Referencing Fails due to scumbag previous letting agents?

Have you had any case when you find good tenants, but their reference report came Failed, because their previous letting agent refused to release their tenancy data? And when you have one document missing, the reference just automatically fails you?

Be alerted, if your potential tenants have lived in any property managed by Paul Simon Letting. They have been absolute nightmare, refused to release tenancy data saying they’re not legally obliged to share this information, and charged me 120 pounds for their tenancy data to be sent to Rent Guard. Both Rent Guard and Open Rent said they’ve never seen such case.

Should there be some legal protection against this? Isn’t tenancy data personal data for the tenants to control, not previous letting agents? This whole Tenancy fee ban was created to protect tenants, but creating more problems in a deeper level. I wouldn’t be surprised if more cases like this pop up in the future, maybe even with higher price tag for what is such minor email reply to Rent Guard. Isn’t this unethical?