Westminster Hall

Wednesday 11th March 2026 Westminster Hall

Wednesday 11 March 2026

[Dr Andrew Murrison in the Chair]

Rough Sleeping: Families with Children

Wednesday 11th March 2026 Westminster Hall

00:00

[Paula Barker (Liverpool Wavertree) (Lab) [R]]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the matter of rough sleeping among families with children.

I place on the record my co-chairship of the all-party parliamentary group for ending homelessness. It is always an honour to speak in a debate under your stewardship, Dr Murrison, but I deeply regret the need to have this debate today.

Government policy is clear. The letter of the law is clear. Basic decency is clear. No child should have to sleep rough on the streets of this country. Despite that, I found myself last week watching a stark ITV News report by Dan Hewitt revealing that the homelessness charity Crisis is seeing growing numbers of families with children who are homeless and approaching it for help after being turned away by their councils. In some cases, that has forced those families and children to sleep rough.

Over six months, Crisis has identified 134 cases of families with children and pregnant mothers who came to its services asking for help to avoid or end their homelessness, because they had been unable to access support from their local authority. One hundred and thirty-four cases—that is about four a week, or almost one every single working day. Those cases included children as young as four, a child with epilepsy, refugees we have welcomed and single mothers. All were people who needed help, but were utterly failed by our broken system.

In my time as shadow Minister for homelessness and rough sleeping and in continuing to be an advocate since then, I have heard many heartbreaking stories while campaigning in this space. I have seen relentless record highs in the numbers of people forced to sleep rough, people discharged from hospital to recover on the streets, and children doing their homework in mouldy bed-and-breakfasts. I thought I could no longer be shocked by how deep this crack in the foundation of our society runs, but I was wrong.

Hearing about children being forced to sleep rough while the services built to help them played “pass the parcel” with their future was profoundly shocking. Before we talk about national plans, funding pots and statutory duties, I want everyone in this Chamber today to sit with these thoughts. What if that were me? What if it were my child having nowhere in the world to go, sleeping in a car or on the steps of a town hall, confused and getting colder, hungrier and more scared every night? How did it come to this? How is our system so broken that we cannot even keep children from having to sleep rough?

We can end this scandal and deliver historic change if we hold on to the moral clarity that we feel right now and pull every lever we have. There are still many levers we can pull if we have the political will to prioritise this issue. I am deeply grateful to my hon. Friend the Minister because she has already written to all the councils in the country to remind them of their clear duties under section 17 of the Children Act 1989 and under the Housing Act 1996. However, will she set out what accountability measures will be put in place to ensure that situations like this are unheard of, as they should be?

These cases also show how guidance, laws and letters can take us only so far. I do not believe that anyone goes to work wanting to refuse help to a child facing rough sleeping, but the fact is that that is happening. It shows just how broken our system really is and how critical it is that we reduce the number of people and families being pushed into homelessness.

I welcome the Government’s national plan to end homelessness. It is an historic first in tackling a range of forms of homelessness across England, setting out a new duty to collaborate between six key Departments, with outcomes frameworks for local authorities, and matching our APPG’s call for the collation of homelessness funding into a multi-annual pot. However, when the APPG for ending homelessness, which I co-chair, produced our “Homes, Support, Prevention” report, we listened closely to the homelessness sector—researchers, councils and experts by experience—to identify three key pillars that the Government need to address. The national plan only really addresses one and a half of those pillars. Without delivering on all three, some of which I accept are beyond even the Minister’s capable reach, families will keep being forced into desperate situations.

The plan broadly focused on what we called the support pillar, with toolkits and an outcomes framework for local authorities that will be published in due course, as well as the prevention pillar, through the new duty to collaborate. I would welcome any further information the Minister can provide about the timeline for the consultations on the toolkit and the new duty.

However, when we review the prevention targets, it becomes clear that a key driver of homelessness is not being adequately addressed: Home Office policy. Homelessness after move-on from asylum accommodation rose by 37% according to the last Crisis homelessness monitor for England, yet the only target the Home Office has signed up to is informing councils about when people are leaving its accommodation. The Home Office has effectively been let off the hook when it comes to preventing homelessness among refugees—people we have welcomed here—and has instead been allowed to start doing what other Departments have been expected to do for years under the duty to refer. This is a huge hole in the preventive wall the Minister is working to construct—one that will see homelessness and further division spreading across the country if it is not closed.

I would like to talk about homes. Homes are the best and only truly sustainable way to end and prevent people’s homelessness, yet across the country an affordable home is becoming a pipe dream for whole communities, leading directly to unsustainable numbers of people needing homelessness support. It does not matter how quickly or effectively we bail if the boat is still sinking. It is therefore vital that the Government step up their social house building targets until the crucial 90,000 social homes per year—a figure supported across the homelessness sector—has been reached.

