Defra and RPA accused of cover up over data loss

Defra Secretary Hilary Benn admitted in the Commons yesterday (Thursday, October 29), that routine  checks earlier this year revealed that the RPA had lost 38 data backup tapes and one CD.

Three tapes and the CD remain unaccounted for, including two tapes potentially containing farmers’ data, such as bank details. 

While Mr Benn sought to reassure farmers that the risk of the data being accessed by outside parties is ‘low’, attention is increasingly focussing on why farmers were not informed until now. 

Mr Benn admitted he only found out yesterday, after whistleblowers went public on the data loss, even though RPA officials knew about it six months ago.

Shadow Defra Secretary Nick Herbert said the silence ‘looked like a cover up’.

“It appears that officials knew about another Government data loss months ago but failed to inform the Secretary of State until yesterday when the press obtained the story,” he said.

He said Ministers ‘must now tell us exactly who was informed about this loss and when’.

Liberal Democrat Shadow Rural Affairs Secretary Tim Farron said it ‘beggars belief that civil servants took six months to inform farmers affected by this staggering loss’.

“Yet again the Government has had to own up to a potentially catastrophic loss of personal data, this time at an agency already damned by its scant regard for taxpayers’ money,” he said.

He said Mr Benn’s reassurances about the implications of the lost data ‘won’t wash with family farmers already suffering under the chaotic payments regime’.

NFU president Peter Kendall said farmers would be ‘horrified’ that the RPA had lost the data.

“We are also very concerned that although the tapes appear to have been identified as missing earlier this year, farmers have only now been told about this issue,” he said.

“The Secretary of State said that he was informed about this issue yesterday and has told the House of Commons at the first opportunity, but we want to know why this was not reported to the Secretary of State and to the industry as soon as the tapes were known to be missing. There are questions here that need answering.

He said farmers would be ‘extremely worried about the vulnerability of their data and in particular their bank details’.

“For that reason, we will be looking for the strongest assurances from the RPA that everything is being done to locate these tapes,” he said.

Earlier, Mr Benn sought to refute accusations of a cover up. He said the decision not to inform Ministers was made ‘in accordance with Cabinet Office guidelines’ because the investigation showed the data was ‘in code that cannot be read’.

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