Kanishka Narayan
MP for Vale of Glamorgan · Labour · United Kingdom
“Let me say three things. First, it is important to be clear on the data. The estimates that we have at the moment suggest data centres account for approximately 0.2% of non-household water usage in England. Secondly, when people build data centres here, we want them to build in the light of our values and what local communities need.”
House of Commons15 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We work closely with the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero and Departments across Government to ensure that critical infrastructure developments are sustainable for local resource capacity.”
House of Commons15 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We already have a series of areas of regulatory focus for artificial intelligence—data protection, competition policy, equality legislation and online safety. I was particularly proud that we were one of the first countries to ensure that the egregious impacts of AI chatbots on our children were mitigated.”
House of Commons15 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank the hon. Member for raising the advances of Culham in particular. I visited the site; I take great pride in it, as a national asset when it comes to nuclear fusion and the combination of AI and energy innovation. On his point about the G20, I am proud that the Prime Minister has set out that AI will be top of the agenda.”
House of Commons15 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank my right hon. Friend for his advocacy and leadership on this matter over the course of the last many weeks. I have mentioned already this week that I want to work with parliamentarians across the House, including him and members of his Committee, on ideas for the Cyber Security and Resilience (Network and Information Systems) Bill…”
House of Commons15 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank my hon. Friend, whose question is one we have discussed at length. The central point is that in the last wave of technology, we built neither public trust nor British technology. In this wave of AI, we are focused on building both trust and technology so we can have sovereign control over what we are building here.”
House of Commons15 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
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“Friend the Member for Reading Central (Matt Rodda) reaffirmed the point that he has made to me in person about this issue. I pay tribute again to Stuart and Amanda Stephens, who have gone through the most horrific tragedy in their family. I am deeply grateful for their grit and resilience through it, and for my hon. Friend’s advocacy alongside them. He asked me for a sense of direction on where the consultation is going. I will not pre-empt its substantive content, but we have had almost 25,000 responses—I hope and expect that this will be the most engaged-with consultation in the history of British national consultations—including thousands of young people. We have designed a dedicated version of the consultation for young people as well as one for parents and carers. I am keen to hear my hon.”
House of Commons19 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“In that context, we have taken a series of initiatives on media literacy to support the ability to sift fact from fiction across our communities. The foreign interference provisions in the Online Safety Act are also a key vector of enforcement against the causes described. On antisocial behaviour, I would be interested, in the light of the consultation, to hear from my hon. Friend the Member for Cowdenbeath and Kirkcaldy about where the headteachers and young people she has engaged with think we ought to go. I agree with her on the divisive impacts, and we will continue to look not just at illegal content but at how we empower users in relation to divisive content that, individually, might be legal but, collectively, ends up being deeply harmful to community cohesion, as well as to democratic integrity. My hon.”
House of Commons19 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“On her point about misinformation and the erosion of public trust, which was also made by the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Dr Spencer), there is a very clear foreign interference offence in the Online Safety Act. I will continue to look at the implementation of that. Alongside that, I serve on the defending democracy taskforce with the Security Minister. This is a priority question that we have been looking at. I will continue to ensure that we do more to press the enforcement of existing law and to look at where we can go further still. Both my hon. Friend the Member for Heywood and Middleton North and my hon. Friend the Member for Rochdale (Paul Waugh) raised important points about community cohesion, and how we must use online experiences not to divide but to unite our communities.”
House of Commons19 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Friend the Member for Gravesham (Dr Sullivan) raised very important points about the impact of social media usage on brain development, which is one motivating factor for our consultation. We are looking at not just acute harms, but the chronic impact over time of engagement on social media. I am grateful to her for raising the point that there is a suite of options that might be appropriate. I very much share her intent that, at the heart of it, the action we take will make platforms, not young people, responsible for the harms being conducted online. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Heywood and Middleton North (Mrs Blundell) for advocating on the questions of misinformation and community cohesion, both in her community and nationally.”
