Clause 97 - Physical data: compulsory provision
Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Bill
11:00 am
Mr Simon Hughes (North Southwark and Bermondsey, Liberal Democrat)
I wish to make two brief points. First, the clause is important, for the reasons that I stated earlier. It allows for information to be compulsorily obtained. It would be helpful if the Minister circulated to hon. Members—I do not ask her to read out the information now—details about the current protections under all the data protection legislation against information collected here being passed on without authority.
I welcome subsection (5), which specifies that regulations must provide for the destruction of information obtained or recorded and
''require the destruction of information at the end of the period of ten years beginning with the day on which it is obtained or recorded''.
That is, one can ask for the record of one's fingerprints or eyes to be destroyed 10 years later so that there is not a permanent Big Brother file. My question is, if I ask for the file containing my fingerprints or the image of my iris, and someone refuses to provide that data, what can I, the citizen, do? What is my remedy, and what are my guarantees? If someone refuses, what offence do they commit and can they be punished? I am keen to know whether the citizen can enforce the rights given in legislation.