Section 45A: Exemption from sections 44 and 45: legal professional privilege

Data Protection Act 2018 · 2018 c. 12View on legislation.gov.uk

Part 3: Law enforcement processing — CHAPTER 3: Rights of the data subject

Sections 44(2) and 45(1) do not require the controller to give the data subject—

information in respect of which a claim to legal professional privilege or, in Scotland, confidentiality of communications could be maintained in legal proceedings, or
information in respect of which a duty of confidentiality is owed by a professional legal adviser to a client of the adviser.

A controller relying on the exemption in subsection (1) must inform the data subject in writing without undue delay of—

the decision to rely on the exemption,
the reason for the decision,
the data subject's right to make a request to the Commissioner under section 51,
the data subject's right to lodge a complaint with the Commissioner under section 165, and
the data subject's right to apply to a court under section 167.

Subsection (2)(a) and (b) do not apply to the extent that complying with them would—

undermine a claim described in subsection (1)(a), or
conflict with a duty described in subsection (1)(b).

The controller must—

record the reason for a decision to rely on the exemption in subsection (1), and
if requested to do so by the Commissioner, make the record available to the Commissioner.

The reference in subsection (1) to sections 44(2) and 45(1) includes sections 35 to 40 so far as their provisions correspond to the rights and obligations provided for in sections 44(2) and 45(1).

About this text

This legislation text comes from legislation.gov.uk. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. These source and reuse terms cover the legislation text, not Remedy's commentary.

Reuse reviewed 21 August 2026 under Open Government Licence v3.0.