House of Commons19 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) on the illegal sale of drugs; I know that she has been, quite rightly, actively advocating on that question. She will be aware that it has been deemed a priority offence. Ofcom is closely monitoring compliance. I know there is more to do; she has made that point very firmly to me. I will also inform her that the National Crime Agency is looking to identify offenders operating online, both nationally and internationally. She made a very important point on covert filming, and we will take what she raised into consideration. Systems that are designed to remove such content will now have to do so within 48 hours of non-consensual intimate images being put up online. I will continue to look at the implementation of that measure once it comes into force. My hon.”
House of Commons19 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“She is right to raise the diversity and depth of views held on how we act, not whether we act. My hon. Friend the Member for Blaydon and Consett raised concerns about the suicide forum, which my hon. Friend the Member for Cowdenbeath and Kirkcaldy (Melanie Ward) also mentioned. I share those concerns, and I have engaged with Ofcom to ensure that it is acting quickly and robustly. I had a meeting with one of the bereaved families just this morning. I will continue to ensure that Ofcom does everything it can with the powers it has, and that we continue to look at any further powers required to ensure we act robustly to prevent any such incidents happening again. I would, of course, be delighted to meet my hon. Friend the Member for Blaydon and Consett to continue that conversation. I have had the privilege of engaging with the hon.”
House of Commons19 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The functionalities that he talked about—algorithmic recommendations and the structural aspects that make parts of social media particularly harmful to children—will be in scope. I would very much welcome his submissions on that as well. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Blaydon and Consett (Liz Twist) for her consistent advocacy on this question, and for the roundtable she held with the Mental Health Foundation and the Molly Rose Foundation, which I was glad to attend. I thank her for not just shining a light and keeping a consistent focus across the House on the scale of the problem, but flagging the diversity of views on how we should tackle it most effectively. I have been in schools pretty much every week since the launch of the consultation. I was with young people just this morning, and I will be in a school next week.”
House of Commons19 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“In the interest of time, I propose to prioritise responses to them individually before talking about the wider context. First and foremost, I thank the hon. Member for St Neots and Mid Cambridgeshire for doing a stocktake of progress on the child safety and illegal content duties so far. He will be aware that Ofcom is due to report on content harmful to children and progress on that question this year. I understand that will be due by October, and I look forward to its findings to assess where we can go further still. The only other thing I will flag to the hon. Member for St Neots and Mid Cambridgeshire is that the national consultation we have launched on children’s wellbeing includes the question of functionality limitations.”
House of Commons19 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank the hon. Member for St Neots and Mid Cambridgeshire (Ian Sollom) for bringing this important debate to the House. A number of hon. Members have mentioned bereaved families, and I want to pay tribute to all those families. Ian Russell—with whom I have had a series of meetings, including this morning—Stuart and Amanda Stephens, Ellen Roome and so many others have gone through the most horrific of tragedies, and despite that, they have consistently fought for appropriate action for other families. I carry them in my heart and mind when I think about the prospect of online safety regulation doing justice to future generations of children in this country. I am grateful to the hon. Member for St Neots and Mid Cambridgeshire and to the other Members who made contributions on this important topic.”
House of Commons19 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“One of the defining impacts of this Government is the action that we are taking to tackle violence against women and girls, and that means making illegal online that which is illegal offline. Intimate image abuse is now a priority offence; cyber-flashing is a priority offence; nudification apps are being banned, and we are standing up to Grok, and as a result the spread of intimate deepfakes has stopped; and non-consensual intimate images are now taken down within 48 hours. We will of course continue to engage with the BBFC and a range of other organisations in fulfilling our demands for parity.”
House of Commons18 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I pay tribute to my hon. Friend’s engagement in her constituency and on this debate nationally. She has been a strong champion for the voices of victims, particularly in relation to this question. I entirely agree with her demands for parity, and that is exactly the commitment we have made as a Government. We have set up a cross-Government unit to make sure that we deliver on that plan within six months.”
House of Commons18 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank the hon. Member for that incredibly important point. That is exactly why we have already made a series of legal changes, not least to ensure that cyber-flashing and intimate image abuse are priority offences under the Online Safety Act 2023. We have mandated highly effective age assurance on pornography sites and sites with content that is harmful to children. We want to go further still where there is clear evidence to do so, and we will do that through the national consultation that we have launched.”
