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UNCORRECTED TRANSCRIPT OF ORAL EVIDENCE To be published as HC 1201-ii House of COMMONS MINUTES OF EVIDENCE TAKEN BEFORE REGULATORY REFORM COMMITTEE
THE Proposal for the Regulatory Reform (Registration of Births and Deaths) (England and Wales) Order 2004
Tuesday 2 November 2004 MR STEPHEN TIMMS, MP, MR DENNIS ROBERTS, MR KIERON MAHONY and MR RON POWELL Evidence heard in Public Questions 85 - 146
USE OF THE TRANSCRIPT
Oral Evidence Taken before the Regulatory Reform Committee on Tuesday 2 November 2004 Members present Mr Peter Pike, in the Chair Mr Dai Havard Mr Mark Lazarowicz Chris Mole Mr Denis Murphy Dr Doug Naysmith Mr Anthony Steen Brian White
Dr Brian Iddon (attending the Committee pursuant to Standing Order 141 (13)) ________________ Witnesses: Mr Stephen Timms, a Member of the House, Financial Secretary, HM Treasury, Mr Dennis Roberts, Director of Registration Services, Mr Kieron Mahony, Policy and Legislation Workstream Manager, and Mr Ron Powell, Lawyer, Office for National Statistics, examined Q85 Chairman: Good morning, Minister, we welcome you here and also welcome again Dr Brian Iddon, who is taking the opportunity under the appropriate Standing Order to be with us because it is an issue in which he has some expertise and interest. You know the procedures under which this Committee has to consider the proposals which are laid down by the 2001 Act and Standing Orders, so I will not go into great detail. I do not know whether you have any opening comments you would like to make but just for the sake of the record if you would introduce your team, whom I think are known to us, and make any opening comments that you wish to. Mr Timms: Thank you, Chairman, I am very pleased to be here. Thank you for the opportunity of coming to answer questions and have a discussion about what is arguably, I think, the most important draft Regulatory Reform Order that the Committee has been asked to consider. I certainly would like to introduce my colleagues. On my right is Dennis Roberts, the Director of Registration Services at the Office for National Statistics; on my left is Kieron Mahoney, the Head of Policy for Civil Registration Reforms also at ONS; and on the other side of him is Ron Powell who is the lawyer dealing with this issue. A couple of points in opening. What we are aiming for is the most far‑reaching reform of the civil registration service in England and Wales since its inception in 1837, and I know that Brian Iddon would say possible the only reform since 1862, so it is certainly of considerable historical significance. As you know, there is a second draft Order that will deal with marriage law reform. Together I think they do represent ‑ and I think there is a broad consensus that this is the case - a long overdue modernisation of an important public service providing help and support to citizens at the most important points in their lives. I was able, Chairman, to have a look at the transcript of the session you had last week and I was struck by Brian Iddon's case set out there that the whole House ought to be given an opportunity to debate these reforms. I know, Chairman, that that is a view that you have inclined to as well and so I want to say to the Committee at the outset that I would very much welcome an opportunity to discuss the RRO proposals in more detail in a debate in the House either on the floor or in Westminster Hall if that opportunity were to arise. Thank you, Chairman. Q86 Chairman: Could I in the first question ask you why you have chosen to introduce this through the Regulatory Reform Order system rather than through primary legislation in a Bill? Mr Timms: I think in many ways it is a classic instance of the kind of change that was envisaged going through this procedure when the procedure was first established and, indeed, that was made clear at the time in the Lords Committee stage of the Regulatory Reform Bill on 23 January 2001 at column 165. Lord Falconer mentioned civil registration reform as an example of the type of regulatory regime that would be able to use the new powers. That was said again in the explanatory notes to the Bill when it was introduced to the Commons on 26 February 2001. So I think it is a very good example of something that is clearly very important and that is administrative in character ‑ admittedly quite complex and I am not suggesting for a moment this is a simple matter, I do not think it is but it is not of a very high degree of controversy ‑ and so I think it is well suited to the kind of procedure that was introduced with the Regulatory Reform Bill and the kind of topic that this Committee has been brought together to scrutinise. I know this Committee has been concerned at some points in the past that we should use the full potential of this procedure and I think this is actually quite a good example of making a reality of that potential. Q87 Chairman: Turning to a slightly different point, the proposal, as you indicated yourself, is a large proposal and there has only been one other that in any way compares to it and that is the fire safety one, which we are waiting to deal with now at second stage depending on what the ODPM department decides to do with it. So it is a complex proposal and there is a view of some people that when dealing with them in RROs they do not get the same publicity as items when they are in a Bill, although other people would argue that the scrutiny through this procedure can in fact be greater. The point I would like to make to you is do you in any way consider that the proposals are controversial? Can I just say I did find your opening comments about a debate extremely helpful and I am sure the Committee finds that helpful because the feeling of some people ‑ and it is a view of concern expressed on fire safety also - is that these issues sometimes to some people and the House as a whole seem to go through in stockinged feet when they come through here without giving all the Members of the House an opportunity to debate, so your opening comment in respect of trying to fit in a debate, whether it is in Westminster Hall which would be acceptable or in the Chamber itself, was very welcome. Do you view it as controversial at all? Mr Timms: Well, there clearly is some debate about some of the details. I think there is a very wide consensus on the range of measures that need to be addressed and the direction that we are going in. There is some difference of opinion on detail but it certainly would not count for me as a controversial measure. It is certainly an issue of very wide public interest. The changes that we are envisaging will have a significant effect on an important public service, and they are important for lots of people, but I would not actually characterise it as a controversial reform. I think we saw in the very large number of responses we have had to the consultation exercise ‑ 1,000 responses to the 1999 consultation and 3,500 to the 2003 consultation paper ‑ there is a very high degree of public interest, broad agreement about the direction, but some discussion about some of the details. Q88 Chairman: So you would accept that this Committee does have to look at the detail? Mr Timms: Oh yes, certainly I would. Q89 Brian White: One of the issues of course is if it was just births and deaths, the two events, then many people would accept the comments you have just made but there is a wider debate going on