Clause 20 - Further uses connected with the prevention and detection of crime
Identity Cards Bill
11:30 am
Andy Burnham (Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Home Office; Leigh, Labour)
I assure the hon. and learned Gentleman that I consider none of his amendments, or the comments he supplements them with, debating points. In this case, he is dealing with a serious point, but his concern would more properly be directed to the Anti-terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001. Clause 20 simply aligns the Bill with measures in that Act on the provision of information without consent.
Section 17 was included in the Act to ensure that, for the purposes of a criminal investigation or criminal proceedings, public authorities can disclose information that is subject to statutory restriction on disclosure. Under section 17(2), information that is subject to a statutory bar may be disclosed for the purposes of carrying out, initiating, bringing to an end or facilitating a determination of criminal investigations and criminal proceedings in the United Kingdom or elsewhere.
Clause 20 will ensure that information from the register can be provided without consent
“for any of the purposes specified in section 17(2)(a) to (d) of the Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001”,
provided that there is compliance with the rules set out in clause 23, which we will come to later.
Those rules lay down a clear framework in which information can be given. This takes us back to other points. For instance, the rules lay down the rank at which an official in an organisation can be supplied with information and the use to which information can be put. I assure the hon. and learned Gentleman that the assurance he wants, although it may be buried, certainly is in clause 23, which provides some safeguards that he seeks.
Subsection (3), which would be deleted by the hon. and learned Gentleman’s amendment, is one of the safeguards, so I am surprised in some ways that he has directed his attention to it. It will allow the Secretary of State to give a direction prohibiting the provision of information for use in specified overseas proceedings. Again, that mirrors the corresponding power in section 18 of the 2001 Act. The amendment would remove that power.
Under section 18, the Secretary of State might prohibit information from being provided for overseas purposes if he considers it more appropriate for any jurisdictional matter or investigation to be exercised or carried out by a court of the UK or a third country. If the Bill allows for the provision of information in the circumstances set out, it follows that the gloss put on section 17 by section 18 of the 2001 Act should be reflected in the Bill.
The clause will simply extend to the national identity register the powers that already exist in respect of other data sources in the UK. It is right that the Secretary of State should be able to specify overseas proceedings for which he considers the disclosure of information under clause 20 not—I stress “not”—appropriate. That safeguard and restriction reserves to the Home Secretary the right not to comply fully when a request for information is made.
I hope that the hon. and learned Gentleman accepts that the clause deals with quite a narrow point and that it brings the Bill fully in line with legislation already passed by the House. There are safeguards in place, and I urge him to withdraw the amendment.