House of Commons18 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“First, may I affirm the importance of the project that the right hon. Gentleman is talking about? The Government are backing the future of nuclear fusion across the country, and this site in particular has a huge contribution to make. Construction will be on its way by the end of the decade, with research and development tests before that. At the heart of it, we will be backing the use of AI to further our clean energy goals in fusion and beyond.”
House of Commons18 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I think that they are pursued with a deeper sense of building public consensus if we are able to show that our clean energy values align with our prosperity aspirations around AI and technology, not just domestically but through Britain’s ability to export lessons and technology to other places, and to move the needle on global climate change.”
House of Commons11 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“He will be glad to hear that, in this role, I was back in Northern Ireland at the artificial intelligence collaboration centre at Ulster University, seeing not just the world-leading cyber capabilities in Belfast and Northern Ireland but the transformational effect that Ulster University’s investments have had on the city by creating opportunities for young people. He will also be glad to hear that just this morning, I spent time with the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland talking about our shared ambition to do even more to support the cyber and AI sectors in Northern Ireland. The points of the hon. Member for West Dorset (Edward Morello) about energy tech were well made. I feel very strongly that our plans on clean energy are best pursued if they make the most of AI and modern technology.”
House of Commons11 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I will say how excited I am about the historic growth in AI investment in the wider region, which I hope will create a series of opportunities for investment, and opportunities for young people growing up in and around Glasgow to take part in it. My hon. Friend’s mention of photonics is deeply important. Photonics is not just a British strength but an increasingly important vector for national security strength globally in the semiconductor context. I am grateful to her for championing that subsector. In response to the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), I note that Northern Ireland is indeed close to my heart. I grew up visiting Northern Ireland and Belfast for lots of debating competitions.”
House of Commons11 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I share her ambition for UK tech businesses to start, scale and stay here. My hon. Friend the Member for Weston-super-Mare (Dan Aldridge) has deep experience, and is also no longer in his place—despite that experience. I agree with him that although our policy is often in a good place, there is a lot more for us to do to spread awareness of that policy. I would be happy to visit him, and others, to be a small part of spreading that awareness. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Alison Taylor) for her strong advocacy for the innovation zone, both prior to and subsequent to coming to this House. She has won £38.7 million for travel support in particular and transport support more generally in that innovation zone.”
House of Commons11 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Friend the Member for Leeds South West and Morley (Mark Sewards)—the AI MP—who is no longer in his place, made a similar and important point about Leeds’s Nexus hub. I have visited Leeds in this role, and I particularly value the contributions of Leeds’s tech sector to healthcare and financial services innovation. The hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells (Mike Martin) made a deeply important point about procurement, which was shared by the Liberal Democrat spokesperson, the hon. Member for Harpenden and Berkhamsted (Victoria Collins). I have a particular interest in defence procurement that I hope to come to more fully in my speech. The hon. Member for Tiverton and Minehead (Rachel Gilmour), who is no longer in her place, has always been a strong champion for family businesses in the contexts of technology and agriculture.”
House of Commons11 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I will make sure that we think about that deeply and engage with the CMA on the implications for agentic AI, the possibility of bundling and the limited competition that might result. My hon. Friend the Member for Caerphilly (Chris Evans) raised the virtues of the Welsh ecosystem. It is an ecosystem that I know and deeply value personally. I particularly value my hon. Friend’s advocacy for Academii, in his constituency. His point about clusters anchored by Welsh universities is really well made. As a Government, we have committed over £1.5 billion to the question of how research translates into commercialisation. I would be happy to engage further with him on any particular instances where the Government can do more, in his constituency and beyond. My hon.”
House of Commons11 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“When the shadow Minister talks about the benchmark as being European growth, I fear I have to say, given that it is ambition season among Conservative Front Benchers, that she might consider joining that and raising the ambition to being a global first, not just a European-relative first. In that period, as the hon. Member for Bromley and Biggin Hill and the shadow Minister noted, power concentrated in the cloud market in particular and right across US big tech. It was clear to me at the time that the Government were much more focused on engagement with US big tech and exactly the trend that the shadow Minister described—the power concentrated in the cloud market. The shadow Minister’s points on agentic AI are very well made.”
