I appreciate the tone of the noble Lord and, if there is anything that comes from behind me before I conclude my remarks, to be helpful, I will certainly do that.
Our debates on this measure have covered many issues. This group, as mentioned earlier, focuses primarily on the operational delivery of the power, so it would be quite good to move on. Just before I do, for the benefit of the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, in terms of
the late introduction—his words—of this measure, as mentioned on Monday the DWP published a fraud plan in May 2022, where it outlined a number of new powers that it would seek to secure when parliamentary time allowed. In the parliamentary time available, DWP has prioritised our key third-party data-gathering measure, which will help it to tackle one of the largest causes of fraud and error in the welfare system. That is a short version of what I said on Monday, but I hope that it might be helpful.
Before I turn to the amendments, it might be helpful to set out how the legislation will frame the delivery of this measure. When we issue a request for data to a third party or, as it is set out, an account information notice or AIN, which is in the Bill, we can only ask it to provide data where it may help the DWP to establish whether benefits have been properly paid in accordance with the rules relating to those benefits. As mentioned earlier, this is defined clearly at paragraph 1(2) of the new schedule. This is where the data that DWP receives may signal—to use the word raised by the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones—potential fraud and error. The noble Lord asked for further clarification on that point. To be clear, a signal of fraud and error is where the rules of benefit eligibility appear not to be met. For example, this might be where a claimant has more capital than the benefit rules allow. As I made clear on Monday, all benefits and payments have rules that determine eligibility, which Parliament has agreed are the right rules in its consideration of other social security legislation. To issue an AIN, we must also have designated a third party in affirmative regulations, which need to be passed by both Houses.
As has been covered, we can also only request data from third parties where there is this relationship, which I will not repeat again and which I think the Committee will be familiar with. Our intention is to designate banks and financial institutions as the first third parties that we can approach, enabling us to request information on accounts only held in the UK. Just to clarify that point, we will not be able to request information on overseas accounts.
On the question raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Sherlock, on examples of non-financial organisations that the power could appropriately be used on, we will bring forward regulations to specify the data holders in scope. I hope that this is helpful. In the first instance, this will be, as mentioned, banks and financial institutions. The power also has potential use cases with other third parties, such as housing or childcare providers, but, just to reassure the Committee, this would be subject to further parliamentary approval.