Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Bill

Rebecca Long Bailey Excerpts

Report stage
Monday 20th November 2023 Commons Chamber

[Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford and Eccles) (Lab)]

On the issue of clarity, the Minister knows that the final offer mechanism should be an issue of last resort, and before that there should be a mechanism by which negotiations can take place. Can he assure the House that there will be a mechanism to ensure that big tech firms do not drag out negotiations unnecessarily, because it is not clear so far?

[Saqib Bhatti]

The whole mechanism is designed to ensure that smaller firms have a say in this. That is why the final offer mechanism is there. I hope that that that gives the hon. Member some reassurance.

Finally, the regime has the potential for significant financial penalties to be imposed, so we have tabled amendments to allow any party subject to a penalty to appeal decisions about the penalty on the merits, rather than on judicial review principles. An appeal on the merits allows the Competition Appeal Tribunal to consider whether it was right to impose the penalty, and to consider the penalty amount. Where appropriate, it also allows the Competition Appeal Tribunal to decide a different penalty amount.

Oral Answers to Questions

Rebecca Long Bailey Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd May 2023 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend has been a fantastic champion for the restoration of the line. Indeed, it was one of the first deliveries from the restoring your railways fund. It will be fantastic for his local communities because that connectivity will provide jobs, opportunity and employment, particularly for young people in his local area. After years, if not decades, of neglect, it is this Conservative Government who are delivering for the people in his local area.

[Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford and Eccles) (Lab)]

Q12. Over 3.6 million women born in the 1950s had their pension age increased without their knowledge. Many, like my constituent, unknowingly gave up work at 60, only to realise they had no income, they could not pay their bills and some have even lost their homes. My constituent asks the Prime Minster: will he commit to the fair and fast payment of any compensation that is recommended by the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman to 1950s women for the injustice they have suffered due to maladministration by the Department for Work and Pensions?

[The Prime Minister]

This issue has been long discussed in this place. Obviously, the hon. Lady knows that there is an ongoing process, which I cannot comment on, but rest assured that of course we will respond appropriately to any recommendations that come our way.

Data Protection and Digital Information (No. 2) Bill

Rebecca Long Bailey Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 17th April 2023 Commons Chamber

[Julia Lopez]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for pressing me on that important point. I know that many businesses are seeking to maintain adequacy. If we want a business-friendly regime, we do not want to create regulatory disruption for businesses, particularly those that trade with Europe and want to ensure that there is a free flow of data. I can reassure him that we have been in constant contact with the European Commission about our proposals. We want to make sure that there are no surprises. We are currently adequate, and we believe that we will maintain adequacy following the enactment of the Bill.

[Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford and Eccles) (Lab)]

I was concerned to hear from the British Medical Association that if the EU were to conclude that data protection legislation in the UK was inadequate, that would present a significant problem for organisations conducting medical research in the UK. Given that so many amazing medical researchers across the UK currently work in collaboration with EU counterparts, can the Minister assure the House that the Bill will not represent an inadequacy in comparison with EU legislation as it stands?

[Julia Lopez]

I hope that my previous reply reassured the hon. Lady that we intend to maintain adequacy, and we do not consider that the Bill will present a risk in that regard. What we are trying to do, particularly in respect of medical research, is make it easier for scientists to innovate and conduct that research without constantly having to return for consent when it is apparent that consent has already been granted for particular medical data processing activities. We think that will help us to maintain our world-leading position as a scientific research powerhouse.

Alongside new data bridges, the Secretary of State will be able to recognise new transfer mechanisms for businesses to protect international transfers. Businesses will still be able to transfer data across borders with the compliance mechanisms that they already use, avoiding needless checks and costs. We are also delighted to be co-hosting, in partnership with the United States, the next workshop of the global cross-border privacy rules forum in London this week. The CBPR system is one of the few existing operational mechanisms that, by design, aims to facilitate data flows on a global scale.

World-class research requires world-class data, but right now many scientists are reluctant to get the data they need to get on with their research, for the simple reason that they do not know how research is defined. They can also be stopped in their tracks if they try to broaden their research or follow a new and potentially interesting avenue. When that happens, they can be required to go back and seek permission all over again, even though they have already gained that permission earlier to use personal data. We do not think that makes sense. The pandemic showed that we cannot risk delaying discoveries that could save lives. Nothing should be holding us back from curing cancer, tackling disease or producing new drugs and treatments. This Bill will simplify the legal requirements around research so that scientists can work to their strengths with legal clarity on what they can and cannot do.