House of Commons11 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Those two issues overlap much more than we often give the CMA credit for. I will briefly take the opportunity to address the shadow Minister’s history of the UK tech sector over the last 14 years. Having been in that sector through part of that time, although I very much value the growth seen in the period, I am also conscious of the particular fact that drove me into politics: over that entire period—one of the most productive periods in global technology markets—no one growing up in this country ever saw a company go from zero to the global top 10; in the United States, in that same period, people saw eight out of those top 10 companies do that. The levels of capital investment and IT in this country were materially below that of the United States.”
House of Commons11 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The CMA assures the Government that it continues to monitor firm compliance. If Apple and Google fail to meet their commitments, the CMA will consider the use of statutory powers to take further action. I am conscious that it has just finished consulting, as the shadow Minister mentioned, on the first set of remedies and commitments in the light of the designations of Google, in search, and Apple and Google, in mobile platform markets. I expect very soon to hear greater detail, as well as firm timelines, on that particular point. The virtue of the previous Government’s digital markets regime is that it is flexible and proportionate, and allows for some remedies that are quicker, and others, where this is due, that are more robust. The Government expect that the CMA will act in line with its growth and competition mandate.”
House of Commons11 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The innovations they bring are delivering major benefits to people and communities right across the country, transforming everything from the way we work to how we manage our health. Given the luxury of time, I propose to respond to each of the points raised by hon. Members. First, I very much appreciate the points on competition policy made by the hon. Member for Bromley and Biggin Hill, and shared by the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Hornchurch and Upminster (Julia Lopez). Of course, I am reluctant to mention any specifics about the interventions, investigations or engagements the CMA is pursuing as an independent regulator. As the shadow Minister acknowledged, the commitments that the CMA has looked at could be quicker than a full conduct requirement process.”
House of Commons11 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Mr Betts. I thank the hon. Member for Bromley and Biggin Hill (Peter Fortune) for securing this important debate on Government support for UK-based tech companies. I am grateful to him and to all other hon. Members across the Chamber for their contributions. They did a sterling job of showing that the UK is truly a buzzing tech economy in every single part of the country—right across the constituencies represented here and beyond. This Government are committed to supporting the UK’s thriving tech ecosystem. We are proud to be home to the largest tech sector in Europe, valued at nearly £1 trillion. The success of UK-based technology firms benefits us all. These are some of the fastest growing parts of the economy and are already employing millions of people.”
House of Commons11 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“At the heart of all this is a culture that prizes innovation and that says to entrepreneurs that their success is our national success, and that their companies are national champions when they create jobs and invest in frontier innovation here. We are radically shifting Britain’s culture to being a culture of agency and innovation. In that context, I am grateful to all Members across the House for their partnership in that mission. The UK’s exceptional technology sector is a key national asset. The steps that the Government are taking will ensure that UK-based tech companies thrive at every stage of their growth.”
House of Commons11 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“When it comes to building a sense of community for talent in this country, the global talent taskforce, the global talent fund and, crucially, the enterprise management incentives scheme—now one of the world’s best tax incentive schemes for early-stage employees to have deep equity participation in start-ups—mean that Britain is at the front of the queue in convening a compelling community of tech talent. When it comes to clarity on regulation, the AI growth lab, the Regulatory Innovation Office reforms that I mentioned and the growth mandates for regulators mean that Britain is regulating dynamically —moving regulation at the pace of technological progress.”
House of Commons11 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We are right across the things that matter to start-ups here in relation to capital: the force that is the BBB investing more; the National Wealth Fund investing more; a sovereign AI unit investing earlier; and the Mansion House pension fund reforms that are spurring greater investment. We are bringing capital to the service of British start-ups. In the context of compute—a critical input for AI—both our AI growth zones programme and our AI research resource programme are ensuring that British companies are at the front of the queue when it comes to adequate compute for AI. When it comes to Government as a customer, the advance market commitment and the reforms that I mentioned in relation to the MOD aspire to that and to ensuring that the Government are the best partner that UK start-ups can benefit from.”