on identity, particularly identity cards but also the wider issue of how do you establish an identity. It is in that context that this becomes controversial. Do you accept that, especially now you have dropped the marriages bit from the original proposals? Mr Timms: Well, I see civil registration as a relatively small but an important contributor to the national identity scheme. It certainly is not any sort of substitute for ID cards so there is a relationship, and I guess I take your point that the relative higher level of controversy about the ID card proposals perhaps does increase the level of interest that there is going to be in the proposals that are here, but I do not think that turns this into a change which exceeds the threshold of controversiality which would rule out this procedure being used for its scrutiny. Q90 Brian White: But are you not putting the cart before the horse in not establishing the whole context of identity first and then doing the changes to birth and deaths, rather than doing it this way? Mr Timms: I do not think we are. Some of the ideas which are in the Order were first floated right back at the beginning of the 1990s. It has been a very long wait and I think the fact that this procedure is now available is the one thing that means that we can at last get on with making a change that is really long overdue. So I would not favour further delay here but of course we do need to look at the relationship between the two if the Government and Parliament does decide to go ahead with the national identity scheme proposals. Q91 Dr Naysmith: We have got to say whether we believe that this is the right thing to do or it is not the right thing to do. The issue for us is therefore how it is appropriate for Parliament to decide on the merits of these proposals ‑ in the Chamber or in this Committee. You have already said that an Adjournment Debate would be helpful. How do you think we could achieve this? How do you think we should set about having an adjournment debate in the normal way of a Member putting it down? There is no way the Government can initiate it? Mr Timms: As I understand it, it would be for a Member to call for such a debate, as I have said. Q92 Dr Naysmith: So if it does not happen what will we do then because this is of course at the discretion of the Speaker and we may not get it in time. Mr Timms: I would be surprised if it was not possible to secure a debate given the high level of interest that there has been in this. I would be confident that that would be possible and, as I have said today, I would very much welcome it. Q93 Mr Steen: Good morning. What would the purpose of a debate be if it is only a half an hour's debate? Surely, it would need to be an hour and a half. Mr Timms: Certainly, in my view, an hour and a half duration would be the more appropriate. Q94 Mr Steen: What would you like to say there that you cannot say here? Mr Timms: What that would provide would be an opportunity for Members of Parliament to air their concerns to make clear the areas in which they would want there to be reassurance in order to be confident about this proceeding in a way that does not cause problems and difficulties in the future. I think it would be a useful exercise in informing how we took the details forward once the Regulatory Reform Order had been secured, and I think it would also be reassuring to the public that Members of Parliament had scrutinised these changes and were aware of the content and had had the chance to express the concerns that have been raised from around the House. Q95 Mr Havard: As I understand it, the criteria is this process is not really to deal with things that are both large and controversial. This is complex, and you say it is substantial, but this is not a process that is supposed to bring in substantial policy changes. Substantially and intrinsically there is a lot of detail and complexity in it and so on. It does cut across these other areas hence the debate about whether it is controversial or not, so where do you see this debate coming in the time process that we are going through? Is it coming soon? Is it coming before we agree the Order? Is it coming after? How do you see it fitting into our process? Mr Timms: I certainly think it should be before the process is concluded, before the Order has taken effect. As I say, it is complex. Whether it is substantial I think is a matter we might debate. The reason it is complex is because it involves changing quite a lot of rather historic legislation and in that sense there is a good deal of complexity to be addressed. I do not think it is controversial in the sense that the Act uses that term and so, as I say, I think it is quite an appropriate measure for us to look at through this procedure. Dennis Roberts has given me a helpful note about the timing and what I would suggest to the Committee is that shortly after the first scrutiny event would be perhaps an appropriate opportunity for us to aim to have the debate. Q96 Mr Havard: Because it is complex and it is also permissive in the sense that the structure of the Order, because it is dealing with a lot of things, is undescribed. It is undescribed how the database is going to be run. It talks about the potential of being able to do things in the future if things come along, so there are lots of permissive arrangements in it, some of which come back to Parliament to be verified, some of which do not, so there is a leap of faith being made if you set up an arrangement that other people are able to operate things that you cannot now see. That is the point about confidence and about whether it is currently controversial or whether it will become controversial and that has to be taken into account as well. Mr Timms: Yes, I think we would air those concerns in the course of this debate. One thought that occurs to me is that there may be future points also where a debate would be appropriate. The points that occur to me where those concerns might be raised would be when telephone access to the database became available and when on‑line access to the database became available, and it might be helpful if we could have a further debate on the point or close to the point where those changes were due to take place just to make absolutely sure that we were not raising concerns that we ought not to be, and to make sure we were doing this in a way that commanded public confidence. Q97 Mr Murphy: I question, Minister, whether an hour and a half's debate actually deals with this in the correct way. It does not really give Members much of an opportunity. You might only get three or four people who have an opportunity to air their concerns or indeed their support for this proposal. Would it not be possible for the Government to make more time available? Mr Timms: I do not know about the Government making time available. To an extent I think this would be in the hands of the House. It is clearly a matter of balance that the Committee will no doubt want to take a view on. My view would be that it would be possible within the period allowed in an hour and a half's Westminster Hall debate to air satisfactorily the kind of concerns that are being raised, but I will await the Committee's view on that. Q98 Chairman: It may well be something that the Committee will express a view on in its report, having taken note of your comments. Obviously neither you nor this Committee is in control of if it gets the one and a half