Clause 15
Education and Skills Bill
12:00 pm
Nick Gibb (Shadow Minister, Children, Schools and Families; Bognor Regis and Littlehampton, Conservative)
Clause 15 gives the Secretary of State the power to supply social security information to a local education authority about a young person. It is clear that that information comprises simply the name and address of the young person, or that of the parents, held by the Department for Work and Pensions. The amendment would ensure that the Secretary of State supplied data to the LEA only if both parties regarded the provision of such information to be proportionate to the aims of the LEA as defined in the Bill.
In a letter to the Joint Committee on Human Rights, the Minister gave as his reason for that provision the fact that young people tended to move around frequently. He said that from the age of 16 young people become a lot more mobile and that such information—the social security data—is what enables local authorities to keep track of them. However, the Bill gives no guarantee that a young person’s private information will be shared only when that proportionate needs test is met.
As drafted, the Bill says that the Secretary of State can provide any information that the local authority would find useful in carrying out the functions placed upon it. However, such information might well be transferred even when the young person in question was not frequently changing address, as the Secretary of State said should be the case, or if there was no other pressing need. If the Minister is comfortable that the power will be used only in a proportionate way, he should have no problem in accepting the amendments.