§ Mr. Wyn Robertsasked the Secretary of State for Wales what steps he is taking to safeguard the confidentiality of information about patients held by the Welsh Health Technical Services organisation at Cardiff.
§ Mr. Barry JonesThere is a well-established and secure procedure for the protection of patient-based confidential information supplied as input to the Organisation's computer principally for statistical analysis. No request for personally identifiable data is met without the consent of the consultant concerned, and all such requests are channelled 39W through the Department's medical advisers. In addition we are setting up a small steering committee including representatives of the areas which will be responsible for a general oversight of all the procedures involved.