hour debate so it might well be that the Government would need to use some of the days that they have in Westminster Hall to have a three‑hour debate as a nominated subject. I think the situation is quite clear and I think Mr Roberts's comments were helpful in that. The appropriate stage is perhaps after we have published our report on the first stage when any debate in Westminster Hall or the Chamber could take note of what this Committee has in fact said. The second thing that you were really commenting on then, which would be helpful to us to know, is whether that that means that on the exchanges that we know will come along at a later stage that you will try to look in a positive way at how there could be some safeguards put in to say that when it goes on line the House would have the opportunity at least of debating the implications? Mr Timms: I would welcome that opportunity being provided and we would need to look at the mechanism that would secure that, but I think that would be very helpful. Q99 Chairman: Thank you, that is helpful. Can I turn to the question of the vires of the proposal and the question of burdens, which is one of the aspects that this Committee has to judge the proposals on. One of the phrases that we have to take into account is "affecting persons in the carrying on of any activity". I have to say that to date the Committee is having some difficulty in establishing how the burdens on informants affect persons in the carrying on of an activity and in an initial response to us on this the Department was suggesting that the activity is the registration of births and deaths and that this is carried on by the public as well as by registrars. Subsequently responses have said that as regards most informants the activity is the "carrying out of their duties to provide information to registrars", so what I want to ask you is ‑ and Mr White also wants to come in on this subject of burdens ‑ is it your Department's view that members of the public carry on the activity of registration and, if so, in what way do they do that, if the burdens on informants affect registrars in the carrying on by them of that activity and, if so, in what way are the registrars affected? Do I make that point clear? Mr Timms: Indeed. Q100 Chairman: We have to establish this point to come within the scope of the 2001 Act. Mr Timms: I take that point. Could I ask Dennis Roberts to comment on this one. Mr Roberts: The activity that is being done here is the registering of the birth and the death, and that is a two‑part process. It is a duty on the person who is the informant to inform the government/society about that event and then there is also a responsibility on the registration service to record that information and to make that available more generally. So the activity is providing the information and recording the information. That is the activity that is involved. The burdens around that are that it is prescribed how this has to be done in law. The informant has to attend a register office at certain times in order to perform this duty. The registrar service has to open at certain hours and has to perform in a certain way. Much of this legislation setting, as we have described earlier, goes back to a long time ago in days well before computers and modern ways of working were thought of. The proposals that we have before us are to remove some of those burdens which are set by old legislation to allow the system to operate in a way that allows people to carry out their responsibilities in a much more easy way that suits the needs of their working lives these days and also allows the registration service to operate in an effective way to support society through the recording and use of that information. Q101 Brian White: That is the very point that is confusing me because under the Act a burden which only affects a government department cannot be done by an RRO, so what are the burdens that do not affect just the Registrar General? Mr Roberts: The burden is on the public itself in that they have to supply the information and they have to supply it in a certain way at the present time which, as I say, is rather inconvenient for many people in this day and age. And the registration service is not a government department, the registration service is a set of statutory registration officers and local authority employees, so it is not a government department that is actually carrying out the bulk of that work. There is the Registrar General himself who is also a statutory body and who at the present time also happens to be the Permanent Secretary of a government department but those two positions can change and vary. That is not a set position. So the Registrar General is a formal statutory position that appoints its own staff and is not as such a government department. Mr Timms: I think the key point here is that we are making it easier for members of the public to comply with their statutory obligations. That is the key benefit, I think. Q102 Mr Steen: The problem I have got is the occasion on which families record the birth or death of a member of that family, fortunately, is a relatively isolated case in their life. I am just puzzled as to why one has to go to the extremes that we are talking about to simplify something which takes a quarter of an hour/20 minutes/half an hour/an hour when somebody has died and somebody has been born. What is the engine which is determining that this should be made simpler? Why should it be? Mr Timms: I think there are two issues here. I really would not characterise what we are doing here as "going to extremes". I think we are simply bringing the service into the current era which I do not think is an extreme change at all. I guess there can be a debate about whether this is the right thing to do but that it is making matters easier for members of the public I think is clear. I take your point that we perhaps ought not to be making it easier for people and that is a debate we can have, but I think this clearly does fall within the range of things which this procedure is able to deal with. Q103 Mr Steen: But if I just follow that point up. When you say "making it easier", somebody dies in one's family ‑ usually one's parents or sister or brother ‑ it happens once, it is not a regular occasion. You talk about time. I had to go to the Registrar for both my mother and my father and it is something which was part of the tragedy of their death. The fact it took me half an hour/an hour was totally irrelevant. It was something which one did because it was part of the process. The next thing will be that you can speed burial up or you out cut the service and just have it on video? The time element, if that is the motivation, may not be enough. I just think that is a rather puzzling concept. Mr Timms: I take those points. In response I would say that while these are indeed rare events in most people's lives they are also often at quite stressful and difficult points in people's lives, and avoiding the necessity to make a visit (and it might be some distance to a local registration office) could make things significantly less difficult in some circumstances than would otherwise be the case. Q104 Dr Naysmith: The proposal would have the effect of repealing numerous provisions which currently prescribe the processes by which registration is recorded and information is recorded and maintained and it would replace them with an administrative discretion