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27 Jan 2009 : Column GC61
Grand Committee
Tuesday, 27 January 2009.
Arrangement of Business
Announcement
3.30 pm
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Gibson of Market Rasen): Before the Minister moves that the first statutory instrument be considered, I remind noble Lords that in the case of each statutory instrument the Motion before the Committee will be that the Committee do consider the statutory instrument in question. I should make it clear that the Motion to approve the statutory instrument will be moved in the Chamber in the usual way.
Visiting Forces and International Headquarters (Application of Law) (Amendment) Order 2009
Copy of the Order
30th Report, Session 2007-08 from JCSI
Considered in Grand Committee
3.31 pm
That the Grand Committee do report to the House that it has considered the Visiting Forces and International Headquarters (Application of Law) (Amendment) Order 2009.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Justice (Lord Bach): With this order, I shall also speak to the subsequent two draft orders, which were laid before the House on 23 October 2008 together with a joint Explanatory Memorandum. These three orders collectively give effect to certain provisions of three status of forces agreements (SOFAs) to which the United Kingdom is a party. They are the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation Status of Forces Agreement (NATO SOFA), the NATO Partnership for Peace Status of Forces Agreement (PfP SOFA) and the European Union Status of Forces Agreement (EU SOFA).
What is a status of forces agreement? SOFAs establish the status of military and civilian personnel originating from one country when they are located in the territory of another country. They also provide for the status of military headquarters established in other countries. The status, privileges and immunities conferred on military and civilian personnel by the draft orders are no greater in extent than those required by the relevant SOFA, or the established custom and practice, to enable either NATO or the EU and specified individuals connected with those organisations to function effectively.
The NATO SOFA effectively has primacy. The PfP SOFA extends the NATO SOFA to all the states that have accepted the invitation to participate in the Partnership for Peace. The EU SOFA comes into force
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What do the orders do? The first order, the Visiting Forces and International Headquarters (Application of Law) (Amendment) Order 2009, amends the Visiting Forces and International Headquarters (Application of Law) Order 1999 to include Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Ireland, Montenegro, Serbia and Tajikistan in the list of visiting forces countries. It also updates the list of headquarters to which the 1999 order applies. For example, the NATO Headquarters for Allied Naval Forces North Western Europe, which is known as NAVNORTHWEST, has been renamed as the Maritime Component Command Headquarters Northwood, or CC-MAR HQ Northwood. The effect of this order is to ensure that various laws apply to visiting forces and international headquarters in the same way as they apply to our domestic Armed Forces.
The second order, the International Headquarters and Defence Organisations (Designation and Privileges) (Amendment) Order 2009, provides for the amendment of the International Headquarters and Defence Organisations (Designation and Privileges) Order 1965. It updates the list of headquarters to which the 1965 order applies. The 1965 order provides for the inviolability of the official archives of international headquarters that have a presence in the United Kingdom. In respect of some of those headquarters, the 1965 order also confers legal capacity and provides for immunity from legal process that involves the seizure of any funds or property.
The third order, the European Union Military Staff (Immunities and Privileges) Order 2009, confers privileges and immunities on the European Union and its military staff, principally that staff shall enjoy immunity from suit and legal process in respect of things done or omitted to be done in the course of the performance of official duties. It also provides that the official archives of the EU military staff and the EU are inviolable, in the same way that the archives of diplomatic missions are inviolable under the Vienna convention of 1961.
Once these orders have been made, Her Majesty’s Government will notify the Secretary-General of the Council of the European Union under Article 19(2) that they have completed their constitutional procedures for the ratification of the EU SOFA. There are no further notification requirements in respect of the NATO and PfP SOFAs. The orders simply bring the list of countries and headquarters up to date.
The provisions of these orders extend to the United Kingdom. In their extent to Scotland they apply only so far as they relate to a reserved matter within the meaning of Section 29(2)(b) of the Scotland Act 1998.
These orders will allow the United Kingdom to comply with its international obligations in giving full effect to the privileges and immunities that were agreed in the SOFA agreements and will allow the UK to continue to develop the strong partnership that it has with these organisations.
The Minister for the Armed Forces and the Minister from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office were both satisfied that these orders are compatible with
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Lord Luke: I welcome the noble Lord, Lord Bach, back to defence issues, which I well remember him dealing with in the past. The issues raised by the orders have been covered in detail in the other place by my honourable friend the MP for Westbury, who set out our reservations about the European Union Military Staff (Immunities and Privileges) Order. I share his concerns but will not detain your Lordships by repeating them this afternoon. The other two orders are uncontroversial.
Lord Lee of Trafford: As far as we are concerned, these orders are updating, functional, practical and necessary. We are happy to support them.
