Dame Chi Onwurah
MP for Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West · Labour · United Kingdom
“An extraordinary debate is going on right now inside and outside AI companies about whether the possibility of AI destroying humanity is more or less than 10%. The European Union is moving ahead with a comprehensive AI regulatory framework, but the UK continues to rely on existing regulation.”
“The Pope also highlighted how the billions of online digital twins constitute an unprecedented concentration of power in the hands of a small number of men. Among the many consequences of the 40 years of neoliberalism repeatedly called out by the Prime Minister is a libertarian attitude to technology.”
“But this stealth digital twinning violates the integrity, uniqueness and very personhood of our constituents and of all of us. Digital twins can take many forms, from content creation algorithms and deepfakes to chatbots that reflect aspects of our personalities back at us. It is particularly worrying when children are the target.”
“The automated version of our kids will grow with them, using the power of AI to target advertising and products at them, and worse. The Science, Innovation and Technology Committee has heard about some of the tragic consequences of online grooming by algorithms and chatbots—a vulnerable boy persuaded to kill himself; a vulnerable girl fed…”
“In the arts, entertainment and tech industries, many performers are agreeing to the creation and use of digital replicas as part of their work—think of ABBA Voyage. But performers increasingly encounter unauthorised digital replicas of themselves, which pose a threat to their career, livelihood and reputation.”
“Since then, deepfakes have proliferated. The hon. Member for Mid Norfolk (George Freeman) was shown crossing the Floor in Parliament to join Reform, to his constituents’ consternation and his own—it was a fake. Then there were the horrendous photos of naked women and girls that Elon Musk’s AI created on demand.”
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“As a chartered engineer from Newcastle, I particularly appreciated the last example, and I would add to it the steam turbine, invented on the Tyne by Parsons. It made cheap and plentiful electricity possible, revolutionised marine transport and powered our Navy. Again and again, UK science has pushed back the boundaries of knowledge, shrinking the vast expanses of ignorance which, as the pandemic has shown, may threaten humanity’s very existence. And science is a key economic driver. Our university research base alone contributes £95 billion to the economy, supporting nearly 1 million jobs in science institutes, charities and businesses of all sizes.”
“It is a real pleasure to respond to today’s debate, which has in many ways shown this virtual House at its best, united by cross-party consensus on the importance of science and support for our scientists. I thank all hon. Members who have spoken so constructively on both sides, even if I cannot do justice to every contribution. As the shadow Secretary of State emphasised, it is vital that we get the Advanced Research and Invention Agency right. As many hon. Members have observed, the UK has a proud tradition in science, engineering, innovation, research and development; it is renowned across the world. The Secretary of State mentioned the discovery of penicillin. The hon. Member for Havant (Alan Mak) referred to the spinning Jenny and Stephenson’s Rocket.”
“Our Parliament, our businesses, our students, our economy and our social lives all depend on broadband. In 2019, the Prime Minister promised full fibre for all by 2025, and the 2020 Budget set aside £5 billion for that. Can the Minister confirm that only £1.2 billion of that £5 billion is planned to be spent by 2025, and that today’s decision by Ofcom to remove pricing controls will deliver greater profits for BT while allowing Openreach to charge more in rural areas that are already broadband-poorer? When will the country as a whole get the broadband infrastructure we so desperately need?”
“Labour would build on the UK’s science successes and ensure that we continue to be an innovation nation that draws on the talents of all. The Royal Society said that the Government’s actions are undermining their ambition for the UK to be a science superpower. Government indecision and inaction have made the impact of the pandemic worse for our critical research sector. They must now provide the long-term funding needed for the recovery.”
“If funds are cut such that the Hubs contracts are terminated this will lead to immediate redundancies in North East England.” What is the Minister doing to ensure that R&D investment is shared fairly across the regions of the UK? The Labour party would champion R&D as an engine of regional progress, strengthening regional economies by rebalancing R&D investment. Finally, we will never unlock the full potential of our research sector if we do not use the talents of everyone. There are real issues with diversity in the UK’s science and research sectors. Diversity is an economic imperative, especially as we face a shortfall of science, technology, engineering and maths workers, so what is the Minister doing to increase diversity, and how is that reflected in the Government’s funding model?”