House of Commons11 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“This debate is about UK-based businesses, but we must also recognise that we are part of a global market, with the huge opportunities that that offers. We are working hard with our international partners to boost collaboration and open new markets for innovative firms globally. We have agreed industrial strategy partnerships with France and Japan, have a Saudi-UK strategic partnership and an India-UK technology security initiative, and are pursuing deeper connections still with other key markets. Last autumn, the top US tech firms, mentioned across this debate, committed to investing £31 billion in the UK.”
House of Commons11 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“That is why we have set up the Regulatory Innovation Office, which has invested over £12.5 million already in helping regulators to adopt new tools and approaches. Sometimes it is challenging to bring new technologies to market, so we are also reforming how the Government procure technologies to lead the way and back British SMEs. In the autumn Budget, we announced an advance market commitment, backed with £100 million of Government funding, to buy products from novel and promising UK chip companies—an important economic as well as national security focus—once they reach a high-performance benchmark. I know that the Ministry of Defence has committed to a significant budget allocation to novel technology procurement and I am keen to ensure that the design and process for that are as compelling as the scale of that ambition.”
House of Commons11 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We are ensuring that firms have access to the best skills and talent through our £187 million TechFirst skills programme and we are hoping to attract the very best minds in the world through the Government’s global talent taskforce, as well as the £54 million global talent fund. We are not stopping there. Across the board, we are looking at how we can use the Government’s levers to support our technology ecosystem. Part of that is about infrastructure, whether that is connecting people, businesses and universities through initiatives like the Oxford-to-Cambridge growth corridor, or funding the specialist infrastructure that tech companies need through the AI research resource and engineering biology scale-up infrastructure programmes. It is also about regulations that help, not hinder, new products to reach the market.”
House of Commons11 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“To ensure that the benefits are felt right across the country, we are backing high-potential innovation clusters throughout the UK through programmes such as the local innovation partnerships fund. Brilliant ideas alone, of course, are not enough to grow a business, so we are taking a whole-of-government approach to ensure that the right conditions are in place for businesses to reach their full potential. We are expanding the British Business Bank to give high-growth tech firms access to long-term scale-up capital. We are upskilling private investors to invest in deep tech through our science and technology venture capital fellowship programme.”
House of Commons11 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“As the Chancellor made clear, the Government are backing the next generation of UK tech start-ups and entrepreneurs. These plans are about making sure that we are supporting our tech companies at every stage of their development. A great tech company starts with an idea. That is why we are making a record public investment in R&D, with spending rising to £22.6 billion by 2029-30. We have one of the most generous R&D tax credit relief systems in the entire world, and I have personally heard testament to that from a series of founders in the UK ecosystem, not least in AI, over the past few weeks. Through our industrial strategy, we are also making sure that investment is targeted to bring innovation to market, with £7 billion for innovative companies to scale and commercialise technological and scientific breakthroughs.”
House of Commons11 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“That is why, in our modern industrial strategy, we set out the first dedicated plan to support the UK’s digital and technologies sector, alongside a separate plan for life sciences. For digital and technologies, we have focused on six frontier technologies with the greatest potential to drive growth: advanced connectivity, AI, cyber-security, engineering biology, quantum and semiconductors. By 2035, we want the UK to be one of the world’s top three places to create, invest and scale up a fast-growing technology business. Building on the industrial strategy, we went further still at the 2025 autumn Budget. We set out a package of additional support for founders and innovators to start and scale businesses here in the UK, including reforms to Government procurement, tax and our public finance institutions.”
House of Commons11 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I am delighted to hear about the history of entrepreneurship in the family of the Liberal Democrat spokesperson, and I am keen on any lessons from her mother about Twitter engagement. I also share and value her ambition for more entrepreneurship; that dream is shared across the House as well. I will come to her five points, which I think the Government are equally focused on. I will now set out some of the things that the Government are doing. As I mentioned, we start from a position of considerable global strength. Four of the world’s top 10 universities are in the UK, and we have a proud history of technological innovation, but there is clearly more to be done.”