The Bill will also ensure that people benefit from the results of research by unlocking the potential of transformative technologies. Taking artificial intelligence as an example, we have recently published our White Paper: “AI regulation: a pro-innovation approach”. In the meantime, the Bill will ensure that organisations know when they can use responsible automated decision making and that people know when they can request human intervention where those decisions impact their lives, whether that means getting a fair price for the insurance they receive after an accident or a fair chance of getting the job they have always wanted.

I spoke earlier about the currency of trust and how, by maintaining it through high data protection standards, we are likely to see more data sharing, not less. Fundamental to that trust will be confidence in the robustness of the regulator. We already have a world-leading independent regulator in the Information Commissioner’s Office, but the ICO needs to adapt to reflect the greater role that data now plays in our lives alongside its strategic importance to our economic competitiveness. The ICO was set up in the 1980s for a completely different world, and the pace, volume and power of the data we use today has changed dramatically since then.

It is only right that we give the regulator the tools it needs to keep pace and to keep our personal data safe while ensuring that, as an organisation, it remains accountable, flexible and fit for the modern world. The Bill will modernise the structure and objectives of the ICO. Under this legislation, protecting our personal data will remain the ICO’s primary focus, but it will also be asked to focus on how it can empower businesses and organisations to drive growth and innovation across the UK, and support public trust and confidence in the use of personal data.

The Bill is also important for consumers, helping them to share less data while getting more product. It will support smart data schemes that empower consumers and small businesses to make better use of their own data, building on the extraordinary success of open banking tools offered by innovative businesses, which help consumers and businesses to manage their finances and spending, track their carbon footprint and access credit.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lucy Powell (Manchester Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is good finally to get the data Bill that was promised so long ago. We nearly got there in the halcyon days of September 2022, under the last Prime Minister, after it had been promised by the Prime Minister before. However, the Minister has a strong record of bringing forward and delivering things that the Government have long promised. I also know that she has another special delivery coming soon, which I very much welcome and wish her all the best with. She took a lot of interventions and I commend her for all that bobbing up and down while so heavily pregnant. I would also like to send my best wishes to the Secretary of State, who let me know that she could not be here today. I would also like to wish her well with her imminent arrival. There is lots of delivery going on today.

We are in the midst of a digital and data revolution, with data increasingly being the most prized asset and fundamental to the digital age, but this Bill, for all its hype, fails to meet that moment. Even since the Bill first appeared on the Order Paper last September, AI chatbots have become mainstream, TikTok has been fined for data breaches and banned from Government devices, and AI image generators have fooled the world into thinking that the Pope had a special papal puffer coat. The world, the economy, public services and the way we live and communicate are changing fast. Despite these revolutions, this data Bill does not rise to the challenges. Instead, it tweaks around the edges of GDPR, making an already dense set of privacy rules even more complex.

The UK can be a global leader in the technologies of the future. We are a scientific superpower, we have some of the world’s best creative industries and now, outside the two big trading blocs, we could have the opportunities of nimbleness and being in the vanguard of world-leading regulation. In order to harness that potential, however, we need a Government who are on the pitch, setting the rules of the game and ensuring that the benefits of new advances are felt by all of us and not just by a handful of companies. The Prime Minister can tell us again how much he loves maths, but without taking the necessary steps to support the data and digital economy, his sums just do not add up.

The contents of this Bill might seem technical—as drafted, they are incredibly technical—but they matter greatly to every business, consumer, citizen and organisation. As such, data is a significant source of power and value. It shapes the relationship between business and consumers, between the state and citizens, and much, much more. Data information is critical to innovation and economic growth, to modern public services, to democratic accountability and to transforming societies, if harnessed and shaped in the interest of the many, not simply the few—pretty major, I would say.

Now we have left the EU, the UK has an opportunity to lead the world in this area. The next generation of world-leading regulation could allow small businesses and start-ups to compete with the monopolies in big tech, as we have already heard. It could foster a climate of open data, enable public services to use and share data for improved outcomes, and empower consumers and workers to have control over how their data is used. In the face of this huge challenge, the Bill is at best a missed opportunity, and at worst adds another complicated and uncertain layer of bureaucracy. Although we do not disagree with its aims, there are serious questions about whether the Bill will, in practice, achieve them.