“Although we welcome it in principle, today’s Select Committee hearing reflected our concerns that, without a clear mission beyond the ideological eyesight of Dominic Cummings, ARIA could become a vanity project vulnerable to cronyism. If R&D is to drive our recovery and provide high-skill, high-paying jobs, it must do so for all regions. In 2018, 72% of R&D expenditure was in the south-east and south-west, with the north-east receiving the lowest per-head funding in England—just a quarter of that of the east of England. Recent decisions may make things worse. Chris Day, the vice-chancellor of Newcastle University, has written to the Chief Secretary to the Treasury to say: “The decision to reduce the budget for international development projects is deeply concerning.”
“The failure of the Government to respond to the pandemic is costing jobs and risks creating a lost generation of researchers. There are 17,000 early-career researchers whose long-term future in research is in jeopardy. In January, researchers from the Northern Ireland and north-east doctoral training partnership, representing universities across the UK, wrote to the Government calling for them to provide security for PhD students. The Government have merely shifted the cliff edge six months back, and only for some. Will the Minister tell us what the Government are doing to support early-career researchers and the next generation of science researchers? My hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge and others have highlighted concerns about the new high-risk, high-reward research body ARIA.”
“Member for St Ives (Derek Thomas) highlighted the importance of charity medical research, which invests £1 billion into university research and development but has been consistently ignored when it comes to pandemic support. Modelling by the Institute for Public Policy Research predicts that lost charity income could mean that medical research charities invest £4 billion less in health R&D between now and 2027, with a knock-on effect on private investment of up to £1 billion. The British Heart Foundation and Cancer Research UK have announced thousands of lost research jobs and cut hundreds of millions from R&D budgets as the Government have turned a blind eye. Why have the Government been prepared to risk those jobs and that investment?”
“We urgently need reassurance on this.” Can the Minister tell me whether the UK’s estimated £2 billion of Horizon contributions will be taken from the promised £22 billion science spend, as the right hon. Member for Kingswood (Chris Skidmore) implied? Will funding received back from the Horizon programmes be counted as part of that £22 billion, and which departmental budgets will pay the Horizon contributions? Science spend increases are a positive break from the decade of austerity inflicted on our economy, but as my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge explained, we need direction, not a destination-less road map, in the absence of a clear strategy. The Government have failed to protect our research sector from the impact of the pandemic. The hon.”
“When Labour calls for a long-term funding plan for science, our ambition is orders of magnitude greater than three weeks. During the Brexit negotiations, the Government sowed uncertainty and anxiety among researchers as they refused to commit to Horizon alignment. I am pleased that the eventual deal did make that commitment, but, as my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge pointed out, the Government continue to be evasive over the funding details. The Wellcome Trust says: “Researchers in the UK welcomed the decision to continue the UK’s” Horizon commitments, but “they will be immensely frustrated, and with good reason, if it’s going to be paid for by cuts to other research.”
“Imperial College London, where I studied electrical engineering decades ago, is one of the many bodies that have written to me emphasising the need for international collaboration to be a priority. Yet, as the hon. Member for Arfon (Hywel Williams) highlighted, the Government are cutting overseas development research. Why? The Government promised to double R&D spending to £22 billion by 2024—a move supported by key stakeholders. However, as with many a prime ministerial promise, we do not have the detail. I have tabled many written questions on that, but the Minister has successively hidden behind the spending review, the Budget and, now, departmental budget reviews. As the Chair of the Science and Technology Committee mentioned, just this morning the Business Secretary admitted that UKRI’s 2021-22 budget had not yet been agreed.”
“Friend the Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe) and the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) emphasised, R&D is a key driver in building the economy of tomorrow, creating new jobs as others are overtaken by automation, and positioning the UK as a leader on the world stage. I am sure the Minister will agree when I speak about the importance of R&D, but let us look at the Government’s actions. Reports in the Financial Times today indicate that the Government are likely to miss their 2.4% of GDP R&D spending target following the cuts to overseas development. Labour has called for a 3% target. To fail on 2.4% would be truly shocking and, as has been said, it would be on the backs of the poorest countries in the world.”
“As we have heard, the Government’s warm words on science have not been backed by action. Industrial strategy seems to have been archived, with decisions on science made piecemeal rather than strategically. The Chair of the Science and Technology Committee, the right hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells (Greg Clark), mentioned the importance of science to yesterday’s integrated review, but the Wellcome Trust has commented: “There’s a growing gulf between rhetoric and reality in the government support for science. The Integrated Review is full of fantastic and achievable ambitions, but the words are meaningless if they’re not backed up with funding.” Funding our R&D sector makes economic sense. The Campaign for Science and Engineering found that, for every £1 of public investment in R&D, between 20p and 30p was returned every year. As my hon.”