House of Commons11 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I have a 100% record so far of committing to visits when asked. I do not want to set too much of a precedent, but given the numbers in the room, I would be happy to take the hon. Member up on his kind offer as well. The hon. Member also made an important point about SME representation on trade missions; on the three international visits that I have been on—to the US, South Korea and India—we have been primarily focused on SMEs. If he has recommendations of firms that would benefit from such engagement, I would be keen to take him up on them—perhaps we can discuss that in West Dorset during my visit. On word clouds, which he mentioned—I know a thing or two about word clouds—he is right about the presence of the word “ecosystem”. I would add “deeply thriving” to that, because that is what Britain’s ecosystem is.”
House of Commons11 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We are the party of labour; we understand that who has power matters as much as what the powers are. In that context, one of the first things I did in my role was to engage with a series of companies in every part of the stack so that we were able to build more diversity into the landscape. The third rung of the ladder is, ultimately, to build British in order to make sure that we have the full-fat version of sovereign capability here in critical parts of the stack.”
House of Commons10 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is to take the best tools the world has to offer today, but also to shape the rest, and ultimately to make that which is critical here in Britain. As I think of it, that strategic leverage is obtained by three steps on a ladder. The first is just to have enough of the critical inputs. Taking AI as an example, we have to have enough chips today to be able to do anything with AI in the first instance. With that in mind, the Government have always been very keen to secure the level of capital investment that means that Britain is at least at the table with critical inputs. Once we are at the table, the second part of sovereignty is to make sure that we have some diversification in who we procure critical inputs from so that we can bargain effectively.”
House of Commons10 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“In Westminster, we sometimes talk about technology sovereignty as an abstract geopolitical goal, but we have to keep in mind that, ultimately, it is the basis for our NHS radiologists to have access to the best tools for detecting cancer, with data here in the UK; for British founders and builders to be able to train and deploy models, rather than depending on foreign APIs and pricing; and for people in their homes and workplaces across the country to know that their everyday AI systems are governed transparently and democratically here in the UK. My view is that technology sovereignty is a state’s ability to have strategic leverage when it comes to a technology, such that it can ensure ongoing access to critical inputs and ongoing assurance that its wider economic and national security objectives can be met more broadly.”
House of Commons10 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is such a pleasure to serve under you in the Chair, Ms Vaz. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West (Dame Chi Onwurah), the Chair of the Science, Innovation and Technology Committee, for securing this debate and bringing to it her deep expertise across engineering, policymaking and leadership in the House on the question of tech sovereignty. I also thank all hon. Members for making very thoughtful points and bringing to the debate a range of experiences—as well as swiftness of speech, given the constraints imposed by time today. I have long felt that the central question in our politics and for our country is the future of technology in this country. It will be the major driver of prosperity and dignity for people, and the central question is whether Britain gets to shape it or is shaped by it.”
House of Commons10 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Friend the Member for Southend East and Rochford, IP capitalisation is a deeply important part of what I focus on with the Intellectual Property Office, and I am happy to engage him on the question of Essex University in particular.”
House of Commons10 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“That means, in the context of quantum, more companies starting, growing and staying here and, in the context of AI, not just developing capabilities in particular parts of the stack, but in part looking upstream for skills as well. In that context, I agree totally with my hon. Friends the Members for Cambridge (Daniel Zeichner) and for Southend East and Rochford (Mr Alaba) that the quality and scale of our talent and skills in our universities and schools is the single biggest determinant of where we end up. I am happy to write to my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge about the UKRI changes that we are making. In answer to my hon.”
House of Commons10 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Friends the Members for Milton Keynes Central (Emily Darlington) and for Lichfield (Dave Robertson), who made important points about quantum, that the Government have doubled the rate of investment in quantum, with about £1 billion committed over the next four years. The points on helium made by my hon. Friend the Member for Lichfield have very much been taken into account. The Government are looking at the developing situation on helium supply in the middle east, which is of concern. Through our national programme, we broadly want to anchor development and access to technological capabilities that are most important to economic growth and national security.”
House of Commons10 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The focus of the unit will be on both capital and compute, to incrementally anchor more and more British companies here, but I know that the unit will only be part of the solution. We have a role to look at innovation and market support much more broadly across the tech landscape. In November, we also announced a significant advance market commitment—a deeply innovative procurement shift—which meant that up to £100 million in Government funding was available to buy products from promising UK chip companies once they reach a high-performance benchmark. That presents UK start-ups with an exciting opportunity to grow and compete right here, building for the world. AI is of course just one area of Britain’s flourishing tech ecosystem. I point out to my hon.”
