Data sharing plans face further scrutiny

Data sharing has been hotly debated in Parliament

The government will face a continued fight to introduce plans for greater public sector information sharing despite dropping controversial proposals last week.

Privacy campaigners know that legislation is almost certain to be re-introduced –­ but next time as a law of its own, rather than as an addition to a largely unrelated bill, which was the case with the now-scrapped Clause 152 of the Coroners and Justice Bill.

There remains significant opposition to the measures from inside and outside Westminster. This week a report by political think-tank the Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust claimed a quarter of all government databases are illegal and the benefits claimed for data sharing are often illusory.

But junior justice minister Michael Wills is determined to pave the way for re-introducing legislation in parliament.

“In this particular case it became clear the powers were drawn too widely. We have therefore withdrawn them and we will be redrafting them and bringing forward the powers in future,” he said.

The original legislation would have given the government powers to share individuals’ data between departments –­ currently banned by the Data Protection Act. The case for doing so in a particular situation would have been debated by parliament and overseen by the Information Commissioner.

But opponents said the safeguards were not enough, and the clause caused uproar. A group of medical, social care, and education professionals wrote to justice secretary Jack Straw earlier this month, expressing grave concern over the issues.

“The use of information is not required to be consistent with the original purpose of the data,” they said. “Moreover, the order-making power will not be contingent on obtaining the consent of the individuals whose information is being shared.”

One of the key accusations against Clause 152 was that it would have enabled biometrics and genetic data –­ including information on the National Identity Register ­ –to be shared between Whitehall departments, over-riding safety clauses in legislation that allowed the collection of that information in the first place.

The clause was heavily debated in parliament, with Conservative and Liberal Democrat MPs united in opposition. Shadow justice secretary Dominic Grieve said the legislation “has enormous implications for civil liberties and it is not right that the government should come to the House and ask us to have it as a little add-on to another complex piece of legislation.”

Straw said he was simply implementing the recommendations of the Data Sharing Review authored by Wellcome Trust director Mark Walport and Information Commissioner Richard Thomas.

He was somewhat upstaged when Thomas’s consultation on the document said the information sharing provisions in the bill “would be significantly improved if they mirrored more closely the relevant recommendation of the Thomas/Walport Data Sharing Review.”

But Straw was correct in saying that the review called for new measures to improve data sharing where necessary –­ the difference was that the government proposals went much further than the recommendations.

The Data Sharing Review said that “primary legislation should provide the secretary of state, in precisely defined circumstances, with a power by order, subject to the affirmative resolution procedure in both Houses, to remove or modify any legal barrier to data sharing”.

The difference lies in the government’s failure to include the caveat of “precisely defined circumstances” in the draft legislation –­ the powers would have enabled them to draft an order to share data in any circumstances at all, according to Grieve.

“The government is proposing to drive a coach and horses through the duty of confidentiality that the state owes to individuals in any case where a quite nebulous concept of public good decides to trump the private right,” he said.

Some examples of these “precisely defined circumstances” where it may be appropriate to share data were set out in the Data Sharing Review (see below).

The review concluded by making it clear that an order to share information must be made only after considering the pros and cons of a specific case.

Alun Michael MP, former deputy home secretary, echoed this view, saying that the Conservatives’ over-eager opposition to data sharing is as misguided as the government attempt to introduce legislation to share wherever possible, and that new powers to share information in certain cases is vital.

“The important thing is that on every occasion, a balanced judgment must be made by those who have the information as to whether it is in the public interest, as well as in the interest of individuals, to share it,” he said.

Some of the benefits of public sector data sharing

In law enforcement, the cross-matching of databases has helped to uncover some significant crimes, and there are further opportunities to do so to help protect vulnerable groups. For example, allowing the Criminal Records Bureau to share information with schools and prisons that are looking to employ staff – a move that supporters say may have helped prevented the 2002 murder of two young girls in Soham where killer Ian Huntley had been previously investigated for sexual offences and burglary.

And data from the Multi-Agency Risk Assessment Conferences scheme suggests an average reduction of 50 per cent in repeat victimisation in cases where statutory and voluntary agencies share information on victims of domestic abuse.

In public service delivery, healthcare is identified by the review as an area that will always benefit from improved information sharing, alongside the justification that bereaved relatives would only have to notify one, instead of many, government departments.

And the sharing of information between motor insurance companies, MoT certification authority VOSA and the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency already allows people to renew vehicle tax discs swiftly and easily online or on the phone through one agency instead of three.

Furthermore, many citizens do not receive the public sector benefits and services to which they are entitled – such as senior citizens’ bus passes, for example, or welfare benefits. Identifying people entitled to services and benefits may be helped by the sharing of personal information across central and local government, and in some cases with the private sector, for example utility companies.

Finally, the area of research and statistics is one where the potential for information sharing is huge. Often, anonymised data is already used for such functions, as it is not covered by the Data Protection Act.

But in some cases more information is needed to make the research accurate. For example, researchers wish to study whether living near power lines is associated with an increased risk of leukemia in children.

To do this they need a complete regional or national registry of individuals with leukemia, coupled with postcode information linked to the geography of power lines – this would most likely mean cross-referencing information held by the NHS and the Department of Work and Pensions.