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Data Protection Bill Is A Serious Threat To Human Rights And Our Healthcare Records

The second version of the Data Protection and Digital Information Bill No 2 is now making its way through Parliament, after getting its second reading on 17th April 2023.

The main difference between this Bill and its predecessor is that it is even more business friendly, gives the state greater powers to access UK citizen personal data, and makes it more difficult for individuals to find out what information businesses and state bodies are holding on them.

The main drive behind this Bill is to grow the economy by increasing commercial access to personal data. This will be at the expense of safeguards for individuals’ confidential information, including NHS medical records, posing a threat to patients’ trust in their healthcare professionals, with implications for receiving the right diagnosis and treatment; note the campaign group Keep Our NHS Public.

We know already that insurance companies and employers are increasingly asking for personal healthcare data when it comes to claims, and the hiring new workers. Furthermore, the medical insurance industry needs full access to our private healthcare records in order to be able to make profit from such data, and to develope our healthcare system into a privately run concern as in the US!

The implication for those who have or are being treated for mental health illnesses, and disabled people seeking employment is obvious; especially when you consider not all disabilities are visible. In effect, this Bill will make it harder for us to ensure that our private data remains just that. In reality all workers who have had or currently have medical intervention and support via NHS services, will no longer be protected from snooping businesses and organisations.

The new Bill will intentionally wipe out majority of the EU/UK GDR data protections we currently have.

Some of the main concerns abut this Bill are that the Bill will:

• Have serious implications for human rights of every person living in the UK by giving increased access to citizen’s personal data for the State and law enforcement authorities.

• Replace the independent Information Commissioner’s Office with an Information Commission largely under the control of the Government.

• Worse still it creates a new duty to promote “economic growth, innovation and competition” rather than the protection of personal data. In effect the Commissioner has the right to considers it is better for economic growth to adopt the US system whereby business can sell on personal data of their customers without notice.

• Represent an abuse of democracy through vaguely worded Henry VIII clauses that will give ministers delegated powers to change primary legislation without proper scrutiny by Parliament.

It also raises particular concerns about access to our personal health data, including:

• The removal of many existing protections, allowing, for example, data controllers to decide when personal data can be classified as ‘anonymous’ and so beyond data protection law.

• Reduced controls on data collection and the processing of personal health data by, for example, abolishing the statutory role of an independent Data Protection Officer. Instead, public bodies and organisations processing vast data sets will designate a senior employee (probably without data protection expertise but at risk of a conflict of interest) to ensure compliance with data protection rules.

• Reduced rights for individuals,  for example, making it more difficult for citizen’s to gain information about the data an organisation holds on them.

This dangerous Bill is not fit for purpose and must be stopped.

Existing legislation, such as the UK GDPR and Data Protection Act (2018), although not perfect, already provides the means, where appropriate, for controlled access to confidential data. What is needed is the robust endorsement of existing safeguards, not legislation that reduces protections.
 
The campaign group Keep Our NHS Public has issued an email campaign to it's membership, providing details of the Action to be taken against the Bill, and are calling for the following:

• Transparency in the use of our health data: we should know who is using our data, on whose say so, and for what purpose. Our rights to opt out must be maintained.
• Sound governance of our health data to ensure patients’ trust.
• Clarity about how to opt out of third party access to our data, and what consent means.
• Stewardship of personal health data to rest with the NHS, supported by proper, state-funded investment that will allow the NHS to develop the relevant technologies and staff training.
• Meaningful citizen engagement about how NHS data can be used.
• An independent regulator whose primary aim is the rights of citizens rather than the interests of commerce.
• The potential of health data to be used for the benefit of patients and the public good, not private profit.

The KONP Data Working Group is asking KONP members to write to their MPs about the Bill.

But YOU TOO can be part of the campaign to protect your personal healthcare data, and indeed all your personal data, by opposing this Bill.

They have also produced an MPs’ Briefing now available on the KONP website or direct by clicking on the image right; with a template covering letter, again available on their website.

According to the House of Commons Library Briefing to MPs, there are many groups raising concerns:

The Open Rights Group, an organisation campaigning on surveillance, privacy, and free speech, has claimed that the Bill would, among other things, weaken data subjects’ rights, water down accountability requirements, and reduce the independence of the ICO.

Big Brother Watch, a civil liberties campaign group, claims the Bill would “tear up” privacy rights protecting the public from automated-decision making in high-risk areas.

Source: KONP / House Of Commons Library

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