Data (Use and Access) Bill [ Lords ] (First sitting)

Debate between Victoria Collins and Chris Bryant

Committee stage
Tuesday 4th March 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Chris Bryant]

I note the comments from the shadow Minister, and I am grateful for them.

There is a fundamental flaw in the argument from the hon. Member for North Norfolk that this new clause was tabled in the House of Lords, because what he means is that it was lost in the House of Lords—the House of Lords did not bring it to us. There is a second flaw in the argument, which is that it seems to presume that people will be required to use a digital verification service. That is not true. People will be able to use non-digital systems if they want to in every circumstance. That is an essential part of being able to take forward digital verification services. It may be that a growing number of people begin to find them more useful, reliable and trustworthy than carrying around a set of papers. I am sure that many of us have gone through the tedious process of renting a car—having to turn up with copies of the previous three months of bills sent to your house, and all that. They have to be printed out, of course, and not provided in digital form, and so on. In the end, therefore, this measure will be transformational for the vast majority of people, but that does not mean that we should exclude people.

Where the hon. Member for North Norfolk is absolutely right is that there are many different patterns of digital exclusion. One, which I am very conscious of from my own constituency in south Wales, is physical digital exclusion. Many people in the south Wales valleys simply do not have the physical digital connections, a mobile phone or whatever it may be, to be able to transact their business. The second is the simple issue of poverty. Social tariffs do not even touch the edge for lots of families, because it is yet another bill. Even another £10 or £15 bill a month is one that has to compete with whether they have fresh food on the table for the kids. Another level where people might be excluded relates to age, at the top end and at the bottom end. The hon. Member mentioned nonagenarians, but he could go down to 60-year-olds and find people who simply do not want to use open banking or any kind of digital system, do not have a smartphone and have absolutely no intention of getting one, or, for that matter, do not have any kind of broadband connection to their home. I understand that fully, and that is why the Bill is written as it is, so that it is permissive and not mandatory.

That is an important reason why—although I have listened to the arguments that the hon. Member for North Norfolk has repeated from Big Brother Watch—I am determined to do everything we possibly can to tackle each and every one of the issues of digital exclusion. I have not even referred to skills—people might have some form of disability, might have simply never acquired or wanted to acquire digital skills, or might find using a screen particularly difficult for whatever set of reasons. We want to tackle every single form of digital exclusion, but I do not think that this is the place to do so. We will not be able to tackle digital exclusion by putting an additional measure in the Bill, and that is why, if the hon. Member wants to push this to a vote, I will still resist his new clause. I commend the clause as drafted to the Committee.

[Victoria Collins]

The Minister says that the proposal for digital verification services is not mandatory, so a non-digital version will be available for people to use. May I check what the guarantees are? We have seen this with card payments and even the banks—in Harpenden, we lost all our banks, apart from Nationwide. A very big team campaigned to get a banking hub, because a lot of people said, “You can either go online or drive many miles to get to a bank.” I want to understand what guarantees are in place to secure that non-digital version.

[Chris Bryant]

It is simply that there is no requirement for people to use a digital verification service to be able to secure the service that they want. Obviously, that is a key part of how local government or Government have to deliver their services. They have to think not only about the people who can use digital services, but about those who cannot, for all the reasons that we have laid out.

The hon. Member for Harpenden and Berkhamsted is absolutely right about banks, and it is not just in Harpenden; I do not have a bank in my constituency. I have seen them go one after another after another. We have a banking hub, but even it has had to move. That provides all sorts of difficulties for people who do not want to do their banking in any way other than physically going into a bank. That is why both our Government many years ago, then the Conservative Government for years, were trying to encourage people to use the post office as an alternative means of doing their banking.

That is the pattern that we will have to adopt. Government will always have to be aware. While we may want all the productivity gains and the added security that digital verification services can provide, none the less we need to ensure that others are provided for. That is all provided for in the Bill, and I would say adequately, although the hon. Member may disagree with me. Yet again, I am still resisting any amendment and urge that the clause stand part of the Bill.

[Victoria Collins]

I thank the Minister for his reply, and I do understand. I will leave what happens with new clause 9 to my hon. Friend the Member for North Norfolk, but it is important to state that we have seen a pattern, as my hon. Friend mentioned, of rights being taken away when we know that people cannot access services, and then the problem being solved after it was created. We need to think about a way to secure non-digital services, whether in respect of public services and council tax, our banks, or whatever it is. The Government need to think about how we can protect those services, whether through this Bill or something else, to ensure that those who are excluded can still access a non-digital version of services.