One way that could be done is by stepping up work on empty homes. Analysis by Crisis found that just £1.38 billion of direct Government investment in local authorities and partner agencies could bring 40,000 long- term empty homes back into use as social homes over four years. I appreciate that this is not directly the Minister’s brief, but how is she working to ensure that the Minister for Housing and Planning understands the need for homes for people experiencing homelessness?

We also need to look at short-term measures. The review of social homes allocation policy is welcome, but there needs to be a commitment to legislative change. The feedback I received from the 27 organisations on our APPG steering group was that people experiencing homelessness face a range of barriers to accessing social homes beyond simply supply, including being dubbed “too poor” to afford social rent homes. How far have we come from the purpose of social housing as housing to ensure that everyone can afford a home if people across Britain are being deemed “too poor” for it? Where are they meant to go? Supported housing, temporary accommodation, the street—back into the bowels of the system. I would welcome it if the Minister set out a timeline for her review of social homes allocation policy.

Given the lack of social homes, the affordability of the private rented sector is crucial. For people who rely on benefits to pay their rent, the Chancellor’s announcement in the Budget in November that the two-child benefit limit will be abolished was extremely good news. However, as it stands, many families in my constituency of Liverpool Wavertree and across the country are still struggling. There is an average gap of £200 per month between local housing allowance and the median rent for a home. That gap can turn a bump in the road into a car crash. If people lose their job, need to take up caring responsibilities or fall ill, they can no longer afford to pay their rent. When they are pushed into homelessness, the local council simply cannot find a local home that those people can afford, trapping them in temporary accommodation at much greater expense to the state—a classic false economy.

I know that the Minister understands these issues. At a recent meeting of the APPG for ending homelessness, I was struck by her focus on the structural causes of homelessness, rather than on individuals. That is a welcome step forward from the last Government, but I am concerned that that understanding is not shared across other Departments.

Do the Department for Work and Pensions and the Treasury know how hard it is for families on universal credit to keep a roof over their heads, given that fewer than three in every 100 homes are affordable on local housing allowance, and that the LHA freeze is pushing people into homelessness? Does the Home Office care that when it slashed the move-on period from asylum accommodation from 56 days to 28 days, it made it impossible for families who have been granted asylum to find a home in that time, and that is pushing people into homelessness? I would welcome it if the Minister set out how often the interministerial group on tackling homelessness and rough sleeping will meet. Will she commit to publishing the minutes? What steps will be taken if Departments in that group do not deliver on their stated commitments?

We must not let national Government play “pass the parcel”, as local government has. Children’s lives are hanging in the balance. I know the Minister shares that determination, and I hope the Government as a whole do too.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Dr Andrew Murrison (in the Chair)]

Order. I intend to call the Front Benchers at 10.28 am, so brevity will be a virtue.

09:41

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Dr Murrison. I thank the hon. Member for Liverpool Wavertree (Paula Barker) for leading the debate. She often brings important debates to the House, especially on issues such as this. I welcome her contribution. She showed passion and understanding from her constituency, and she expressed that incredibly well. I am pleased to see the Minister in her place again. She has been a frequent visitor to Westminster Hall in the past two days; it is always a pleasure to see her in her place. I wish the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Hamble Valley (Paul Holmes), well too.

I have seen on social media awful revelations that in England children as young as three, holding on to their mummies—three years old; my goodness!—are being forced to sleep rough with their families. What an awful thing that is to think about and to experience, even if at that young age they may not exactly understand all that is happening. The hon. Member for Liverpool Wavertree is right to raise this issue. It is our duty to ensure that no child—furthermore, no individual—is ever subject to sleeping rough with little or no support. The hon. Lady conveyed her revelations and personal experience very well through her words today. This should not be allowed to happen.

There are many charities in Northern Ireland and across this great United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland that contribute and do well. I want to thank the church groups in my constituency that collectively and ecumenically come together to help families in need at the time that they need it. The good will and Christian faith that drive people and churches to do that are often underestimated; I thank them for that.

The Simon Community is very active in Northern Ireland. I have used its stats and information as evidence. In audits it carried out across Northern Ireland, the number of people observed sleeping rough has ranged from zero to 19 per night—it very much depends on the circumstances—with an average of six in certain monitored areas. To be fair, in Northern Ireland rough sleeping among families with children is relatively uncommon, because families are usually placed quickly in temporary accommodation. When there is a rush because circumstances overtake them and they have to leave their house—domestic abuse can be one of the reasons for that—the authorities quickly jump in to give temporary accommodation. Rough sleeping is not something that we see much of in Northern Ireland because of the methodology that the authorities use to ensure that families are housed.

I am ever mindful that this is a devolved matter, but my request of the Minister is that we learn together. That is an example of what we do. Maybe things are different in Northern Ireland and the temporary accommodation is a bit more abundant. Maybe the way we do things works. Again, I just want to be helpful in this conversation today.

