Automated Vehicles Bill [HL]

Lord Liddle Excerpts

Report stage
Tuesday 6th February 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Berkeley (Lab)]

My Lords, this is a group that somebody has decided to call “operations”, which is fine. I have two short amendments in this group. Amendment 5 relates to the consultation requirements. Your Lordships regularly debate the question of who should be consulted and on what basis. My worry here is that the Government are suggesting that the right definition of who should be consulted are those whom the Secretary of State thinks fit. It would be more appropriate to have wording, as I suggest in the amendment, to make sure that it includes not only road users but other groups whose safety

“may be affected by the application of the principles.”

There is a worry here, which also comes out in my Amendment 34 in this group, about the weighting of persuasion and the weighting of firepower, or whatever one likes to call it, between the average uninsured road user—who might be a pedestrian or a cyclist, or perhaps eventually a scooter rider—and the companies that have invested a large amount of money in setting up the systems that the vehicles are using. Whether the pedestrians or cyclists should or should not be insured is another matter for debate, but the fact remains that most of them are not insured at the moment. If something goes wrong, there will be a tendency for Ministers to say, “Well, we need to hear the opinion of the company”, and somehow that will be given more weight than the opinion of those who might be affected. I hope I am wrong there, but it happens in other walks of life that occasionally your Lordships debate. For me, it is right, through Amendment 5, to look at the groups whose safety or other interests might be affected by this.

I turn to Amendment 34, which is much the same. If there is an accident or incident—whatever we want to call it—between a pedestrian and an insured AV, who decides who is at fault, if there is any fault? The vehicle will have insurance and the insurance company will work hard to make sure that its client is given the right advice and that it supports them where necessary. The amendment suggests that, if there was nobody in the vehicle,

“it will be assumed for the purpose of this section that the authorised automated vehicle caused the accident unless proved otherwise”.

That is very radical, but we do not have a better solution. If we do not have something that recognises the lack of balance between a pedestrian or an uninsured cyclist and an AV being driven legally with the right insurance behind it, we will have trouble in the future. I am not sure that this is the solution—I look forward to noble Lords’ comments on it—but something must redress the balance between what we might call the little person on the street and the big companies investing a lot of money in this. They will want to make sure that they look after their clients, if we can call them that. I beg to move.

[Lord Liddle (Lab)]

My Lords, we have a great deal of sympathy with the points that my noble friend Lord Berkeley made, particularly on his Amendment 34 dealing with insurance. That is a very complicated question; people have written to me about it, and I have difficulty understanding it, to be quite honest. The Government should give further thought to the question that Amendment 34 asks, for when the Bill goes to the Commons. We do not intend to press this in any way now, but it matters and deserves further consideration by Ministers.

Having said that, I turn to the amendments in my name. We will not press Amendment 9 to a vote, but it concerns another issue about which we hope the Government will have a good think before the Bill is presented to the Commons. We have been approached by people in the business of delivery robots that use pavements, and there is legal confusion. Because a pavement is legally defined as part of the road, this question is within the scope of the Bill; yet, clearly, the regulation of vehicles that primarily use the pavement must be different from those that use the roads. We think of the obvious case of mobility scooters, which are mainly intended to be used on pavements.

Amendment 9 does not direct anything. It gives the Government the power to make regulations about delivery robots which are designed to use pavements. This is not a trivial issue. There is a lot of potential in the delivery robot principle. It deals with the final mile from where the lorry drops off its load to how the parcel gets to the individual dwelling. Doing this with electric robots has the potential to make a big contribution to our net-zero commitments, rather than it being done by diesel vans as happens at the moment. This is an important question which we would like the Government to think about.

--- Later in debate ---

Moved by

[Lord Liddle]

28: After Clause 93, insert the following new Clause—
“Advisory Council(1) Within six months of the passing of this Act the Secretary of State must establish a council to advise on the implementation of this Act, and the roll out of self-driving vehicles.(2) The Advisory Council must include organisations appearing to the Secretary of State to represent—(a) the interests of road users, including drivers, pedestrians and cyclists;(b) the cause of road safety;(c) the cause of accessibility, and the impact of the roll out of self-driving vehicles on disabled road users;(e) trade unions and the interests of relevant employees including delivery providers and public transport workers;(f) the interests of businesses involved, or likely to be involved in, the manufacture, operation and insurance of mechanically propelled road vehicles designed to travel autonomously;(g) the police and other emergency services;(h) highway authorities.(3) The Secretary of State must designate a relevant officer of the Department to send reports to the Advisory Council on the roll out of self driving vehicles and any issues of public policy that arise. (4) The Advisory Council must report regularly to Parliament on the advice it has provided, and any related matters relevant to the roll out of self driving vehicles and associated public policy.”

[Lord Liddle (Lab)]

My Lords, I beg to move Amendment 28 on the establishment of a statutory advisory council, which would enable better progress with self-driving vehicles and automated vehicles than not having it. I would like to test the opinion of the House.

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[Baroness Bowles of Berkhamsted (LD)]

My Lords, I have tabled four amendments which constitute this group. There are two interacting issues: public interest and commercial interest. It is clear that where safety, human lives or participation are at risk, that has to win over commercial interest. This is what we are dealing with in these amendments. I have made some suggestions because I do not really understand what the legislation is saying. Instead of a speech, and because my voice is dodgy, I am just going to read out the subsection and explain what I do not understand.