with respect to these matters on the part of the Registrar General. How do you justify bringing forward legislation which would remove so much of the registration system, which everybody agrees is a matter of vital importance to individuals and, as we have just been hearing from Mr Steen, is important to individuals and to national life? We are going to stop it being defined in legislation. Is it not the case there is protection in the fact that the present law is very careful to prescribe how information is to be recorded and how it is to be preserved which will inevitably be lost on transfer to a regime which has given away the power to determine the form of the register to an appointed office‑holder? Mr Timms: I think the approach that we have taken here is one that is more consistent with a modern approach to legislation and one that we can see in many areas across the range of government activity. There is absolutely no intention at all to reduce the importance or the care with which these records are obtained or maintained. They continue to be absolutely vital information and indeed we hope we will be able to improve the reliability of them and help to deal with problems like identity fraud as a result of these changes. But the precise way in which a system will be defined to some extent will depend on technology available at a given point, and so I think I would suggest to the Committee it is not appropriate for us to be too prescriptive at this stage about precisely how it should be done. Q105 Dr Naysmith: Is that because there will be changes in technology and you envisage that and you are making provision for it but at the same time are you not running the risk of losing some protection? Mr Timms: I hope that we are not. It is certainly not our intention to do so and I am comfortable that we are not doing that. The contents of the register is being specified in the regulations. It is the format which is less prescriptively set down and that is to enable the Registrar General to take advantage of current technology which will change over time. Q106 Dr Naysmith: How do you react to the suggestion that it is premature for us to legislate in this way and give the Registrar these enhanced administrative powers before we have any knowledge or assurances that the proposed IT‑based system will be reliable and secure? We really do not know enough about the system that is proposed to know whether it will be able to provide this protection. Mr Timms: Inevitably one has to legislate first before the IT system is built, partly to obtain public funding for investment in the system. I think there are plenty of examples around of systems doing comparable kinds of work on the same sort of scale or a greater scale which work very well, so I think we can be confident that the technology can be delivered. Q107 Dr Naysmith: So you do not think it would be appropriate for the legislation to impose legal requirements on the Registrar General to maintain the register in a form which is secure against damage, unauthorised access and falsification, rather than leaving questions like that, on which the reliability of the new system will depend, only to the Registrar General's good judgment? Mr Timms: I can well see that in the debate that we have been discussing it may well be that Members of Parliament would want reassurance on these points. I would also make the point that these are quite common problems being addressed across government in the whole of the e‑government programme and we have been able to address them successfully elsewhere, and I think that provides a good degree of reassurance that we will be able to do so in this instance as well. Q108 Dr Naysmith: This brings us to what Mr White was talking about earlier. Why do we not do it all in one rather than piecemeal, these little bits of information in different government departments? Mr Timms: There are many, many systems across government and the logistics of managing the process of moving toward e‑government inevitably means that one has to move one step at a time. In this particular case I would strongly resist the suggestion that we ought to hold back for a few more years given we have waited since 1990 to get this drafted. Q109 Mr Steen: The more I hear of it, it is not really deregulation it is just administrative reorganisation for modern technology. Could you not just say that? Mr Timms: I think it is deregulation because in the future it will be possible to comply with the obligations that each member of the public has in a less prescriptive way than has been the case up until now, so I think that is a deregulation. There is clear public benefit from it and, as I said earlier, this particular exercise was clearly identified in the Parliamentary debates as one that this process was appropriate for. Q110 Chairman: Obviously on IT systems it is always the ones that go wrong that get all the publicity. You will recall the fiasco with the change of IT system for passports. You indicated that there were systems that showed this could be done. Are you able to indicate any now or would you write to us on who could undertake this type of work? Mr Timms: There are plenty of examples of very successful public sector IT systems. One that I happened - and Brian White knows this very well as do other members of the Committee - to be closely associated with was the Post Office system to automate benefit payments, which was a very large system and technically an extremely successful one. I think I would also point to private sector experience. The banks have been very successful in delivering on‑line banking and addressing all of these security, confidentiality and scale issues which are likely to arise in this sort of system. So I think there are plenty of successful precedents. I think we have also learnt a lot in the last few years about how to implement public sector IT systems successfully. The Gateway Review process has been introduced and has worked very well in that respect. So I am confident that we can deliver this system successfully as well. Q111 Mr Murphy: Can I say, Minister, I had 200 concerned constituents unable to draw their pensions on Monday. Mr Timms: I am alarmed to hear that. Q112 Brian White: You are going to have a central register. There are dangers in putting it into a centralised system, which I am sure you have looked at. Why is a centralised system better than a diverse system? Mr Timms: It is clearly more convenient to have information in one place and there will be the availability of a gateway to other government systems, the DWP system for example. From the point of view of managing systems across government having it in one place is, I think therefore, more convenient. Having said that, perhaps Dennis can help me on this, I am not sure the legislation actually specifies that it needs to be in one place, I think that would be a matter that would be decided at the time but Dennis? Mr Roberts: At present we already bring all the information together centrally and we hold a central set of information although not on a computer system, where at the moment if you want to look up a birth certificate you can come to us and we will produce a copy of the existing register from the central register we hold. What this will enable us to do is to do that much more quickly and cheaply for people who want to get hold of those records because it will be available electronically. It is also a fact that