and reduce the maximum FOBT stakes. However, it is a complex issue and not about stakes alone. We are therefore publishing today a package of measures to address the concerns. We must strike the right balance between the socially responsible growth of the industry and the protection of consumers and the communities they live in. Our position is that the maximum stake should be between £50 and £2. We are consulting on that specific issue. This has to be done with due process to avoid any further problems which may come in the future with doing it in too rushed a manner.