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Coroners and Justice Bill

That may be necessary. The question is whether there can still be an adequate and effective investigation without that last piece of evidence. That evidence may not be necessary, but we have the system of public interest immunity certificates and the Government can persuade the coroner to withhold sensitive material. Both those provisions were upheld in two cases against the UK, those of Jordan and McCann. It has been stated that those restrictions are compatible in principle. Another concern is that under clause 29, the new inspection arrangements will be excluded from investigating inquests such as I have mentioned, as inspectors cannot be present when people are excluded under subsections (3) or (4) of clause 34, which specify the direct exclusion of persons. That is a serious matter. I want briefly to consider data protection, about which the Joint Committee on Human Rights has made many recommendations over the years. I welcome the provisions for spot checks of public bodies, the tougher powers for the Information Commissioner and the proposed code of practice. Our approach, which is set out in numerous reports, is that, when there is a demonstrable need to permit data sharing, the Government's intentions should be clearly set out in primary legislation, including the necessary safeguards, to enable proper scrutiny. Secondary legislation cannot be amended and cannot improve or question the safeguards. Article 8 of the European convention on human rights contains the right to private life provisions, and I am concerned about clause 152 on information sharing. It is difficult to imagine a provision that would contradict more the basic views of the JCHR and—more important —the requirements of the Human Rights Act 1998 and the European convention on human rights. It is too broad and unspecific; no safeguards are specified. The Bill contains a power to amend by secondary legislation any Act of Parliament—the Data Protection Act 1998, the Human Rights Act and, presumably, the new safeguards in the Bill. We should at least have provisions such as those in the Civil Contingencies Act 2004 to exempt from amendment by such a process those Acts and the Bill's additional safeguards. The data-sharing provisions allow the Secretary of State to permit any person, department or company to share information, including personal information, about anyone if that serves a Government policy objective. They are not restricted to Departments, to the original reason for obtaining the data, or to a statutory duty or power. The provisions would cover all personal data, including ethnicity, credit history, medical records, DNA, tenancy records and tax and benefit records. A general, blanket discretionary power is not proportionate or necessary and does not justify departure from article 8. No legitimate purpose is specified—it remains an open question. To depart from article 8, there must be a legitimate purpose. Departure must be proportionate and necessary. I am interested to learn the Government's justification in anticipation of the very long letter that I expect to write on behalf of the JCHR, which will pose those questions in more detail than I have time to set out today. My last point is about witness anonymity. We debated it at length previously and I do not want to go over the old points that were made during the discussions on the emergency legislation, save for one. The Government promised to come back on the recommendations about independent counsel that my Committee made for the 50 or so so-called civilian cases in which credibility is an issue. One suggestion was for a voir dire process. Why have the Government decided not to proceed further with that? My Committee may wish to revert to the matter, and it would be helpful to have an explanation now, if there is one, of the reason for not addressing that. The recommendations would provide a basic safeguard in the 50 or so cases involved, allow trials to proceed with greater confidence and enable the interests of justice to be more adequately served. I have flagged up a few items on behalf of the JCHR, to which I suspect we will come back: secret inquests in particular; data protection, which is fundamental, and witness anonymity.