Clause 95(2) says:

“The provision does not require or authorise any disclosure, obtaining or use of information that … contravenes data protection”


or is prohibited under something to do with the Investigatory Powers Act. What does “the provision does not” mean? I have changed it to say that the provision —which would come forward from regulations—“must” not authorise things that would contravene data protection legislation. This might be similar to what we used to call a “notwithstanding” clause—notwithstanding what the provision says, it actually means something else, or it does not mean what it says. I think it would be better if it said “must”.

If it is a contravening provision—a notwithstanding type—meaning that the regulation might say one thing but that thing is not allowed because it is forbidden in another piece of legislation, at what point does this come to light in the request for information? Is the requester of the information obliged to make it clear: “Oh well, we do not need this bit”, or does the person who is requested to give the information have to plead: “Oh, I do not have to answer that”? I do not know the answer to those questions. I do not know whether this is a notwithstanding clause or whether the constraint will be clear at the point at which the evidence or information is being sought. I wait to hear what the Minister tells me it means.

Amendment 30 would add intellectual property rights to the list of legislation which must not be contravened. As Clause 95 deals quite a lot with commercial rights and the use of data and things that can be asked for under investigatory powers, why can we not put in intellectual property rights, which is another part of the family, if you like? I am still having some interesting discussions with the officials as to whether or not it is needed. I think it is, they think it is not. Maybe we can get some clarity by Third Reading. That is the basis of my second amendment.

My third amendment is to Clause 95(3), which says:

“But the provision is to be taken into account in determining whether the disclosure, obtaining or use of information would contravene the data protection legislation”.


I do not quite know what it means when a provision starts with “But”. It might be another notwithstanding—in which case this is a notwithstanding clause on a notwithstanding clause. I am not quite sure where two notwithstandings leave us.

Does this mean that the provision can have in it new things that it then deems can be taken into account? Is it without limit or does it regard a provision that is cast within an obligation there might be under some other legislation, as there is in data protection legislation —that is, you can have new reasons in the public interest as to why something might be needed? Does the constraint apply or not? From what it says here, I cannot tell. It looks to me as if a provision can be made and then taken into account when interpreting it. I just do not see how that works.

I cannot construe this any better than I have attempted to do—and I am not quite a beginner in construing legal things. I may wish to test the opinion of the House on this clause because it is really quite confusing. If it verges on that broader side, we would be better off without it. Provisions can be made in the public interest under all kinds of legislation; you can do it under data legislation and intellectual property legislation. There are times when the public interest will prevail. So I do not see why we need this clause there at all.

My final amendment simply suggests that Clause 95, which is titled “Disclosure of information: interaction with external constraints”, should be inserted into the list at the start of Clause 96, which is headed “Crown application” and says that the provisions in Sections 42, 73 and 88 “bind the Crown”. To some extent, Clause 95 is mainly relevant to Sections 42, 73 and 88; it therefore seemed logical to me that it should also be listed in Clause 96.

This is not the grand speech that I was going to make, it is just why I cannot understand what is written here. What I think about it will now depend entirely on what the Minister is able to tell me—in particular, about these clauses, which may or may not be “notwithstanding” clauses. I beg to move.

[Lord Liddle (Lab)]

My Lords, these are important issues that the noble Baroness, Lady Bowles, has raised. She has, with her characteristic acuity, asked lots of penetrating questions about what the proposed legislation actually means. For the part of the Official Opposition, we will listen carefully to what the Minister says in reply but, if we are not satisfied, we will support the noble Baroness in her testing of the opinion of the House.

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

My Lords, I begin by briefly clarifying a point that I made earlier in response to a question from the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, which I am afraid I did not hear correctly. I should have responded by saying that the right legislative vehicle for the Road Safety Investigation Branch remains under consideration.

I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Bowles, for her insightful and challenging remarks. I reiterate that we take the protection of personal data and intellectual property very seriously. I can confirm that the Bill does not seek to replace or change existing legislation on either personal data protection or intellectual property rights. The Bill does not enable us to contravene this legislation, whether domestic or under treaty obligations. Indeed, this would be beyond the scope of the Bill, which is confined to creating an effective safety framework for self-driving vehicles.

Although that may necessitate the use and sharing of information, this will not be done indiscriminately. We will do so only for specified public interest purposes because safety and security must come first. These purposes would be considered and developed with stakeholders. They would be subject to consultation and would be laid in the House before coming into force. This will provide multiple opportunities for input to, and scrutiny of, the proposals. Indeed, we are required by law to consult the Information Commissioner’s Office if our regulations permit or require the sharing or use of personal data.

As colleagues have highlighted today and in our meetings, it is not just the application of the law that is important but the understanding of it. That is why we are consulting the ICO in the development of specific guidance for the self-driving vehicle industry; that guidance will support the interpretation and understanding of existing personal data protection legislation in an industry-specific context. I hope that this provides some reassurance before I turn to the amendments.

On Amendment 29, the noble Baroness is right to understand Clause 95(2) as a clarifying clause or a “notwithstanding” provision, as she has referred to it. I am advised that the correct legislative form is to use “does” rather than “must”, but the effect is the same. The clause ensures that the Bill is consistent with data protection legislation, and is written using standard drafting. Its effect is that recipients of information must continue to ensure that their processing complies with data protection legislation and the Investigatory Powers Act 2016. The clause provides confirmation that these obligations continue to apply to provisions made in or under the Bill.

To be clear, the Bill does not change existing data protection legislation. However, the UK general data protection regulations do allow new purposes for the processing of personal data to be set out in law. This law must meet an objective of public interest and be proportionate to the legitimate aim pursued.