Freedom of Information (Amendment) Bill

May I just respond to the point, because it think that it would be courteous to the right hon. Gentleman to do so? I am sure that the Minister will confirm that the present Leader of House, the then Home Secretary, thought about this very carefully indeed. As he says himself, he was in two minds and wondered whether or not to include Parliament. He reached the conclusion that Parliament should be included—it was his Bill. He was the Cabinet Minister who saw that Bill through, so he had given plenty of careful consideration to exactly the point raised by the right hon. Member for Penrith and The Border. Of his own volition, the present Leader of the House admits that the decision was not easy and that he was in two minds at certain times. I am not sure how familiar with such legislation throughout the world the right hon. Member for Penrith and The Border is. However, he makes the wider point that Parliaments handle freedom of information in different ways. Some freedom of information legislation covers parliamentarians, while some does not. It is a matter for each Parliament to decide. However, we have found another way. All the exemptions that worry the right hon. Gentleman are covered by the Data Protection Act 1998. The way in which the two Acts of Parliament lock together like a jigsaw ensures that the sorts of problems that the right hon. Gentleman is worried about are not real.