Ditch plan to split from EU on data rules or UK security will be affected, warns Rudd

A Conservative former home secretary has backed calls for Boris Johnson's successor to ditch his Brexit plan to split from the EU on data regulation, amid warnings it will cost businesses billions.

- ANDREW WOODCOCK

A new report by the ex-leader of Tory MEPs, Lord Timothy Kirkhope, warns Mr Johnson's plan for a new UK-only rulebook on data security could cut Britain off from the free exchange of information within Europe, and undermine protections against international crime and terrorism.

Businesses could be locked out of lucrative markets and may relocate outside the UK in order to avoid the additional barriers to trade, while police and security agencies could lose access to vital information on suspects' criminal records, fingerprints, DNA or car registrations, the report warns.

Author Lord Kirkhope, who led the Conservative group in the European parliament for six years and played a key role in drawing up the EU's GDPR data security system, told The Independent that Mr Johnson's "ideological" proposals appeared to be driven by the impulse to demonstrate benefits from Brexit.

But he that "going it alone" i own sake could deal a massive blow to trade in personal data-enabled services worth £85bn in exports from the UK to the EU and £42bn in imports from the EU in 2018. And he warned Mr Johnson's lighter-touch regulatory system could mean personal data ending up in the hands of corporations without citizens' consent, in a way which is prevented by GDPR.

Former home secretary Amber Rudd cautioned against allowing UK agencies to be locked out of EU-wide security arrangements, such as the Prüm convention on cooperation in the fight against counterterrorism and cross-border crime, which rely on data adequacy agreements with Brussels.

Backing yesterday's report, she said: "In the interests of security, both for the UK and the EU, we should seek to maintain the free flow of data. As a former home secretary, I saw for myself just how important it was to have access to Prüm, the European Criminal Records Information System and other databases to help tackle serious crime."