Lord Bach: Apart from thanking both noble Lords for their contributions and, in particular, the noble Lord, Lord Luke, for his kind remarks, I commend the orders to the Committee.
International Headquarters and Defence Organisations (Designation and Privileges) (Amendment) Order 2009
Copy of the Order
30th Report, Session 2007-08 from JCSI
Considered in Grand Committee
3.38 pm
That the Grand Committee do report to the House that it has considered the International Headquarters and Defence Organisations (Designation and Privileges) (Amendment) Order 2009.
European Union Military Staff (Immunities and Privileges) Order 2009
Copy of the Order
30th Report, Session 2007-08 from JCSI
Considered in Grand Committee
That the Grand Committee do report to the House that it has considered the European Union Military Staff (Immunities and Privileges) Order 2009.
27 Jan 2009 : Column GC64
Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007 (Disclosure of Pupil Information) (England) Regulations 2009
Copy of the Order
2nd Report from JCSI
Considered in Grand Committee
3.39 pm
That the Grand Committee do report to the House that it has considered the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007 (Disclosure of Pupil Information) (England) Regulations 2009.
Lord Brett: These regulations represent the first use of the data-sharing power under the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007 and are part of a wider programme of work, the Migration and Population Statistics Improvement Programme, which is being taken forward by the National Statistician. This work seeks to address the problems faced by local authorities in estimating highly mobile populations, taking into account short-term migration. The Government are committed to helping to improve the accuracy of the population estimates produced by the ONS, particularly at the local level. This is in order to underpin the correct funding of local government, NHS and other public services. Both central and local government need accurate information on migrant numbers and overall changes to the size and structure of the population for resource allocation and for the planning and delivery of local services.
The ONS has evaluated the content of the school census and identified the information that it needs for essential research and methodological work on population and migration statistics. The regulations will allow the DCSF to share this information with the ONS, including pupils’ names, birthdates, addresses, ethnicities, spoken languages and dates of joining and leaving schools. Access to these specific data items will enable the ONS to evaluate current estimation procedures and, if necessary, to develop new approaches for the derivation of migration statistics, population estimates and projections. The benefits to accrue from this include better information on local populations, including areas with high rates of population turnover; better information on estimates of numbers of migrants; improved accuracy of mid-year estimates and projections of population; improved enumeration strategies for the 2011 census; better assessments of coverage of the 2011 census leading to better estimates; development of ongoing research into the use of administrative data in updating population statistics without a traditional census; and improving resource allocation, policy formation and planning and delivery of services.
When collecting school census data, the DCSF gives a fair processing notice to parents—in effect, the privacy policy for the data that it collects—which already states that information from the school census may be shared with other government departments, including the ONS, for statistical and research purposes. At present this covers only educational statistics. These
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Lord Bates: I thank the Minister. The key issues that I want to test a little further relate to the security of the data to be made available and whether the data are in fact already available in other forms. I accept that the regulations have gone through a number of other channels already and that they were considered in a significant debate in the other place, and here I associate myself closely with the comments of my honourable friend Nick Hurd. Because the measure relates to pupil information, I should declare my interests as recorded in the Register: I am a director of four academies in the north of England and vice-chairman of an educational foundation.
I turn first to the issue of the data and ask whether these regulations are absolutely necessary. When any statistician is asked whether they want more data sets, the answer is always that they do. However, do they actually need them? That is what I would like to focus on. The Minister has already referred to the school census data collections. I went on to TeacherNet to look at the guidance for the 2009 collection. It states that the data are widely used by the DCSF policy divisions, other government departments, local authorities, external agencies and educational researchers. Therefore, the first question to pose is: given that that freedom already exists, why is it necessary to have secondary legislation to make that information available?
The specific requirement under Regulation 6 talks about the use of pupil names. It states that names will be used only for cross-referencing purpose, but I should like the Minister to say little more about why it is necessary to introduce pupil names. I draw the Committee’s attention to the Merits of Statutory Instruments Committee’s consideration of the draft of what became the Children Act 2004. That document refers to the confidentiality of data relating to young people. I know that that is an issue that the Government take very seriously—I do not for a moment suggest otherwise—but it would be appreciated if the Minister answered those questions about the security of data entered by schools.
3.45 pm
Turning to other potential data sources, when I was looking at how one might get better information on migration flows, I was interested to note that on the internet, where there is a huge amount of information on such things, the UK Border Agency has already produced its estimates of migration flows, especially
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When it comes to pupil information, which is specifically what is dealt with by the regulations, many websites—all the school and local authority websites—give ample information about the number of pupils registered at a particular school. One can then track that backwards to see whether the number of pupils registered is increasing. For personal affinity purposes, I happened to look up the great town of Middlesbrough in the north-east of England. I was able to see the pupil roll not only at the King’s Academy, of which I am a director, but at the feeder primary schools. There is lots of detail, even down to the level that there are 17 nationalities at the school speaking 16 different languages. That level of data is quite rich by any stretch of the imagination.