“Our university research base contributes £95 billion to the economy, supporting nearly 1 million jobs in science institutes, charities and businesses of all sizes across the country. Twenty per cent. of the UK workforce is employed in a science or research role, and those are good, high-wage, high-skilled jobs that are helping to solve key challenges facing our country and planet—climate change, disease and productivity—and helping to ensure that the UK stays globally competitive. As the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Anthony Browne) emphasised, the pandemic has highlighted the importance of the UK’s science research base and shown the world what we can do, particularly through vaccine research and development. However, our world-leading science sector does not have the world-leading Government that it deserves.”
“It is a real pleasure to serve under your chairship for the first time, Mr Dowd. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge (Daniel Zeichner), who called today’s important debate. He is a passionate champion of science and his constituency’s science strengths. In his excellent opening remarks, he set out today’s R&D landscape, and where the Government must do better. Indeed, there has been cross-party agreement in the debate about the importance of research funding. It is unfortunate that the Government do not build on that consensus. From the gravitational constant to the structure of DNA, and from jet engines to the worldwide web, the UK has a proud tradition of science, innovation, research and development that is renowned across the world.”
“Justice delayed is justice denied. That is no cliché; it is the lived reality for the many, many victims who have not had their day in court during this pandemic. The Minister has said that he expects the number of cases to be brought back to acceptable levels before Easter 2023. Is this really acceptable, and what confidence can victims have that this late date will be met?”
“This Government have devastated the finances of local authorities, such as Newcastle City Council, cutting their funding year after year, breaking their promise to pay their covid costs and forcing them to raise council tax, which itself raises more in some areas than in others and takes money out of the pockets of those who need it most. This fund pits councils against each other to compete for meagre and recycled pots of money, with Government Departments taking all the decisions. Why does levelling up mean putting Whitehall in charge?”
“But waiting times for face-to-face appointments under the veterans’ transition, intervention and liaison mental health service was 37 days in 2020 against the Government’s own target of 14. North-east charities, such as Forward Assist and Anxious Minds in Newcastle, do fantastic work to support veterans in civilian life, but they have been overwhelmed with demand. Does the Minister agree that care for the mental wellbeing of our armed forces veterans must begin before they leave the armed forces, and what is he doing to ensure that they are better supported in that transition to civilian life?”
“The Prime Minister is far keener to celebrate a yet-to-be-built bridge between Great Britain and Northern Ireland than to take responsibility for the barriers that he has put there. Just five weeks ago, he said that the protocol must not “place… barriers of any kind…down the Irish sea.” —[ Official Report , 3 February 2021; Vol. 688, c. 948.] Will the Secretary of State explain, then, why he negotiated an agreement that did just that?”
“I am really pleased that those key points have been raised in the debate, and I hope that the Minister will set out in her response the action that the Government will take.”
“This Government have been in place, in one form or another, since 2010, and in that time we have seen a dramatic change in the prominence and the role that the online world plays in our lives, our democracy, our news and our understanding of the world, yet we have seen no action from the Government. Understanding, mapping and measuring the impact of cyber-troops on UK citizens is an action that any responsible Government should be taking. We have heard today about the ways in which cyber-troops are deployed, controlled and developed, but those strategies will not stay the same—they will continue to evolve—and we are not even playing catch-up, because we do not seem to be in the game at all.”
“Finally, anonymity is a complex issue, but the sheer scale of misinformation, online abuse and extremism means that there has to be more we can do. We recognise anonymity as a shield for whistleblowers, victims finding refuge online, or children in minorities exploring self-expression, but how does the Minister see the relationship between anonymity and the work of cyber-troops? Is she looking at the trade-off of protecting privacy and free speech—the hon. Member for Strangford talked about the importance of free speech, and I echo that point—and protecting our democracy and citizens from harm and abuse? Inaction is to make the worst trade-off of them all.”
“So far, the Government appear content to leave those issues to the market, but it is a market that has allowed the spread of disinformation, opening the door to cyber-troops. Self-regulation by the social media giants has failed, and they have made little progress. Twitter has begun checking some of its posts, and Mark Zuckerberg has rolled back on his declaration that Facebook would not become the arbiter of peace, but that is too little, too late, and there is not enough progress. Will the Minister explain why the only requirement that she places on those platforms is that they should not make money from disinformation? Surely there has to be a higher standard than not directly profiting from it.”
