Data Protection and Digital Information Bill
Debate between Lord Bassam of Brighton and Lord Anderson of IpswichWednesday 24th April 2024
(2 weeks, 1 day ago)
Grand CommitteeRead Full debate Data Protection and Digital Information Bill 2022-23 View all Data Protection and Digital Information Bill 2022-23 Debates Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts Amendment Paper: HL Bill 30-VII Seventh marshalled list for Grand Committee - (23 Apr 2024)
Lord Anderson of Ipswich (CB)
I take the Minister’s point and I will settle for the appellation “investigatory powers nerd”; I am quite happy with that. Does the Minister agree with me, however, that the legal difficulty —we see this with the other bulk powers already in our law—is that Article 8 of the European convention locks in not when a human eye gets stuck into the detail, but as soon as a machine harvests the data in bulk? Most of that data relates to people in respect of whom there could be no possible suspicion. Satisfying the requirements of necessity and proportionality must be done even at that stage. I understand that that is awkward and I am sure a lot of people would prefer that it was otherwise, but that is, as I understand it, the law. That renders the distinction that the Minister seeks to draw between data gathering and surveillance perhaps slightly difficult to maintain.