if we have an electronic central system then it will be easier for people to register anyway, and that will be part of moving towards an on‑line system and phone system because one would not be confined to one local area, one would be able to do it from any area. One of the key things we have to look at are the checks and balances within the system and one of the key checks that we have is that we have notification of a birth or a death from the Health Service so that we know that event has occurred when we register it. At the moment that information is provided locally to the local registrar which therefore means if you want to register somewhere else they are not able to get at that information. Having it all centralised means that you would be able to register anywhere and the registrar would be able to look up the system to see whether that birth has occurred even if it is in another part of the country. This fits in with the computerisation systems that are going in within the Health Service at the present time and in which they are investing very large sums and which are up‑to‑date. Q113 Brian White: Which is fine until you have a catastrophic event. Mr Roberts: Fortunately, catastrophic events are rare but they have to be allowed for and we have to build that into our systems and have all the necessary back‑up available for that and that is what we will be doing. Q114 Chairman: Can I turn to the question of authenticity. Obviously this is crucial in any system. We understand that there is going to be developed a framework on this. What is the position with regard to developing it and what form is it intended the framework should take? Mr Timms: Authentication? Mr Roberts: Could I just come in on that. Sorting out authentication is a big issue for electronic services and the E-Government Unit are in the lead in trying to develop a cross‑government system so that we do not have a multitude of systems with each department running its own authentication arrangements. Some progress has been made on that front but there is still progress to be made before we have an acceptable form of verification/authentication across government. That is one of the reasons why in the legislation we are proposing that we would allow on‑line registration but only at a time when those sort of safeguards and arrangements are in place. Thus it is to take a power to allow it at a future date rather than to introduce it immediately. Mr Timms: We have been talking, for example, to the Inland Revenue about whether there is potential for using the same authentication regimes established for people filing on‑line tax returns. That is one of the discussions that has been taking place. Q115 Chairman: So this is one of the things that is still being looked for along the line to go on‑line? Mr Timms: Yes. Q116 Chairman: In the ONS answer to our written question, number 8, we got a reply saying: "The intention is to introduce registration by remote means once the authentication framework currently being developed within central government to enable access to services becomes available. Should this prove inappropriate for one‑off transactions such as registering a birth it may be necessary to provide an alternative." What factors might make it inappropriate to allow remote registration of single life events? We understand that the proposals for remote registration are one of the chief benefits being looked at under the current reform proposals. If these elements of the proposals cannot proceed because of doubts about verification what alternatives are there in mind to go ahead? Mr Timms: I will ask Dennis to comment on this. I would just make the point that this is one of the reasons why the proposal that there should be a debate separately before we go to the on‑line implementation might well be helpful. Dennis? Mr Roberts: We very much hope that the arrangements which will be introduced across government will be suitable for this sort of transaction. The comment we have put in there is that it is conceivable that it will be a complex arrangement to get on line for some government transactions. We think it is unlikely but it is possible. As has been pointed out, for a single one‑off transaction it may be inappropriate to have to go through a long-winded procedure to be able to get on‑line just for a single transaction. At the moment if you want to get on‑line for the Inland Revenue you have to obtain a password, you have to write to them, they have to write back to you and there is quite a time-lag before you can do things. It would not be appropriate for registering a birth or a death if you had to go through a procedure like that so in those circumstances we would have to see whether there is something that could be done just for this single transaction. As I said, there are already quite a lot of safeguards within the system which we are designing in that we will not take a registration unless we already have a notification that that event has occurred from the Department of Health so we know that that birth has occurred and with a national system a national database we will know that that birth can only be registered once and it cannot be registered at more than one place. It will already be quite difficult, even if we had no authentication, to get in and register the birth on a false basis and that not to be discovered. We think we do need to go further than that and that is why we have said that we expect to have some sort of verification procedure. As I say, at the moment we expect to be able to use the general government one. If that is not feasible then we will have to look at alternatives. We have not devised alternatives at the present time. Chairman: Minister, when you say you think there is a case for allowing a debate, that is a key point. At the moment in a way we are giving a blank cheque to something we do not know the exact details of for a further stage and for that reason it may be appropriate to say there should be another Parliamentary opportunity to debate it at that stage. Q117 Mr Steen: You talked about a birth and that is less controversial than a death because the consequences of registering a death have all sorts of spin‑offs. I am thinking of cases of libel, saying somebody has died when they have not, benefits and pensions, insurance, private companies. You could have an absolute field day saying somebody has died with all the attendant financial implications. That strikes me as a much more controversial point than births. Mr Roberts: That is also covered by a requirement that we have a notification of a death from the Department of Health as well, just as we do a notification of births. Q118 Brian White: One of the issues that you will be aware of is about the nature of restricted data which we will come on to in a moment, but when we asked the question how that restricted data be made available to authorised users it was unclear from the answer what the mechanisms would be. It was suggested that approved users would gain access but there was no indication of how that would happen. Perhaps you can explain how the information on restricted data would be given once the data subject is given approval for that information to be made available? Mr Roberts: Once the person has been given authority to receive the information, then the information would be provided as a full set of information on either the birth or the death. Q119 Brian White: So how would the person be