“What discussions has the Minister had about the need to reform our electoral system to protect it from foreign interference, as the Electoral Commission and the Law Commission have set out in a number of reports? Does she accept that cyber-troops warrant reform to our electoral laws, and what recommendations does she have, if any? It is harder than ever to trust what we see online, with fake images pretending to be from reputable sources such as the BBC and so on. As we have heard, the Government were themselves guilty of that during the 2019 general election, when they changed their official social media channels to appear as unbiased, neutral fact-checkers. The bots may be following the Prime Minister, but is the Prime Minister following the bots?”
“As we have heard, cyber-troops operate primarily on social media: Facebook, Google, YouTube, Instagram, Reddit, Twitter, and all parts of our social lives, as well as our work lives and consumer lives. However, we have little control over how that content is curated. Facebook itself says that millions of users have been exposed to coronavirus disinformation, so I ask the Minister why we are so slow to introduce any effective regulation of online content, when the online safety Bill will be before us, and whether it will include anything to address cyber-troops. The hon. Member for Midlothian also highlighted the impact of disinformation on our democracy specifically.”
“That shows how essential public understanding is in a crisis, and that the enemies of democracy will exploit every weakness. The Government launched the armed forces cyber-regiment last year. That is good, but I ask the Minister why it took so long, and whether we have already been exposed to digital hostility. The hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) emphasised the changing role of the armed forces, and I pay tribute to his work with the armed forces. What discussions has the Minister had with the Secretary of State for Defence specifically on cyber-troops? There can be confusion between the responsibilities of the National Cyber Security Centre and those of Ofcom in this key area, so could she outline where the demarcation is there?”
“With the vast range of activities, sources and strategies deployed by cyber-troops, it is important to keep up with the changing geopolitical landscape, so I ask the Minister to tell me what assessment has been made of these measures deployed by cyber-troops across the world, and specifically what the impact is on UK citizens and our democracy. The emergence of these strategies and threats is a threat to our democracy, which emphasises the importance of collaboration with our friends and allies to fully map the threats that we face. We have heard of the well-publicised Russian disinformation campaign in the US 2016 election, as well as our lack of resilience, and even as our service personnel are mobilised to help contain the pandemic, our adversaries are feeding disinformation and division into our communities.”
“These Government-sponsored accounts are not always run directly by the services whose message they are spreading, nor is that message always obvious. The University of Oxford research found one Russian cyber-trooper who ran a fortune-telling blog that provided insight into relationships, weight loss, feng shui, and just occasionally geopolitics, with the goal of weaving propaganda seamlessly into what appeared to be the non-political musings of an everyday person. The serious point is that this can be very hard to detect by the most informed consumer.”
“Members have mentioned the research by the University of Oxford that found that cyber-troop teams use a variety of strategies, tools and techniques, but they often have an overarching communications strategy that involves creating official Government applications, websites or platforms for disseminating content, using accounts that are either real, fake, or automated to interact with users on social media, or creating substantive content such as images, videos or blog posts—fake images, as well. They do not have to be sinister or abusive in themselves: for example, Israel deploys the policy of positive interactions with social media users who are critical of the Government, and the Czech Republic seeks to provide neutral fact-checking services. However, negative strategies are used, as we have heard.”
“As I understand it, he is the first Member of Parliament to mention cyber-troops in a debate, and in congratulating him—it is, as we have heard, a very important subject—I wonder why the Government are not bringing forward or raising issues of this importance. It has been 11 years since the earliest reports of organised social media manipulation in 2010, which coincided with the first Conservative Government after Labour.”
“We live in a digital age and there are, unsurprisingly perhaps, emerging digital threats to our democracy, so today’s debate is overdue and I am concerned that the Government are weak on online protections, and are presiding over continuing delays to the online safety Bill as well as failing to decisively oversee the impact of Huawei on our telecoms networks. As we have heard, cyber-troops are Government military or political party teams, committed to manipulating public opinion over social media. I want to congratulate the hon. Member for Midlothian again. I was the first Member of Parliament to mention the internet of things in the House.”
“Thank you, Sir Charles. I greatly appreciate that, but in any case I would like to start by saying what a pleasure it is to serve under your chairship, and what appropriate discretion you show. I congratulate and thank the hon. Member for Midlothian (Owen Thompson), who called today’s debate. The internet plays an ever-increasing role in our lives, as the pandemic has shown. Our work, social and family lives and our Parliament are all largely online, and we get our news from online sources and develop our politics digitally. Research by Ofcom shows that Facebook now rivals ITV as the second most popular news source for UK adults. That is reflected at party level. In 2018 the UK’s three largest parties spent £3.7 million on Facebook advertising alone, which, as Members have observed, is largely unregulated.”
