Lords
Oral Questions
22 January 2026
Diego Garcia: Comments by the President of the United States
That is correct. The relationship that we have with the United States on security, defence and intelligence sharing is the deepest such relationship that has ever existed on this planet, and it is precious to us. We believe it to be precious to the United States, and we will continue to talk with th…
Lords
Oral Questions
15 January 2026
3 contributions
Exercise Pegasus 2025
My Lords, I draw attention to my registered interest as chair of the National Preparedness Commission and I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper.
My Lords, Exercise Pegasus tested our ability to respond to a pandemic, involving all nations of the UK and thousands of participants. Evaluation and lesson identification is under way for the first three phases, with interim findings incorporated into the draft pandemic preparedness strategy due to…
+1 more contribution in this session
Lords
Oral Questions
5 January 2026
Muslim Brotherhood
There is a range of offences on the statute book on which the security services and/or the police can take action in the event of potential terrorist or criminal activity. The purpose of proscription is to say that an individual cannot support an organisation, and that gives additional power to the …
Lords
Oral Questions
18 November 2025
Space Debris
I thank my noble friend for that point. As it stands, DSIT is playing a major role in developing UK space surveillance. This covers debris and satellites. Through the space clusters and the infra- structure fund, we are backing new ground-based observatories and analytics platforms. We are also co-o…
Lords
Oral Questions
10 November 2025
Accidental Prison Releases
I thank my noble friend. The checklists that we have made more robust are the same checklists across all prisons, but the number of releases per prison varies dramatically. HMP Gartree averages two releases a year, whereas, as I previously said, in Wandsworth it is 2,000. That is why the digital tea…
Lords
Proceedings
5 November 2025
“Soldier F” Trial Verdict
My Lords, could my noble friend confirm that the decisions in the case of Soldier F and the other cases that have been highlighted where judges have taken a particular view demonstrate the impartiality and appropriateness of the way in which judges act? Could she further confirm that the Crown Prose…
Lords
Oral Questions
27 October 2025
Undersea Cables: National Security Threat
There are certainly plans to do exactly as my noble friend asks. There certainly needs to be work on those plans, and they need some more detail to them, but there certainly are plans to do that. I have said a number of times from this Dispatch Box that the threats we face from others are now differ…
Lords
Oral Questions
23 October 2025
2 contributions
Chinese Embassy
My Lords—
On 6 August, a reference back letter was sent to parties seeking further information to assist Planning Ministers in reaching a decision on this case. This related to a representation from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the Home Office relating to the consolidation of existing diplomatic pr…
Lords
Oral Questions
21 October 2025
4 contributions
Amazon Web Services
My Lords, I beg leave to ask a Question of which I have given private notice, and in so doing I refer to my interest in the register as chair of the National Preparedness Commission.
