§ The Chief Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Paul Boateng)The Registrar General for England and Wales will announce later today that he is leading the next stage of development work for a UK population register, which will inform a further decision by Ministers in 2005 on whether this work should proceed to implementation.
A population register would become, for the public sector, the prime source of address and other core contact information relating to people usually resident in the UK. The development would pave the way for more responsive and personalised public services, by supporting joined-up delivery and more efficient and effective transaction and back office services.
A critical consideration in developing plans for a population register will be the protection of individual privacy. To that end, if a population register were 8WS implemented, individuals would be able to see the contact details held on them and to know which parts of government were accessing this information.
The work will build on a feasibility study that reported to Ministers in June. The Registrar General will place an information note summarising the feasibility study on the Office for National Statistics and General Register Office website. A copy has been placed in the Library of the House.
The project team will continue to work closely with other Government Departments, the devolved Administrations, agencies and local authorities.