UK Parliament / Open data

Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Bill [HL]

I hope that I can be helpful. I apologise to the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, who I am preventing from speaking, only because I hope I can deal with this amendment quickly. The idea behind it is that the courts would be able to ask Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs or perhaps other government departments for specific pieces of information. That is covered in Clause 89(3)(a) to (e). We are not asking for financial information from which people could make judgments. The areas that would be covered would be name, address, date of birth, national insurance number, and name and address of employer. That kind of information is to do with where people are; it is not about what they earn. Clause 89(3)(e) is in the Bill because of the machinery of government changes that take place from time to time. What is in one department one day is in a different department another day, and we wanted to make sure that we could deal with that. It is not about what someone earns, but about specific information. The noble Lord looks puzzled; I was rather hoping that that would solve his problem.
Type
Proceeding contribution
Reference
687 c123-4GC 
Session
2006-07
Chamber / Committee
House of Lords Grand Committee
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