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Criminal Defence Service (Information Requests) Regulations 2009

Yes, my Lords, that is exactly what I am saying. Indeed, the money that this new scheme has cost, referred to by the noble Lord, comes not from the legal aid fund that the LSC is responsible for but from its own administrative fund. That is of course a separate amount of money, which, in the final analysis, comes from the Exchequer. Those costs will obviously go to pay Her Majesty’s Court Service staff who do some of this work on behalf of the LSC, and to the other two departments of state for their work. Questions have been asked about data protection. We understand and respect that the House as a whole is concerned about this. The noble Lord, Lord Henley, asked me about a privacy impact assessment, which I will describe a bit better. It is a process during which the potential privacy issues and risks of a proposal are identified and examined from the perspectives of all those involved—in other words, users and service providers—and consideration given to how to avoid or minimise privacy concerns. These assessments should be carried out on all policies that involve the processing of personal data. Government departments are required to undertake privacy impact assessments because the data sharing review, published in July last year, noted their benefits, stating: "““Privacy impact assessments are structured assessments of a project’s potential impact on privacy, carried out at any early stage. They enable organisations to anticipate and address the likely impacts of new initiatives, foresee problems and negotiate solutions””." In addition, the data handling review mandated that all departments will introduce privacy impact assessments which ensure that privacy issues are factored into plans from the start. Of course, this is personal information given by one government department to another for a purpose. However, we are satisfied that that information is secure, and is unable to get out into the hands of those who have absolutely no need to have it. I hope that, with those few words, I have to some extent comforted both noble Lords about these provisions.