House of Commons10 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It will concentrate efforts on priority areas. There was interest in my specifying those areas. The four areas that are of interest at the outset are novel compute, in particular focusing on the inference chip part of the stack; novel model architecture; AI for science—I point hon. Members to the AI for science strategy published by the Department three or four months ago, which set out particular areas of focus and priority—and embodied AI. To give a concrete example of early action that the sovereign AI unit has taken, we have already invested £8 million in the OpenBind consortium to accelerate AI-driven drug discovery, and £5 million in the Encode: AI for Science fellowship to support the next generation of world-class talent.”
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“When it comes to models, we have huge strengths, not just because a number of the Gemini teams and researchers continue to sit in King’s Cross at DeepMind, but because companies developing foundation models in AI for science and autonomous vehicles, embodied AI, and aspects of world models and computer vision reside here in the UK. Wayve raised £1.5 billion just this year, the largest funding round in Europe to date for that stage. It is a fantastic company that looks in particular at embodied AI and vision. I am proud of those companies. It is right that the Government are supporting them through the lens of tech sovereignty, as that is what both Britain’s and the companies’ best interests dictate. The sovereign AI unit will be crucial to that. I am glad to see the level of interest in that across the House.”
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“I am happy to discuss that further if it is of interest. As I said, the third rung of the ladder is, ultimately, to build British and focus on areas in which we can develop our strengths. I have to point out that we made sure that Nscale, one of our neocloud hyperscale providers, was an important part of the supply chain for AI growth zones. I noticed that yesterday Nscale raised the largest ever series-C funding in Europe, in part as a result of the Government’s support and convening in that context. Arm, the leading chip design company globally, is still headquartered in Cambridge, and we have fantastic companies in the AI inference chip part of the stack, Fractile and Olix being two of them. It is an area that I spend a lot of my time on.”
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“I valued my hon. Friend’s earlier point that sovereignty has to be seen in the round. We cannot make everything here; we have to look at the entire bundle that we have to offer. In the context of LLMs, there is some uncertainty as to whether all the capability will ultimately accrue in closed proprietary models, or whether open-source, open-weight models might be part of it. To me, as things stand today, it is a pretty important part of the stack. The question then is whether we have enough of it to be able to make the most of it by adopting it for economic and national security usage here, or whether there are aspects in which, at least from a distillation or small-model point of view, we need to develop some capabilities here as well. I do not think there is a binary answer to the overarching question; the answer is much more nuanced.”
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“In north Wales, data centres are pulling our nuclear small modular reactor into the future, which is critical to thousands of jobs in that community. In Lanarkshire, the old steelworking community, which lost thousands of jobs and never fully recovered, now has hope from half a billion pounds of community investment as a result of data centres. That is precisely what I believe in.”
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“Friend the Member for Mansfield (Steve Yemm) spoke very thoughtfully about the fact that we should not just rely on venture-focused companies in particular parts of the country, but look at our industrial heritage. That is exactly why I have focused on ensuring that the AI growth zones programme puts data centres in the north-east, alongside the headquarters of our largest listed tech company. A deep heritage of financial services technology innovation in Newcastle and the surrounding area is now able to benefit from good jobs anchored by that data centre. In south Wales, the data centre planned for the site of the old Ford car manufacturing plant gives hope for jobs in the semiconductor cluster, anchored by that data centre. That is critical.”
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“The hon. Member is absolutely right to raise that point about a defence for cyber-security purposes. The Computer Misuse Act is being reviewed at the moment—the Home Office is looking at it—but, as I mentioned in Committee on the Cyber Security and Resilience (Network and Information Systems) Bill, that is not the appropriate vehicle, given its much narrower scope than the broad scope that we would like in the context of a defence. For those reasons, I am keen that we pursue the matter, but elsewhere. I am conscious of time, so I will proceed at pace. Alongside quantum and AI, semiconductors are another technology that underpins the global economy and is fundamental to our way of life. As part of our industrial strategy, digital and technology sector plan, we are taking measures to foster the growth of that particular sector. My hon.”
House of Commons10 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