Data reform and new regulation are welcome and long overdue. Now that we have left the EU, we need new legislation to ensure that we both keep pace with new developments and make the most of the opportunities. The Government listened to some of the concerns raised in response to the consultation and removed most of the controversial and damaging proposals. GDPR has been hard to follow for some businesses, especially small businesses and start-ups, so streamlining and simplifying data protection rules is a welcome aim. However, we will still need some of them to meet EU data adequacy rules.

The aim of shifting away from tick-box exercises towards a more proactive and systematic approach to regulation is also good. Better and easier data sharing between public services is essential, and some of the changes in that area are welcome, although we will need assurances that private companies will not benefit commercially from personal health data without people’s say so. Finally, nobody likes nuisance calls or constant cookie banners, and the moves to reduce or remove them are welcome, although there are questions about whether the Bill lives up to the rhetoric.

In many areas, however, the Bill threatens to take us backwards. First, it may threaten our ability to share data with the EU, which would be seriously bad for business. Given the astronomical cost to British businesses should data adequacy with the EU be lost, businesses and others are rightly looking for more reassurances that the Bill will not threaten these arrangements. The EU has already said that the vast expansion of the Secretary of State’s powers, among other things, may put the agreement in doubt. If this were to come to pass, the additional burdens on any business operating within the EU, even vaguely, would be enormous.

British businesses, especially small businesses, have faced crisis after crisis. Many only just survived through covid and are now facing rising energy bills that threaten to push them over the edge. According to the Information Commissioner,

“most organisations we spoke to had a plea for continuity.”

The Government must go further on this.

Secondly, the complex new requirements in this 300-page Bill threaten to add more hurdles, rather than streamlining the process. Businesses have serious concerns that, having finally got their head around GDPR, they will now have to comply with both GDPR and all the new regulations in this Bill. That is not cutting red tape, in my view.

Thirdly, the Bill undermines individual rights. Many of the areas in which the Bill moves away from GDPR threaten to reduce protection for citizens, making it harder to hold to account the big companies that process and sell our data. Subject access requests are being diluted, as the Government are handing more power to companies to refuse such requests on the grounds of being excessive or vexatious. They are tilting the rules in favour of the companies that are processing our data. Data protection impact assessments will no longer be needed, and protections against automated decision making are being weakened.

[Rebecca Long Bailey]

AlgorithmWatch explains that automated decision making is “never neutral.” Outputs are determined by the quality of the data that is put into the system, whether that data is fair or biased. Machine learning will propagate and enhance those differences, and unfortunately it already has. Is my hon. Friend concerned that the Bill removes important GDPR safeguards that protect the public from algorithmic bias and discrimination and, worse, provides Henry VIII powers that will allow the Secretary of State to make sweeping regulations on whether meaningful human intervention is required at all in these systems?

[Lucy Powell]

My hon. Friend makes two very good points, and I agree with her on both. I will address both points in my speech.

Taken together, these changes, alongside the Secretary of State’s sweeping new powers, will tip the balance away from individuals and workers towards companies, which will be able to collect far more data for many more purposes. For example, the Bill could have a huge impact on workers’ rights. There are ever more ways of tracking workers, from algorithmic management to recruitment by AI. People are even being line managed by AI, with holiday allocation, the assignment of roles and the determination of performance being decided by algorithm. This is most serious when a low rating triggers discipline or dismissal. Transparency and accountability are particularly important given the power imbalance between some employers and workers, but the Bill threatens to undermine them.

If a person does not even know that surveillance or algorithms are being used to determine their performance, they cannot challenge it. If their privacy is being infringed to monitor their work, that is a harm in itself. If a worker’s data is being monetised by their company, they might not even know about it, let alone see a cut. The Bill, in its current form, undermines workers’ ability to find out what data is held about them and how it is being used. The Government should look at this again.

The main problem, however, is not what is in the Bill but, rather, what is not. Although privacy is, of course, a key issue in data regulation, it is not the only issue. Seeing regulation only through the lens of privacy can obscure all the ways that data can be used and can impact on communities. In modern data processing, our data is not only used to make decisions about us individually but pooled together to analyse trends and predict behaviours across a whole population. Using huge amounts of data, companies can predict and influence our behaviour. From Netflix recommendations to recent examples of surge pricing in music and sports ticketing, to the monitoring of covid outbreaks, the true power of data is in how it can be analysed and deployed. This means the impact as well as the potential harms of data are felt well beyond the individual level.