given approval? Mr Roberts: With a computerised database the intention is that for people who do not have access to that data, then the print‑out would have blanks where that information would be. For people who are entitled to the information, that information would be included on the print‑out that they would receive or the screen that they would see it on. Q120 Brian White: Perhaps, to make it clear, if I give an example of something I am concerned about. We have at the moment companies that do listing services for the credit card industry. They go through the direct marketing lists and take out the names of people who have died. That service happens for the direct marketing industry at the moment. Under the proposals that you are putting forward how would that be able to go ahead? Would they have to become an approved user? What is to stop you saying, "We do not want you to carry on this activity", and just destroying a whole industry? Mr Roberts: The restriction on access that is proposed is only on a very limited amount of information, on the address and the cause of death. Q121 Brian White: But it is the address that the credit card industry is particularly interested in. What happens is they go through those lists taking out those addresses so the person who has died does not get a letter from the direct marketing industry. You are going to stop that: why? Mr Roberts: We are also proposing in the reform to have a delisting service to provide that sort of service. Q122 Brian White: So you are going to do that yourself? Mr Roberts: Yes. Q123 Brian White: So a public body is going to take over a function that the private sector is currently doing, and doing very effectively? Is that what you are saying? Mr Roberts: We are saying that we would offer the service. Q124 Brian White: But it already exists in the private sector so why are you doing it? Mr Roberts: It exists in part of the private sector. It is not widespread. Q125 Brian White: You are going to close this company down and other companies like it and not provide information to them for a service that happens at the moment that makes the direct marketing industry work, which is worth billions of pounds to this country, and you are actually going to put in extra burdens as a result of this Order that are going to cause those companies problems? Is that seriously what you are saying? Mr Timms: Can I say this is a new issue to me and I think what might be helpful is if we were to write to the Committee. I must say I would be extremely surprised if any changes that we were making here would have the negative impact of the kind that you are describing. What I would be grateful for is an opportunity to write to the Committee setting out how we see that. Q126 Mr Havard: Could I ask when you do that you said you would offer a service and there have got to be some costs associated with that so if you could describe the whole process you envisage happening that would be very helpful. Mr Timms: We will do that. Q127 Chairman: That would be useful because we all know how this type of mail can cause distress to somebody. We experience that ourselves when we are working on electoral registration which is rolling and you can add on but you cannot delete people. When you write to somebody and they get a letter and they come back to you and say, "My wife has died," it is very distressing. Mr Timms: It is a very important subject. Q128 Dr Naysmith: Turning to another aspect of access to registration services, when we were taking evidence on 26 October the witnesses were clearly concerned that the proposals would lead to wider variations between standards of service offered by different local registration services. What do you think will be lost in terms of equality and consistency of local registration services under these proposals and does that matter? Mr Timms: I will ask Dennis to comment on this. Clearly there is a degree of variation currently between different local authority areas although the particular status of the registration officers is a safeguard against that. I would be surprised actually if the changes that we are making would introduce significant degrees of variation because there will be standards of service and so on. Dennis, I would ask you to comment on that. Q129 Dr Naysmith: We asked some questions in writing about this and we got the answer that equality and consistency were not felt to be an aim of the proposals and that there would be a national minimum standard set and then local authorities could choose to offer enhanced levels of service if that is what they wanted to do. We were told this was a good example of the philosophy of minimum prescription but it sounds to me like a recipe for having quite a large number of places with the absolute minimum they can provide, especially if we look at the financial aspects to local authorities, and other places maybe doing a better job. Is that what we really want? Mr Timms: I think it would all depend on where the minimum standard was set. As you described, it sounds to me like an opportunity for there to be significant improvements in some parts of the country, which I think people would probably welcome. Dennis? Mr Roberts: The basic principle is that we would set minimum standards at the current levels but that local authorities would be able to offer higher standards if it were the wish of the local electorate that they do that. They would have the freedom (if they do not currently) to run this service alongside other services which may enable them to offer much higher services at no extra cost because they would be able to run it more efficiently, putting it in with the batch of other services that they provide. Q130 Dr Naysmith: We also took oral evidence from the National Council on Archives and they expressed to us a concern that they had about the effects of the proposals on access to current local register books. One can easily understand that if no funding comes with the new responsibility then this could result in a loss of access again to something they currently have. This is clearly a big worry. Do you worry that this might be a problem? Mr Timms: I do not think this need be a problem. Let me ask Dennis to comment on that. Mr Roberts: Again the local authorities already have responsibilities for maintaining records. Those responsibilities are set out clearly to them. It is a hope that these sets of records should come under the generality of their powers and they should maintain them in the way that is best suited for them. I think it would be rather difficult for a body such as ourselves to go round and tell each local authority how they should best maintain their records. Q131 Dr Naysmith: The answer is in the income from issuing certificates. Mr Timms: Can I just add on this, the draft Order in Schedule 4 does place an obligation on registration authorities to make sure that there are proper arrangements for storage of the records. I know that the National Council on Archives thinks that that obligation should be extended to include preservation and access, and that is something that I am going to be reflecting on. Q132 Dr Naysmith: There is a loss of income too, is there not, to the local authority from the issuing of certificates? Mr Timms: There is a likely loss of income and there is also a saving in costs, and we have published in the regulatory impact assessment what we think the scale of those is. We think the saving