Clause 43 - Information about a person's bank account
Crime (International Co-operation) Bill [Lords]
10:45 am
Mr Nick Hawkins (Surrey Heath, Conservative)
I beg to move amendment No. 151, in
clause 43, page 25, line 43, at end insert—
'(8) Where any bank or financial institution contacts any of its customers holding a bank or financial account or accounts, they shall not request customer information alleging they require it for legislative or investigative reasons when they actually want it for marketing'.
This is my reassurance to the hon. Member for Wirral, West and other Committee members that, despite my background, I will not always be putting forward proposals on behalf of banks and financial institutions, because there are times when we would all accept that they go too far.
With regard to another recent piece of legislation, we had a debate with the Minister's predecessor, the hon. Member for Coventry, North-East (Mr. Ainsworth), about the problems that some banks and financial institutions have caused to constituents throughout the country. They have misused some of the provisions of the proceeds of crime legislation to enable them to get information by using that legislative framework as a cloak when they actually wanted the information not for the
investigation or prevention of crime but for marketing reasons.
There was such a case in my constituency. It involved a local charity—I am sure that all Members have local charities in their constituencies. This charity—the Windlesham United Charities and Poors' Allotments—has done a great deal of valuable work in my constituency over many years. The secretary to the trustees of the charity is a lady who is well known for her good work in my constituency. Her name is Doris Christie, and she has been honoured for her charity work. She saw me at one of my surgeries to draw attention to the fact that the bank with which the charity had an account was asking for information which I, having been the shadow Minister on the proceeds of crime legislation, happily knew went far beyond the legislative requirements. When we finally got to the bottom of things—after much strongly worded correspondence from me—the bank admitted that some of the information that it was seeking about the trustees' personal details went beyond the legislative requirements and was simply required by it for marketing purposes.
Therefore, I have had experience of how previous legislation has been working. The hon. Member for Wirral, West and others might recall that when my hon. Friend the Member for Beaconsfield and I were leading for the Opposition on the proceeds of crime legislation, we expressed worries that it might be misused—that it might sometimes be used as a sledgehammer to crack a nut. I have seen a subsequent example of how some of the requirements have been misused.
I hope that the Minister will understand that Opposition Members do not always defend everything that banks and financial institutions do. I felt that it might be helpful to introduce a correction into this Bill to make it clear that banks and financial institutions, while they should be encouraged to help the Government, police and prosecution forces generally to investigate crime, must not misuse their powers and start trying to seek information that they use purely for marketing purposes under the cloak of this Bill, the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002, or any other legislation.