My Lords, tracking the provenance of Clause 113 has been a very interesting exercise. If we think that Clause 114 is pretty politically motivated, Clause 113 is likewise. These rules relating to the fact that political parties cannot avail themselves of the soft opt-in provision have been there since 2005. The Information Commissioner issued guidance on political campaigning, and it was brought within the rules. Subsequently, there has been a ruling in a tribunal case which confirmed that: the SNP was issued with an enforcement notice and the information tribunal dismissed the appeal.
The Conservative Party was fined in 2021 for sending emails to people who did not ask for them. Then, lo and behold, there was a Conservative Party submission to the House of Lords Democracy and Digital Technologies Committee in 2020, and that submission has been repeated on a number of occasions. I have been trying to track how many times the submission has been made by the Conservative Party. The submission
makes it quite clear that there is frustration in the Conservative Party. I have the written evidence here. It says:
“We have a number of concerns about the Information Commissioner’s draft code”—
as it then was: it is now a full code—
“on the use of data for political campaigning. In the interests of transparency, I enclose a copy of the response that the Conservative Party sent to the consultation. I … particularly flag the potential chilling effect on long-standing practices of MPs and councillors from engaging with their local constituents”.
Now, exactly as the noble Baroness has said, I do not think there is any call from other political parties to change the rules. I have not seen any submissions from any other political party, so I would very much like to know why the Government have decided to favour the Conservative Party in these circumstances by changing the rules. It seems rather peculiar.
The guidance for personal data in political campaigning, which I read while preparing for this debate, seems to be admirably clear. It is quite long, but it is admirably clear, and I congratulate the ICO on tiptoeing through the tulips rather successfully. However, the fact is that we have very clear guidance and a very clear situation, and I entirely agree with the noble Baroness that we are wholly in favour of charities being able to avail themselves of the new provisions, but allowing political parties to do so is a bridge too far and, on that basis, I very much support the amendment.