Moreover, as we heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Salford and Eccles (Rebecca Long Bailey), the algorithms that analyse data often replicate and further entrench society’s biases. Facial recognition that is trained on mostly white faces will more likely misidentify a black face—something that I know the parliamentary channel sometimes struggles with. AI language bots produce results that reflect the biases and limitations of their creators and the data on which they are trained. This Bill does not take on any of these community and societal harms. Who is responsible when the different ways of collecting and using data harm certain groups or society as a whole?

As well as the harms, data analytics offers huge opportunities for public good, as we have heard. Opening up data can ensure that scientists, public services, small businesses and citizens can use data to improve all our lives. For example, Greater Manchester has, over the years, linked data across a multitude of public services to hugely improve our early years services, but this was done entirely locally and in the face of huge barriers. Making systems and platforms interoperable could ensure that consumers can switch services to find the best deal, and it could support smaller businesses to compete with existing giants.

Establishing infrastructure such as a national research cloud and data trusts could help small businesses and not-for-profit organisations access data and compete with the giants. Citymapper is a great example, as it used Transport for London’s open data to build a competitor to Google Maps in London. Open approaches to data will also provide better oversight of how companies use algorithms, and of the impact on the rest of us.

Finally, where are the measures to boost public trust? After the debacle of the exam algorithms and the mishandling of GP data, which led millions of people to withdraw their consent, and with workers feeling the brunt but none of the benefits of surveillance and performance management, we are facing a crisis in public trust. Rather than increasing control over and participation in how our data is used, the Bill is removing even the narrow privacy-based protections we already have. In all those regards, it is a huge missed opportunity.

To conclude, with algorithms increasingly making important decisions about how we live and work, data protection has become ever more important to ensure that people have knowledge, control, confidence and trust in how and why data is being used. A data Bill is needed, but we need one that looks towards the future and harnesses the potential of data to grow our economy and improve our lives. Instead, this piecemeal Bill tinkers around the edges, weakens our existing data protection regime and could put our EU adequacy agreement at risk. We look forward to addressing some of those serious shortcomings in Committee.

Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation

Rebecca Long Bailey Excerpts

Monday 20th March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford and Eccles) (Lab)]

Today, the Resolution Foundation reported that workers in the UK are £11,000 worse off per year, after 15 years of almost completely unprecedented wage stagnation. It said:

“Nobody who is alive and working in the British economy today has ever seen anything like this… This is definitely not what normal looks like. This is what failure looks like”.

Far from being a global phenomenon, as the Government would have us believe, the UK is lagging behind comparable economies such as Germany. In 2008, the gap was more than £500 a year; now, it is more like £4,000. The UK is the only country in the G7 where pay is lower today than it was in 2008. It is the only economy in the G7 that is smaller now than pre-pandemic, and it has the lowest growth forecast for 2023 of any G7 nation.

Any responsible Government should have done two things at last week’s Budget. First, they should have insulated people from the cost of living crisis and tackled poverty pay in the process. Secondly, they should have invested in a comprehensive industrial strategy to reverse the decline in living standards. Neither happened. On a day when so many of Britain’s key workers were forced to strike over poverty pay, they were offered nothing. Instead of setting out how his Government would tackle widespread in-work poverty, or how the 7.1 million people on NHS waiting lists, many of whom want to go back to work, could receive the treatment that they need to do so, the Chancellor threatened more vigorous benefit sanctions.

The families struggling to afford energy bills were offered crumbs. The Government announced that energy bills would be kept at the same rate for just three months, but that is still a real-terms increase of 19%. There was no mention of making the windfall tax more robust, to provide much needed support, and there was no promise that bills would come down in line with falling wholesale prices. All the while, big oil and gas giants are still raking in billions of pounds in super-profits. The Chancellor ignored collapsing public services, too. Unprotected departments face 10% cuts to real day-to-day spending per capita by 2027-28.

On industrial strategy, to be fair to the Chancellor, he did utter the words “industrial strategy”, but they were a passing reference and that is where it ended. There was no extension of support for energy bills for businesses and no support for manufacturing, which is predicted to contract by 3.3% this year. There was no mention of the urgent support needed by our the steel industry, and nothing for SMEs. We heard about the full expensing scheme for larger businesses, which might have been meaningful if it sat alongside an actual industrial strategy. But in the absence of one, it is just another tax break for large companies.