My Lords, the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology is leading the Government’s response to the Amazon Web Services outage that took place yesterday. DSIT continues to work across government and with businesses to understand the full impacts of the outage. All AWS services were restored …
+2 more contributions in this session
Lords
Oral Questions
16 September 2025
National Health Service Regulations
I appreciate what my noble friend says about HealthWatch, which has done a sterling job over the years. However, in assessing where we are in ensuring that we have the right framework in place, including on patient safety—Dr Penny Dash recently published her report saying that the landscape was “clu…
Lords
Proceedings
18 July 2025
Strategic Defence Review 2025
My Lords, I offer my congratulations to the noble Lord, Lord Robertson of Port Ellen, for his role in leading the strategic defence review team and for delivering such a thoughtful and important contribution to UK defence policy. I am particularly grateful to the review team for appearing last week …
Lords
Oral Questions
16 July 2025
Diplomatic Missions: Unpaid Charges
As I have said, there are a range of options available. It has been suggested that we impound diplomatic vehicles—seize them and prevent them being used—and other such measures have been suggested. But for the time being, we continue to raise these issues directly with missions in this country and w…
Lords
Debate
14 July 2025
Employment Rights Bill
My Lords, I say briefly that the principle in the amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, is absolutely right. He has made a cogent case for why special constables are indeed special, and for their contribution. Some 25 years ago, when I chaired the Metropolitan Police Authority in London, w…
Lords
Oral Questions
14 July 2025
Tourism Levy
I am grateful to my noble friend for his question. As he says, there are devolved Administrations who have proposals in this regard. We have been engaging with them to understand their proposals. Obviously, we will continue to do so but, as I have said, we have no present plans to introduce such a l…
Lords
Proceedings
10 July 2025
Government Resilience Action Plan
My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend for the answers she has given. I join in the general welcome that has been given by the Benches opposite for this action plan. As chair of the National Preparedness Commission, I will say that that my noble friend will not be surprised that there are all so…
Lords
Oral Questions
8 July 2025
Data Centres: Energy and Water Consumption
The Government are aiming to designate data centres as a type of commercial project to be considered under the nationally significant infrastructure projects plan, allowing the Secretary of State to decide on applications for new centres and bringing this into clear view of the security agencies. Th…
Lords
Proceedings
2 July 2025
Peers’ Entrance Security Door
The noble Lord makes a very valid point; this is something that has troubled me for some time. On the particular matter of the Peers’ Entrance, the project business case has undergone a process of standard professional scrutiny. The clerks of both Houses ultimately scrutinised and approved those cos…
Lords
Proceedings
1 July 2025
G7 and NATO Summits
My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend the Leader of the House for bringing forward this Statement. It strikes me that some of the carping that we have heard from the Leader of the Opposition here today rather misses the point of what has been happening in the last few weeks. We have had a serie…
Lords
Proceedings
25 June 2025
Palace of Westminster: Restoration and Renewal
My Lords, interestingly, when the public were surveyed in March, 74% of them supported the preserving of the building for future generations. We should have confidence that this building represents across the world a very important feature—democracy—and how that should function and flourish. Clearly…
Lords
Oral Questions
23 June 2025
Business Rates Reform
I am grateful to my friend for his question. I will say honestly that I had not thought of it in that way before, but I can absolutely see the point that he is making. My noble friend started his question by talking about the important role that BIDs play. There are, as he knows, more than 340 BIDs …
Lords
Oral Questions
19 June 2025
2 contributions
English Marine Protected Areas: Bottom Trawling and Dredging
My Lords—
My noble friend is absolutely right, and this is why we are serious about taking action in this area. When it comes to national security or promoting biodiversity and protecting our marine environment, we want to work with all stakeholders to get this right. I would be very interested to hear the vi…
Lords
Oral Questions
3 June 2025
3 contributions
Reservoirs: Protection from Contamination
I refer to my interest in the register as chair of the National Preparedness Commission and beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper.
My Lords, the Government’s first duty is to protect our national security and keep our country safe. Defra recognises that the drinking water supply is a potential target for hostile actors. It works with water companies and partners across government to understand and monitor threats to water suppl…
+1 more contribution in this session
Lords
Oral Questions
21 May 2025
Improving Cyber Resilience
I thank my noble friend for the question. He is absolutely right: there is a clear role here for the National Cyber Security Centre, both during an attack and afterwards, as it works with experts. My noble friend is right that I cannot comment on the details of the current attacks. I reassure noble …
Lords
Oral Questions
15 May 2025
Pensioners: Shoplifting
In 2014, the then Government introduced a £200 threshold, which meant that police forces were, in effect, told to disregard shop theft below £200. I was the shadow Police Minister in 2014, and I opposed that measure. I am pleased to say that in the Crime and Policing Bill that will be coming before …
Lords
Proceedings
6 May 2025
Energy Grid Resilience
My Lords, I refer to my interest in the register as chair of the National Preparedness Commission. My noble friend the Minister is quite right to highlight the fact that our grid is recognised as one of the more resilient around the world. However, noble Lords have already indicated the number of th…