on costs will be considerably greater than the loss of income, but you are right there is a loss of income. Q133 Dr Naysmith: There are also fears about the digitalisation exercise and whether there will be enough funds available to carry that out properly because it could be quite expensive and the degree of transcription error that might occur is worrying as well. How do you intend to prevent this happening? Mr Timms: Those are exactly the kinds of issues that are raised with any exercise of this kind. I think we need to resolve them successfully, as we have done elsewhere. Q134 Mr Murphy: Following on from that, Minister, it has not been made clear at all as to exactly what the financial impact on local authorities would be. From the regulatory impact assessment it was believed that local authorities in England and Wales could lose up to 50 per cent of their income which is currently gained from registrations services. It was also pointed out that in some cases they would also have substantially increased costs as a result of having to maintain in good order the current records. Do you think that is fair on local authorities? Mr Timms: The calculation that we published is an income loss of £8 million a year based on the loss of chargeable certificate sales. On the cost side we have used some assumptions based on the local registration scheme time allowances which describe the time effect on all registration activities, and we think there will be a net cost saving of £23 million a year, so roughly three times the loss of income. There are also of course opportunities certainly for some increase in income for local authorities through the citizenship ceremonies and other changes, so our view is that there certainly will be changes. I think it is right for the Committee to raise them but we think they are manageable. Q135 Mr Murphy: Thank you, Minister. Again, would it be your intention to actually implement the proposals to allow people to register by telephone immediately or would that be phased in at a later date? Mr Timms: No, we envisage that being introduced at a later date. As I said at the beginning, that would be one of the specific points when a parliamentary debate would be helpful. Q136 Brian White: Can we move on to data sharing. The RRO proposal says that this has no part within the Government's plans for a national identity register although you yourself, Minister, talked earlier on about the fact that it may be useful in identity fraud and the ONS has said it could be a tool in the verification of identity. Article 41 of the Order currently gives the Registrar General the power to use any information which comes into his possession in that capacity and also in his capacity as head of ONS. I am slightly confused as to how that is going to work in practice. Presumably there will be a royal prerogative Order giving the ONS the power to do this. Perhaps you could just explain why there is this what seems to me unlimited power to make use of the register in the Order? Mr Timms: At the moment there are already statutory obligations upon the Registrar General to provide births and deaths information to DWP and to the Department of Health, for specified purposes. In the draft Order, Article 45 proposes the establishment of a statutory gateway which would allow the Registrar General to provide births and deaths information to other persons and bodies. It provides, though, that only specified information may be provided to specified persons and for specified purposes. Schedule 12 on the draft Order proposes that the Inland Revenue be provided with information to assist in their functions, for example the payment of child benefit. If there were to be another government department that wanted to obtain births and deaths information that department would have first of all to approach the Registrar General. It would require that department to be added to schedule 12. That would be done by means of a subordinate provisions Order which would be subject to the negative resolution arrangements, so there would have to be a parliamentary procedure around any extension to the list of parties in schedule 12 that is in the Order as proposed currently. Q137 Brian White: And that would include bodies like Surestart which go across government departments? Mr Timms: Yes. Q138 Mr Havard: Can I ask something following up this issue about government departments. We asked a question about how this proposal, which relates to England and Wales, fits with the rest of the United Kingdom, particularly in relation to Northern Ireland and Scotland who have different arrangements. The answer you have given us is a description of where they currently were at the time you wrote it in both Scotland and Northern in developing various proposals that seemed to be coming forward this month. Your answer also says that identifying the differences and the similarities between the proposals in the draft Order in Scotland and Northern Ireland is difficult given that each jurisdiction has its own legislation. So this question of UK is worrying in this regard. Have you got any more you can say because if it is government departments (which presumably means UK government departments) and then we have Scottish parliament departments, whatever they are called (I do not know, someone from the "jockocracy" will tell me in a minute) and I know the situation in Wales is even more "mixed" if I can describe it that way. This question of the United Kingdom where this registration and sharing of information sits is clearly quite an important question if they are developing their relationships differently. As I understand it, in Northern Ireland they are not proposing to change the arrangements for local authorities and their relationship to supplying and delivering the service. Given that all these things are coming forward in November, how is this going to be brought into your proposals? Mr Timms: I do not think there is anything more I can say about that other than the information that has already been provided to the Committee. I take the point that there are some complexities introduced by the devolution arrangements that we have. In case of the Department of Health the problem does not arise because there are separate arrangements in Scotland and Northern Ireland and indeed in Wales. I think we can live with that degree of complexity and it is inherent in the fact that we do have a devolved settlement. Q139 Brian White: Minister, if you take what is happening in terms of education at the moment with the Children's Minister and the consultation on restricting how you find out about people who have been adopted and looking at the register to be able to trace natural parents, that added complexity does not seem to have been considered. There seem to be two different directions the Government is going in: one restricting a lot of information in the Department of Education and one is trying to open up a much better system under these proposals. You seem to be going in two different directions. Mr Timms: I think what this will allow us to do is to deliver services to the public that Parliament has agreed should be provided in a more modern and more efficient and easier way. Parliament will decide from time to time that some information ought not to be released and these arrangements will cope with that, but the information that has been agreed should be made available we want to be available in the easiest and