Government lobbied over electoral roll data

The Incorporated Society of British Advertisers (ISBA) has expressed concern over government plans to stop advertisers using edited information from the electoral role.
ISBA´s media and advertising director Bob Wootton wrote to the prime minister´s chief special adviser Stephen Carter to warn the government of the consequences of barring advertiser´s access to the electoral role.

In its recent Data Sharing Review, the government´s information commissioner Richard Thomas recommended removing the edited electoral register from sale.

But Mr Wootton disagreed and wrote: "Losing access to the register would mean direct marketers relying on less accurate sources of data."

"This would undermine current environmental initiatives and would be at odds with the Review´s objectives," he added.

According to the Data Sharing Review, the selling of edited electoral data to marketers is an unsatisfactory way of treating personal information and sends the wrong message to the public, reports legal news website out-law.com.
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