When we then look at the Office for National Statistics database—as a bit of an anorak when it comes to data, I am sad to say that I find it really enjoyable to mine into that—we find that quite a lot of data sets are already there. When it comes to people and society, population and migration, the Office for National Statistics website, under the heading “Neighbourhood statistics”, has 31 data sets available—this is for the local authority of Middlesbrough. A lot of those data sets are not linked back to the 2001 census, which shows the important need for updating the information. There are data sets from as recently as 2006-07.
This is about testing the security of the information, particularly given that this is sensitive information about children. I also want to put on the record our view that the list in the instrument of the variables that will be input should be the limit and that the department should not be coming back for more variables and more personal information.
The second point relates to the current availability of statistics. Given that this is 2009 and the last census was in 2001, a census cannot be seen as the panacea for all issues. As the evidence to the Treasury Committee inquiry on counting the population—this is in volume 1 of its 11th report from 2007-08—stated, often the take-up for the completion of a census can be as low as 60 per cent or 70 per cent. The people who are least likely to complete the census are migrant workers, for obvious reasons. I question the reliance on the idea that the census will provide the answer; it will give some of the answers.
Finally, we are now in 2009 and the next census is in 2011. Could the data that will be required not wait? Could the extra page that is proposed be put into the census form to capture all this information, so that people have that security?
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For the school census data, there is a requirement to stipulate whether parents have given approval for the data to be released and to be moved on; there is a requirement to say whether parental approval has been given. I can happily come back to the Minister to refer to the specific section in the guidance for schools, but I should like him to comment on that.
The guidance document talks about the uploading of fields to Connexions, the Jobcentre people. It states that it must be stipulated, “Yes, permission has been given by a parent or guardian for the information to be shared”, “No, permission has been refused by the parent or guardian”, or, “UNS”, which is unsought. The SNR field should be used when the school has sent out fair proceeding notices but no response has been received from the parent or guardian. Those are pretty important safeguards, particularly when we are talking about children. Will they apply in the uploading and the use of data by ONS?
Baroness Walmsley: This is the first time that I have had the pleasure of debating with the noble Lord, Lord Brett, and I am delighted to be able to do so, albeit from the further reaches of the Moses Room. I fail to see, when there are only three people in the debate, why we on these Benches have to be sent to the far end of the Room. Maybe it is in a vain hope that our arrows will fall short. I can promise the noble Lord no arrows today.
We understand the purposes of the regulations. Given the very mobile population that we have today, it is essential that statisticians have sufficient information to ensure that local authorities are properly resourced to look after those people who move into their area at fairly short notice. However, when we are talking about the data on children, I share the Conservative spokesman’s concern about security. Only this week, we have been told that the number of people who will have access to the ContactPoint database will be in the region of 400,000—a figure that we did not have when debated this issue in your Lordships’ House. Will the Minister say how many people are likely to have access to the information about which we are speaking today? Can he also assure us that the data will be used only for the purpose for which they were collected? That may be the case at the moment, but I understand that the Coroners and Justice Bill, which is on its way down the track, will allow wider data sharing without consent. In other words, the data will be used for purposes beyond those for which they were collected. Will these regulations be affected by the measures in the Coroners and Justice Bill? If so, will they return to your Lordships’ House for discussion at that time, because that would certainly widen the effect of these regulations considerably?
I looked in some detail at the various items of information about each child that are to be collected and shared. Will the Minister say why it is necessary to provide the child’s full address? If the purpose is to ensure that local authorities are properly resourced to look after the various needs of the child, I see no reason why the full address needs to be given. Why not simply give the local authority ward in which the child lives? That would be quite sufficient. Given that the child is most vulnerable to any paedophile when his or
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The regulations clearly relate to children of school age, because the information comes from the school census. When this was debated in another place, a question was asked about young people who are just above school age and whether there were any proposals to address the fact that, in many cities, there are large numbers of students above school age in both higher and further education who are not counted until they leave the city, which is too late for the city to be given any resources to look after their needs. I am afraid that, when I read the Minister’s reply, it was not terribly clear whether there were any plans to deal with this. I realise that this is slightly beyond the scope of the regulations, but the noble Lord might be able to help me on it.
My colleague in another place asked whether there would be any other benefits of this kind of data sharing—for example, the ability to track tendencies such as girls being taken out of school and going abroad to be married. I can think of other trends that might be picked up by the statisticians and which could be an additional benefit of this kind of sharing without contravening the narrowness of the purpose for which the information was collected.
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