[Chris Bryant]

Even without inspiration, I agree with everything the hon. Lady said. I would add the fact that to park a car in lots of places in the country now we have to go online using a smartphone. When I was in Cardiff recently, the sign said “Go to the app”, but it did not say which app. What frustrates me is that every local authority in the land seems to have adopted a different app, so if we park in more than one local authority area, we have to download app after app, upload all our card details and all the rest of it.

I hope to God that one of the things smart data might be able to solve is the issue of different apps for parking, because the car does not change, we do not change and our banking details do not change; the only thing that changes is our location. To achieve that, though, we must also address the issue of digital exclusion. Lots of areas simply do not have a download speed of 5 megabits per second for mobile coverage, even though Ofcom probably suggests that there is 99% coverage in all areas from all four operators. My problem is that the new clause tries to correct many deficiencies in society, none of which has anything to do with digital verification services.

--- Later in debate ---

[Chris Bryant]

I need to make it absolutely clear, for a start, that the element of clause 45 that we are removing—subsection (6)—makes no reference to sex or gender at all. The words do not appear on the face of the Bill at all. Subsection (6) refers to accuracy and inaccuracy, but it says

“the public authority is able to attest that it…has been corrected through a lawfully made correction,”

and that is obviously aiming at a particular form of lawfully made correction.

Public authorities are already bound in law by data protection legislation—this goes to the point that the hon. Member for Isle of Wight East just made—to ensure that the personal data they process is accurate and, importantly, that it is accurate for the purpose for which it is being processed, and that it is kept up to date where necessary. In essence, what the noble Lords’ amendments to the Bill did was say that we should also be keeping, in every instance, a history of what the data had been. That, I think, is problematic.

The hon. Member is absolutely right about wanting to preserve women-only spaces, which is why public authorities are required to process information that is accurate for the purpose for which it is being processed. In the delivery of healthcare, for instance, when it comes to health screening for transgender and non-binary individuals, the Department of Health and Social Care has comprehensive guidance that sets out the NHS default adult screening programmes that are available in England and lays out who is invited. In England, it is up to GPs to ensure that, as part of processing gender change, the individual is correctly registered for relevant screenings in relation to their sex.

I simply do not buy this argument that we need to make this provision in relation to all digital verification services. Although it is of course right that, in the delivery of prison services or in the health service, or in so many other areas, simple common sense should apply in relation to female-only spaces and wanting to make sure that women are safe, I do not think that this Bill on digital verification services benefits from the introduction of a measure that would effectively mean that in the provision of every digital verification service—whether in regard to the provision of some sensitive service or not—you should make this provision. That is why we tabled amendments 10 and 11, and I urge all hon. Members to support them.

[Victoria Collins]

The Liberal Democrats support the Government amendments. As the Minister highlighted, the amendments are about proportionality in digital verification services. For Liberal Democrats, it is about the balance between trust and helping to protect privacy, as well as getting the data needed to make our society better. We believe that the original proposal had the proportionality right, so we will support the Government’s amendment.

Question put, That the amendment be made.

Data (Use and Access) Bill [Lords]

Debate between Victoria Collins and Chris Bryant

2nd reading
Wednesday 12th February 2025 Commons Chamber

[Victoria Collins]

There is definitely a lot of opportunity in automated decision making, but the safeguards must be in place to make sure that human decisions and the right to safeguards around the impact of those decisions are upheld, because restricting enhanced safeguards to only certain categories of information, without further amendments, could exclude a wide range of significant decisions from meaningful human review and create a lack of transparency. Again, doing so undermines public trust and hinders the adoption of AI and emergent technologies.

We share the concerns of organisations including Justice and the Open Rights Group that clause 80 weakens safeguards by broadening the scope for automated decisions. Although the clause makes safeguarding requirements more explicit, there are concerns that it also provides the Secretary of State with considerable powers via secondary legislation to amend or set aside those safeguards. The Liberal Democrats are firm in our conviction that where a person is the subject of automated decision making, there simply must be a right to explanation, a right to appeal and a meaningful human intervention.

[The Minister for Data Protection and Telecoms (Chris Bryant)]

I hope the hon. Lady recognises that one of the changes we have made to the Bill is to insist on there being meaningful human involvement. That was not in the previous version of the Bill. I think that that helps considerably with the issue of automated decision making.

[Victoria Collins]

I thank the Minister for his intervention. For us, it is a question of making sure that any input from the Secretary of State—whoever that is—does not undermine those safeguards. [Interruption.] I am sure that the current Secretary of State will be around for a while.