most accessible possible way. Q140 Chairman: I wanted to turn to the question of employment issues. You are aware ‑ and you said that you have seen the transcript of evidence from last week ‑ of the oral evidence given us by Unison and the Society of Registration Officers. Quite clearly there is a view, if I might summarise it that they would perhaps prefer the protections under TUPE than those which are proposed in Article 4 of the proposed Order. We know that there is the question of consultation and there are a lot of good intentions in transferring the employees from one employer to local government, but do you feel if you were looking at it as an employee that there are the guarantees that you would want as an employee? Mr Timms: I certainly think there are a number of benefits for the individuals concerned from the arrangements that we are proposing. At the moment registration service post‑holders do not have an employer, they do not have access to industrial tribunals because they are statutory officers, and they do not have the benefit of protection from other elements of employment law. So we want to make provision for registration service statutory post‑holders' employment service to be regularised as soon as we can. The draft Order achieves that within the guidance set out in the Cabinet Office Statement of Practice. Although registration officers at the moment are paid by local authorities, the local authority cannot direct an officer in their duties or manage their performance. I think there are a number of benefits and, in particular, officers will have access from day one to employment protection legislation. So I hope that people will see that as a significant gain. Q141 Chairman: Do you think there is any need to add mandatory consultation or do you think that that consultation is taking place in a more mutual way without being a mandatory requirement? Mr Timms: There certainly has been a good deal of discussion and if there is a sense on the part of the representatives of those involved that there are further things that we need to talk about then I am very happy to help facilitate that. Chairman: Dr Iddon, would you like to come in on that? Q142 Dr Iddon (attending the Committee pursuant to Standing Order 141 (13)): I would like to come in briefly, Chairman, and thank you for inviting me again. This is something I have been campaigning on now for seven years to try to get statutory officers the right to go to tribunals. SORA and Unison both welcome this transfer to local authorities but there is a difficulty in the transition period. If their fears prove accurate in that the balance of costs are negative rather than positive, as the Minister has explained, Chairman, suppose the IT system takes much more money to set up because of hiccoughs and problems on the way, which we have seen in other state departments and which has been highlighted in this Committee this morning, then the balance of costs may not be as favourable as the Minister is telling us, and then of course there would be pressure on the maximum costs in the registration costs which are the staff costs and local authorities might chose to shed some of their staff during the transition. That is the fear of Unison and that is the fear of the Society of Registration Officers whom I represent. Whilst Mr Mahoney in an e‑mail to the Society of Registration Officers has pointed out, correctly, that the Cabinet Office Guidance covers staff transfers in the public sector, a statement of practice would protect that transition period. Unison and SORO would both like to see this written in as an amendment to the RRO, and I think that would give them greater confidence than they have at the moment. I ask the Minister whether he would consider the evidence that both organisations have presented to him and perhaps amend the Order in the way suggested? Mr Timms: I am certainly happy to meet Unison and SoRA. In fact, I wrote to Unison very soon after my appointment making the offer of a meeting and that offer stands. I do not think I have had a response as yet but I would be very happy to make sure that happens. Q143 Dr Naysmith: Really the question I was going to ask has partly been answered but in our discussions and taking evidence en route we have discovered that everybody has the highest respect for registration service staff and it is likely that its future will depend on their expertise and goodwill as much as introducing new technology. As we have just heard, and they told us, they are pretty unhappy with these provisions as far as they affect them and their employment and they have made it very clear how they could be improved. You have made it pretty clear there are no other reasons for not making the amendments they suggest aside from the fact that it is Cabinet Office policy and guidelines not to do so. In the discussions that you are going to have and which I hope you will have maybe this can be explored a little further. Mr Timms: Yes, I would not want to give the impression today that we are going to introduce a change, but I am very happy to have those discussions. I agree with you about the importance for the success of all this of the very high level of skill there is on the part of registration officers and we will certainly be heavily dependent on that, and we recognise that and acknowledge it. I think there are quite a lot of benefits for the staff concerned from these changes and I think my sense is that really everybody wants these changes to take effect, nobody wants them to be delayed, but if there are points of detail that we need to get right, let us talk about them and make sure that we do. Q144 Brian White: The Minister himself has got good contacts in the BBC to have them putting forward programmes just to promote births and deaths services, but one of the questions we had to ask last week was under the new proposals would the BBC programmes have been able to be made and the response we got was quite worrying. Mr Radcliffe said he did not think they would because they would have restricted for example the cause of death on the death certificate. You have seen the evidence of the concerns that were raised last week. Will you take that on board and look to amend those are restrictions in order to ensure that programmes like the BBC programme can be made in the future? Mr Timms: Let me look at that point and when I come back to the Committee address it. Q145 Chairman: There is nobody who has been trying to catch my eye who I missed. Can I just ask you on a final thing, it is not directly related to this one, originally we were obviously going to include marriages; when do you feel you will be coming forward with a proposal on that? Mr Timms: We are pretty confident that we will be able to do that in the next session. Q146 Chairman: Thank you. Finally from me in thanking you and your team for coming along, are there any points that you feel you would have liked to make that you have not had the chance of doing so? Mr Timms: No, I think you have given me a very full opportunity to air the things that I am thinking about and I just want to express my thanks to the Committee for giving us this opportunity. Chairman: It has been very useful to us because we have got some areas of concern which have been voiced in the proper way this morning and your comments have been very useful to us in considering this proposal. Thank you to you and your team for coming along this morning. |