“I thank the Minister for her comments and the information she is giving. Before she moves on from the unit for disinformation, when I asked recently how many full-time employees it had, the answer was none. She has talked about how spread out it is, but given the increased importance of disinformation, will there be full-time employees in the unit or will they all have other things to do as well as disinformation?”
“I thank the Minister for her comments. I asked about the role of Ofcom with regard to cyber-troops and electoral disinformation and whether she sees a role for Ofcom and the NCSC there.”
“Earlier this year, Baroness Harding defended giving £1,000 per day to private sector consultants on the failing test and trace programme. Now, the Minister says we cannot afford to give our NHS heroes a real-terms pay rise. Given that covid will be with us for years to come, given the outstanding non-covid backlog in treatment, and given the incredible pressure on NHS staff, the existing 100,000 NHS vacancies and the resulting reliance on expensive agency staff, can we really afford not to?”
“There was the continuation of existing schemes, but nothing for those who fall through the existing gaps. The Government say that local authorities have funds for discretionary grants—which is true, and Newcastle City Council has worked incredibly hard to distribute them—but it is a cowardly and base attempt to dodge responsibility. The Government know that they have not offered anything like the funding necessary to fill the gaps in support which they have created. If the Government allow our small businesses to go bankrupt, the demand we will see after this pandemic ends will be met by big national or international chains and fire-sale venture capitalists, not the local businesses that our economy and communities need.”
“They have shown amazing resilience and dedication to the protection of customers and jobs. They have invested thousands of pounds in making their premises covid-secure, in the technology to move online if they can, or in diversifying the services that they offer. Some are paying the costs of staff furlough from their own pockets and borrowing against their homes to do so. One pub owner told me that if he gets through this pandemic, he will be working for the bank for the rest of his life. I wrote to the Chancellor about the town hall that I held last month for Newcastle upon Tyne Central businesses that have been excluded from covid-19 support because they were started a week too late, earned a few pounds too much or do not have business premises. There are thousands of them in my constituency—what did the Budget do for them?”
“There is the super deduction capital allowance, which treats jacuzzis the same as manufacturing lines and rewards Amazon for investing in surveillance technology but not companies for investing in people. After a decade of the Tories religiously repeating that cutting corporation tax increases the revenues brought in, apparently raising corporation tax now increases the revenues brought in. It really is the Tory magic money tree, is it not? It shows that all the years of austerity were driven by Tory ideological fantasy, even though they were a horror story for the communities that suffered, the public services that were cut and the jobs that were lost. What about small businesses? For a year now I have heard from the wonderful, vibrant businesses in Newcastle upon Tyne Central that are trying so hard to keep going in this pandemic.”
“It is the greatest crisis that this country has faced since the second world war, and the Chancellor offers us a partisan and peripatetic Budget—partisan because it seeks to shore up the majorities of Conservative MPs, regardless of need or national benefit, and peripatetic as it jumps from area to area and sector to sector, giving and taking with no vision and little ambition, with nothing on social care, nothing for our key industries, nothing for Newcastle and almost nothing on climate change. There is an infrastructure bank with one 20th of the funding for the failing test and trace system. This should have been the moment to light up the road to recovery; instead, it is a mean and limited mates’ rates economic sticking plaster.”
“During the recent cold spell, it was heartbreaking to see rough sleepers in the heart of Newcastle in the snow. Newcastle City Council has a bed for every rough sleeper, but hostel accommodation is not suitable for everyone. Does the Secretary of State agree that annual short-term programmes, however successful, will not end rough sleeping, and will he provide the long-term funding needed to support real change at a local level, as well as greater access to social housing?”
“The Government’s infatuation with private sector delivery of pandemic public services has led them to ignore basic procurement best practice, replacing value for money with cronyism and due diligence with pub pals. Will the Government commit, as Labour has done, to a programme of insourcing and start by handing over the failing Serco test and trace to the public sector, which has made such a success of the vaccine delivery?”
“1331.] We must know, first, what that strategy is and, secondly, how this Bill is contributing positively or negatively to the telecoms landscape. The Minister said that this would undermine technology neutrality, which is somewhat rich, given that the gigabit ambition was a technologically neutral downgrading of the Prime Minister’s original fibre ambitions.”