On the vision for the future, which the Minister gave a nod to earlier, there was certainly a mention of AI, quantum computing and ARIA. All that is good, but the funding does not match the rhetoric. The reality is that, out of the 38 leading OECD nations, we are 27th in terms of our investment in research and development.

This Budget should have been a game changer. It should be have been bold, ambitious and dedicated to improving lives. It should have set out a clear industrial strategy, with an investment plan alongside it. It should have increased the living wage to £15 an hour, and seen a major improvement in benefits for the poorest and a pay deal for all public sector workers. It should have included a genuine tax on oil and gas companies, and the introduction of a wealth tax on the assets and profits of the super-rich, which could have easily funded a massive injection into our public services. Indeed, that is not a radical idea. Patriotic Millionaires and Tax Justice UK provided a wealth tax plan for the Government prior to the Budget, which would have raised over £50 billion a year for our public services.

Instead, we got a Budget that entrenches poverty and restricts our country’s potential. Off the back of the Budget, the Office for Budget Responsibility projected that living standards are expected to fall by 6% over the next two fiscal years. That is disgraceful. The only answer is a general election because we do not have a fiscally or socially responsible Government in office.

BBC: Government Role in Impartiality

Rebecca Long Bailey Excerpts

Tuesday 14th March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Julia Lopez]

I thank my hon. Friend for setting out how he feels about the comments that were made. I very much appreciate the deep sensitivities of this matter. I also think it was distasteful to compare the Government’s actions, or otherwise, to the Putin regime. That is a disgraceful comparison to make and I think it is way off the mark.

[Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford and Eccles) (Lab)]

The BBC’s decision to take Gary Lineker off the air for his criticism of the Government’s immoral, inhumane and unworkable Illegal Migration Bill justifiably angered both the public and the professional staff working for the corporation, many of whom are in my constituency. Sadly, confidence in BBC management was already at a real low following revelations about the circumstances of Richard Sharp’s appointment as chairman. This week, members of the National Union of Journalists across the BBC in England will be taking strike action in defence of our local radio services. Does the Minister agree that the issues with the BBC are much more fundamental than just how presenters use social media? Will she join me in calling on Richard Sharp to resign so that trust in BBC impartiality can be restored?

[Julia Lopez]

The hon. Lady talks of BBC staff in her constituency. They signed contracts and are aware of the standards to which they must adhere, because impartiality is so fundamental to the organisation, its future success and the trust in which the public hold it. As an organisation, the BBC strives to adhere to those principles, so I suspect there is a conversation happening between staff at every level as to whether consistent standards are being applied to the professional terms to which they all signed up.

Science and Technology Framework

Rebecca Long Bailey Excerpts

Tuesday 7th March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Michelle Donelan]

On the way the framework will operate, in many of the areas, there will be a lead Department, but we will be working to hold the Departments to account, while also collaborating with them. The Department for Education will lead on the education and skills element, but we will of course work closely with it, because we have a vested interest in ensuring that the framework delivers and we can meet that goal of a science and technology superpower by 2030. However, I want to reassure my hon. Friend that the examples given in the framework are intended to provide a flavour of what every Department will be doing; they are not an exhaustive list. Departments will be coming up with more policies and ideas over the coming years, but they will all have to be linked with the framework, because this is a Government who will be strategic and relentlessly focused.

[Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford and Eccles) (Lab)]

The Secretary of State says that her ambition is to send the message around the world that the UK is a leader in science and technology, and I share that ambition, but, sadly, the Sir Paul Nurse review of research and development—published today—says that funding provided by the Government is limited, and below that of other competitive nations. In fact, the UK is 27th out of 36 OECD nations when it comes to Government funding of R&D. If the Secretary of State is serious about this ambition, as I truly hope she is—and it would be helpful if she listened to what I am saying—will she commit today to assuring the House that, by next year, the UK will be No. 1 among all the OECD nations in respect of Government funding of R&D?

[Michelle Donelan]

What I can do is reaffirm the commitment that by 2024-25 we will have a record level of R&D spending in this country: £20 billion. Rather than simply standing here announcing endless pots of money, we are being strategic in our spending, and working with the sector when we come up with our policies and plans.