As of November 2024, almost 5,400 children were living in temporary accommodation in Northern Ireland. That is the other side of the coin, which illustrates very clearly that there is much need. Temporary accommodation is often under the “homeless” category as properties are not permanent places of residence and are often, with respect, substandard and not always up to the standard they should be. The figures are increasing, showing that there is a real issue and that steps are not being taken to address it.

Loss of housing and domestic abuse are significant drivers of homelessness. Victims of domestic abuse might be forced to leave their homes suddenly to protect themselves and their children, often without time to secure alternative accommodation. Given the shocking stats in Northern Ireland in relation to domestic abuse and violence against women, I want to reiterate how important it is that we make those services available and known and that we continue to ensure they are fit for purpose to provide support for those who need it most.

I am working on the assumption that my speech will be about five minutes, to make sure that everybody else can get in. Although families with children sleeping rough are often hidden from official stats, the reality is stark: this is real. In England alone, over 140,000 children are living in temporary accommodation, and the problem is not confined to one region—it affects communities in Scotland, Wales, England and Northern Ireland alike. Things do not stop at the Irish sea and at borders. We must do more on a UK-wide basis to prevent families from reaching crisis point and to expand access to safe and affordable housing.

I congratulate the Government on removing the two-child benefit cap. That made sure that almost 60,000 children in Northern Ireland from 13,000 families were lifted out of poverty. I have put that on the record in the main Chamber and I say it again in this one. Some of the work that the Government are doing is to be welcomed and encouraged, but we need to ensure that every child has a secure home. I look to the Minister to commit to that.

09:47

[Steve Witherden (Montgomeryshire and Glyndŵr) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Dr Murrison. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool Wavertree (Paula Barker) for securing this debate and for her tireless work on tackling homelessness.

The crippling cost of living, sky-high private rents and the lack of social housing in the UK mean that far too many people have no option other than to spend the night on the street. We hear reports of people sleeping in cars, pregnant women turned away from support by their local councils, and children as young as four years old forced to sleep rough. In the sixth richest country in the world, those are despicable reminders of how broken our system is. We know the detrimental effect that sleeping rough and housing insecurity can have on children’s health, education and life chances.

The trauma of living in insecure, temporary and often dangerous conditions can have lifelong impacts on physical and mental health, housing stability and economic prospects. Children experiencing homelessness face increased rates of infection, asthma and sleep deprivation, high rates of anxiety, depression and behavioural issues, and a higher likelihood of being exposed to violence, crime and the risk of sexual assault. The streets are no place for children to be sleeping. It has a knock-on effect across other areas of children’s lives: disrupted education, increased school drop-out rates and children forced to hide their situation, leading to social exclusion. We must do better.

A huge driver of homelessness and rough sleeping is the current unaffordability of the private rented sector. Two weeks ago, the Welsh Affairs Committee heard evidence from Shelter Cymru, Cymorth, the Bevan Foundation and Crisis. Private rents in Wales are increasing faster than anywhere else in Great Britain. In the last year, private rents in Wales have gone up by 6% on average. In England and Scotland, the figure is closer to 3%. Housing is devolved in Wales, but there are levers that can be pulled in Westminster, particularly around benefits, to immediately prevent more people from being forced into homelessness, the most effective of which would be unfreezing local housing allowance and restoring it to cover the true cost of rent.

Local housing allowance is a massive driver not just of homelessness in general, but of keeping people in homelessness, in turn affecting those sleeping rough, including children. When LHA was introduced by Labour in 2008, it was intended to cover private rents up to the 50th percentile—the lowest 50% of rents in a local area. Due to subsequent policy changes and freezes, LHA now covers only 1% of private rents in Wales, and 2.5% in England. I call on this Government to end the routine freezing of LHA and permanently relink it to the 50th percentile of local private rents, in line with the Welsh Government’s position. That is a vital step to prevent homelessness, tackle inequality and further rebalance the power of private tenants.

How can the Government achieve their plan to halve long-term rough sleeping and prevent homelessness if people on low incomes simply cannot afford a local home?

[Rachel Gilmour (Tiverton and Minehead) (LD)]

I was shocked, although perhaps not entirely surprised, to learn that among local authorities, Somerset has the third highest number of young people sleeping rough, in absolute terms, in the country. It struck me even more that it is sandwiched between urban areas. Does the hon. Member agree that the challenges of destitution and homelessness for families are as acute but far less visible, which often leads to rural rough sleeping being overlooked in national policy considerations?

[Steve Witherden]

The hon. Lady and I both represent rural parts of England and Wales, and she makes an extremely valid point. Not only do rural areas often get overlooked, but there is simply less housing in those areas—it is a double whammy. I thank her for her welcome intervention.

We must ensure that no child is forced to sleep rough in any circumstances. The measures that I have outlined today would be a vital step towards achieving that. Diolch yn fawr.

