Under the Bill as it stands, the assurer can be removed, but owing to the weakness of the provisions relating to data protection, it is not clear whether he can be automatically removed if he does not abide by the Data Protection Act. Perhaps the Minister will be able to answer that question. Our amendments are intended to give trade unions the power to remove an independent assurer if they feel that he is causing a trade union data controller to be in breach of his duties.
Let me now deal with the question of whether clause 37 is compliant with article 11. The first issues that emerged from the Sunday Times v. United Kingdom case were “legitimate aim” and “pressing social need”. The Government’s discussion paper states:
“at present complaints to the Certification Officer (CO) about the register can only be made by trade union members and no-one else. In addition, members only have a right to see whether and how their own details are recorded. This means it is difficult for members to make a complaint in relation to the accuracy of the membership register as a whole.”
Liberty rightly argues that that is not a legitimate aim, as the position is already adequately covered by current legislation, and
“the independent scrutineer”
—for whom the Bill also provides—
“is required to examine the entirety of register of their own volition and report any issues to the union.”
That brings us back to the arguments relating to clause 36. Again, these provisions already exist in the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992. The same reasoning lies behind amendment 110, which aligns clause 37 and provision for the appointment and removal of assurers—which was mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe)—with the obligations conferred on scrutineers by section 49(1) of the Act. Any individual challenge to the regulator must involve investigation of the accuracy of the register as a whole, not just the member’s own incorrect entry. The current framework in section 24 of the Act allows for that.