Clause 44

Part of Statistics and Registration Service Bill – in a Public Bill Committee at 10:15 am on 25 January 2007.

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Photo of Mark Hoban Mark Hoban Shadow Minister (Treasury) 10:15, 25 January 2007

I thank the Minister for his remarks.

I would like to complete the CBI quotation that the Minister used earlier. The CBI said:

“However, the information provided must only be used for the same type of purpose by all bodies and careful and detailed consideration must be given to concerns related to data protection and privacy.”

That strand has been running through the debate. I would argue that if information is held by another public body, that body could be served a court order to release it, rather than people going through the board or the Office for National Statistics. I understand the Minister’s point and the rationale behind data sharing, but we need to examine more carefully how we restrict data that are shared, to ensure that they are released predominantly for statistical use, with certain specified  exemptions. That may be a theme that we return toat a later date. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.