[Chris Bryant]

What do you know?

AstraZeneca

Debate between Victoria Collins and Chris Bryant

Monday 3rd February 2025 Commons Chamber

[Victoria Collins (Harpenden and Berkhamsted) (LD)]

This news makes for yet another disappointing day for the UK’s investment landscape. We could be a global leader in innovation, but ever since the previous Conservative Government’s scrapping of the industrial strategy businesses have been left with uncertainty. The life sciences sector is vital not just for economic growth, but for our health and technological innovation. It contributes over £43 billion to the UK economy, supports thousands of highly skilled jobs and drives breakthroughs in medicine and healthcare, yet in conversations that I have had with businesses, I have heard time and again how the UK’s fragmented approach to investment is holding them back. That is why I have highlighted those concerns in previous questions to the Secretary of State.

The Government have promised to publish “Invest 2035” this spring, but right now companies still have no detail on what support will be available and when. Without urgent action, we risk more world-leading firms following AstraZeneca’s lead and taking their investments elsewhere. Will the Minister please confirm exactly when the final Invest 2035 strategy will be published? The Government said that the decision was based on value for money, so will the Minister and the Secretary of State also publish the impact assessment, so that we can see for ourselves?

[Chris Bryant]

I am afraid that I will have to write to the hon. Lady on that last question, as I am not sure precisely where we are with an impact assessment. She is absolutely right that the UK’s life sciences sector generated something like £108 billion in turnover in the financial year ending 2022—a sharp 13% increase on the previous year. We want to build on that. The sector has seen year-on-year growth since the financial year ending 2015, and turnover is now 40% higher than in the financial year ending 2022. We are keen to publish, as part of our industrial strategy, our precise plans for the financial services sector. We said that will be in the spring—it certainly still felt like winter in the Rhondda at the weekend, so I am afraid she will have to wait until spring has sprung.

Copyright and Artificial Intelligence

Debate between Victoria Collins and Chris Bryant

Wednesday 18th December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Victoria Collins (Harpenden and Berkhamsted) (LD)]

The UK can and should be a global leader in AI innovation, and I welcome this consultation. Investment and support for technological innovation will be a crucial pillar of growing our economy and solving the problems of today and tomorrow. Likewise, our world-leading creative industries must remain a growth priority.

In my constituency, I see the invaluable contribution that the film industry makes to the local and national economy, driving growth while producing top-quality content. We might not have James Bond, but we have had “Robin Hood” and “Deadpool”, and “Wicked” was recently filmed just over the border.

The creative industries have been clear that failure to apply existing copyright laws to AI model training presents an existential threat. They are being asked to allow their output to be used to train models that could be in direct competition with them. We must get this balance right.

There is no uncertainty in existing law. UK law is totally clear that commercial organisations must license the data they use to train their large language models. The announcement that the Government favour a text and data mining exemption will be deeply concerning to the creative industries. The issue was thought to be settled under the previous Government, so what assessment have the Government made of the likely impact of their favoured option on the creative industries? The expectation seems to be that small businesses in the creative industry should welcome an opt-out system in exchange for vague commitments to transparency, so will the Minister lay out what successful, workable examples of an opt-out system he has looked at? Can he give us examples of where this approach has successfully protected creatives? Why has the option of an opt-in not been included in the consultation?

As has been said previously, the creative industry adds £125 billion a year in gross value to the economy and goes hand in hand with our digital economy. It is essential that the Government support AI innovation, but that cannot come at the cost of our world-leading creative industry.

[Chris Bryant]

Madam Deputy Speaker, I will look at you to make sure that I do not go over time, but I would point out that “Wicked” is far too long a movie.

I make it clear that I do not think there is a complete separation between AI and the creative industries. AI is a creative industry in many regards. There is an important collaboration between the two, and even Sir Paul McCartney has said that he has used AI to help him write some of his most recent work.

The hon. Lady says this was all settled under the previous Government, but nothing in this territory was settled under the previous Government. It was simply left hanging in the air, which is why we are trying to take action. She asks whether there are any successful examples of opt-outs. No, there are not. Precisely the point I am trying to make is that, at the moment, it is remarkably difficult for individuals and organisations—whether a record label, an individual artist or photographer, or whoever—to protect their rights. That is what needs to change.

There has been some licensing. Some newspapers have licensed content with OpenAI. Sony Music has written to all the different AI operators to say that all the work that it protects is copyrighted and not to be used. But I am not sure that such piecemeal processes are enough to build the control we want for rights holders, while enabling AI to develop fruitfully in the UK.