Businesses told they’ve fallen into the Brexit trap - after a fifth cancel preparations for EU General Data Protection Regulation

John Culkin, Director of Information Management at Crown Records Management

A fifth of businesses in Manchester have cancelled all preparation for the EU General Data Protection Regulation – after mistakenly presuming it will be scrapped because of Brexit.

The regulation, which has been years in the pipeline, is designed to harmonise data protection regulation throughout Europe and provide citizens with more control over their personal data.

It has been ratified by the UK and is due to come into force in May 2018 – almost certainly before Britain completes its exit from Europe, despite the recent triggering of Article 50.

However a survey of IT decision makers at companies in the Manchester region with more than 100 employees, undertaken by information management experts Crown Records Management, has revealed some shocking results.

It showed that:

• 20% of firms have cancelled all preparation for the regulation.
• 23% think the regulation will not apply to UK business after Brexit.
• 3% haven’t begun any preparations at all
• 3% don’t even have any plans for staff training on data protection.

John Culkin, Director of Information Management at Crown Records Management, believes the results are alarming.

He said: “For so many businesses in Manchester to be cancelling preparations is a big concern because this regulation is going to affect them all in one way or another.

“Firstly, it is likely to be in place before any Brexit. Secondly, although an independent Britain would no longer be a signatory it will still apply to all businesses which handle the personal information of European citizens.

“When you consider how many EU citizens live in the UK it’s hard to imagine many businesses in this region being unaffected.”
UK officials and politicians were heavily involved in the drawing up of the new regulation and Culkin believes the general principles behind it are set in stone.

“The reality is we are likely to continue to see stringent data protection in an independent UK rather than a watered down version,” he said.

“Our survey revealed that at least half of companies saw Brexit as an opportunity for Britain to position itself as the safest place to do business through even more robust legislation – in fact in Manchester the figure was higher at 66 per cent.

“This means the best course is to prepare now and have a watertight information management system in place as soon as possible. This issue is not going away.”

The EU GDPR will bring in massive fines for data breaches - as high as 20million Euros or up to 4% of global turnover - as well as new rules to ensure privacy is designed in to data policies, plus new rights for citizens to ask for their personal data to be edited or deleted.