To meet the expectation the noble Lord voiced earlier, I will indeed point out that Ofcom can consult the ICO as a skilled person if it wishes to. It is important that we square the circle and look at these issues. The ICO will be able to be involved in the way I have set out as a skilled person.
Before I conclude, I want to address my noble friend Lady Harding’s questions on skilled persons. Given that notices will be issued on a case-by-case basis, and Ofcom will need to look at specific service design and existing systems of a provider to work out how a particular technology would interact with that design system, a skilled person’s report better fits this process by requiring Ofcom to obtain tailored advice rather than general technical advice from an advisory board. The skilled person’s report will be largely focused on the technical side of Ofcom’s assessment: that is to say, how the technology would interact with the service’s design and existing systems. In this way, it offers
something similar to but more tailored than a technical advisory board. Ofcom already has a large and expert technology group, whose role it is to advice policy teams on new and existing technologies, to anticipate the impact of technologies and so on. It already has strong links with academia and with external researchers. A technical advisory board would duplicate that function. I hope that reassures my noble friend that the points she raised have been taken into account.
So I hope the noble Lord, Lord Allan, will not feel the need to divide—