“Labour believes that this is vital to ensure that the mechanisms in the Bill are robust and well resourced enough to ensure that legislation does not fail when it makes contact with reality. We do not want to be back here with further legislation after more wasted years for our telecoms infrastructure. This amendment provides the mechanisms to empower the Government to meet and assess their roll-out targets. The Government tell us that the Bill is just about freeholders, but it is clearly part of a larger puzzle. Indeed, the noble Lord Parkinson confirmed that, stating that the Bill was “one discrete instrument in the Government’s overall strategy” —[ Official Report, House of Lords, 2 June 2020; Vol. 803, c.”
“The Government amendment seeks to ensure that this cannot happen, and the option for diversification is left open. However, it does not encourage deployment and inter- operability. Labour is pleased that the Government have offered concessions on competitiveness and inter- operability, so we will not oppose this amendment as we consider it a gesture in the right direction. However, UK businesses and consumers deserve more than gestures. They need real action to promote competition, and the Bill was a chance for the Government to do that. Finally, Lords amendment 3 is Labour’s new clause. This has been designed to provide accountability and transparency via a review of the impact of the Bill and the sufficiency of the electronic communications code to support gigabit roll-out.”
“This has been replaced by the Government amendment in lieu, with parts (a) and (b) making technical changes to avoid contradictions between this Bill and the Communications Act 2003. We welcome that, but we are concerned that the Government missed this issue, leaving it for others to raise. The interests of tenants as well as those of leaseholders must be kept in mind. The Government’s amendment, Lords amendment 2, is based on Labour’s amendment 3 on Report. Labour is the party of business, and we are keen to remove barriers to competition and interoperability, and to encourage a competitive market. However, we feel that the Government’s changes to this amendment mean that it does not go far enough. As the Bill stands, one operator can technically “capture” a building, locking the residents into its service.”
“I join the Minister in paying tribute to the infrastructure providers who have supported our connectivity at this difficult time, while recognising how much still needs to be done to close the digital divide. I am pleased that the Lords amendments we will be discussing today reflect the issues that Labour has been raising consistently at every stage of the Bill. The first amendment removes ambiguity over the definition of a lessee and expands the scope of the Bill to be more inclusive with regard to tenants. The amendment would ensure that introductory or probationary tenancies in local authority housing, flexible or joint tenancies and demoted tenancies were all covered. Labour first raised this as amendment 2 on Report, and the Liberal Democrats tabled an amendment in the Lords.”
“I begin by thanking colleagues in the other place who have worked so hard to improve the Bill—and for longer than many would have expected, as the Government delayed the Bill until they thought they could resolve their Back Benchers’ concerns on the human rights amendment. That continues to ping-pong as part of the Trade Bill, but I hope we can now move quickly and decisively to resolve the matters of telecoms infrastructure. The pandemic has shown us how important good fast stable broadband is, with so many people currently depending on it to work from home and stay in contact with friends and family. It is just over a year since I stood at the Dispatch Box for the Second Reading of the Bill and argued that broadband was a vital utility. The pandemic has proved that beyond doubt.”
“We are all grateful to Britain’s world-leading scientists for blazing a trail of hope in this terrible pandemic, but how are Government protecting science’s future? Medical charity research is predicted to fall by over £4 billion after Government refused support. University research has only been offered loans to cover losses from international students, while 90% of UK researchers are excluded from support, even though the virus prevents them from finishing their research. Postgraduate research students from the nine doctoral training programmes have written to demand action, given the escalating scale of the crisis, and there is a massive reduction in funding for early career researchers. Why are Government not protecting the future of the science that is protecting us?”
“Yemen is the world’s gravest humanitarian emergency, with 80% of the Yemeni population reliant on humanitarian assistance and protection. If President Biden’s decision to end support for Saudi Arabia’s offensive operations in Yemen was part of his pledge to restore US moral leadership, how would the Minister characterise the UK’s continuing support for and arming of Saudi Arabia —moral indifference, perhaps?”
“Mr Speaker: “No one should have to accept racist abuse as the price to pay for being in the public eye”, the Secretary of State assured footballers. No one should have to accept racist abuse full stop, and no one should be subject to extremist grooming or have their lives endangered by anti-vax misinformation, but they are, and for 10 years Conservative Governments have refused to act. As the head of UK Counter Terrorism Policing tells us, extremism has become so widespread online that it “cannot be policed”. Will the Minister say what steps she has taken to protect us and, please, no more vague assurances for the future?”