09:52

[Iqbal Mohamed (Dewsbury and Batley) (Ind)]

It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Dr Murrison. I thank the hon. Member for Liverpool Wavertree (Paula Barker) for securing this important debate. I will repeat and add to a couple of points that we have already heard.

It is not an unfortunate inevitability but a national disgrace that, in one of the wealthiest countries on Earth, families with children are still being pushed into homelessness and, in some cases, on to the streets. We are a country with immense resources and capacity to solve problems—one that spends tens of billions of pounds on weapons every year, and that has just opened Crossrail, the Elizabeth line, after one of Europe’s largest construction projects—yet we cannot guarantee that every child in this country has a safe and secure roof over their head when they go to sleep at night. That is a fundamentally moral contradiction, and it should weigh heavily on all of us, as parliamentarians with the collective power to change that status quo.

The statistics alone paint a bleak picture. In autumn 2025, an estimated 4,793 people were sleeping rough on a single night in England: a record high, and a 171% increase since 2010. We must remember that the figure, which is a snapshot of just one night, is widely acknowledged to have been undercounted. Even more shockingly, recent reports suggest that families with young children have been forced to sleep rough after being refused emergency local authority accommodation, in direct contravention of the law.

As we know, children in temporary accommodation are still classed as homeless, and the numbers show that over 175,000 children are currently homeless in temporary accommodation. Based on the most recent council-level data, as of June 2025 more than 600 children were living in temporary accommodation in Kirklees, where my Dewsbury and Batley constituency sits. These children are part of the around 375 family households in Kirklees in temporary accommodation as of March 2025. That temporary accommodation is costing Kirklees between £7 million and £8 million, which is money that could be better spent providing other public services.

Recent reports have shockingly suggested that families with young children are being forced to sleep rough after being refused emergency local authority accommodation, despite that being in direct contravention of the law. If families are reaching the point where they are unable to prevent their children from sleeping on the streets, in cars or anywhere else not designed for human habitation, then something in the system is clearly broken and the state is failing in its most basic obligations to its citizens.

One constituent, who has been contacting me regularly over the past several weeks, is a single mother with three children, one of whom has autism and asthma. The council has been unable to provide suitable accommodation for her and her children, and she has been sleeping in her car for the past several weeks. Her car is now uninhabitable, as it has been written off. She has been forced to accept temporary bed and breakfast accommodation. It is not suitable for her children, but she has nowhere else to go. I am sure that Kirklees is doing everything it can to help the family, but given the lack of resources and the lack of adequate family social housing, such examples are not as rare as they should be.

[Jess Brown-Fuller (Chichester) (LD)]

The hon. Member is right to highlight the resource challenges that local authorities have. From an outward perspective, my Chichester constituency is a very affluent area, with lower levels of homelessness, but in 1989 a gentleman died on our streets, and so a charity called Stonepillow was formed. It has gone on to support thousands of people experiencing homelessness across the Chichester and Bognor area. Does the hon. Member agree that although the charitable and voluntary sector has admirably stepped in where local authorities are too poorly funded to support people, it should not have to do so?

[Iqbal Mohamed]

The hon. Member is absolutely right. We all pay tribute to all the charities across the country, including the one in her constituency, that are stepping in to help people in times of desperate need, when Government and councils have not been able to provide the necessary support. I pay tribute to all those charities, but they should not have to step in to provide the basic necessities for children and families in our country.

Part of the failure undoubtedly lies with the immense financial pressures facing local authorities. Councils across the country are struggling to meet their duties to house those at risk of homelessness, including children, because of skyrocketing costs, limited housing supply and shockingly overstretched budgets. The cost of temporary accommodation alone has placed extraordinary financial strain on local government, with councils now covering more than half of those costs themselves, according to a recent analysis by the Institute for Government.

I see the consequences of this crisis at first hand in my constituency, where housing and homelessness are among the issues most frequently raised by my constituents. My office regularly hears from families who are on the brink of losing their homes and from people facing unfair evictions, struggling with rising rents or desperately seeking emergency accommodation at a time of unimaginable crisis. Increasingly, we see that these are not isolated individuals, but families with children who are living with the constant fear of having nowhere to go. Local authorities want to help, but they are operating with limited resources in the face of overwhelming demand.

Another shocking incident, reported by local media at the start of this year, is that a single mum of three, including a 12-year-old daughter with cancer, has been housed by my local authority in a one-bedroom flat with damp and mould for the past two years, after a no-fault eviction by a private landlord who wanted to sell their property. Such stories mean that we must be honest about the scale of the challenge facing us and the requisite ambition to adequately address it.

I have a number of questions for the Minister. First, what steps are the Government taking to ensure that no local authority unlawfully refuses emergency accommodation to families with children, and how will compliance with the statutory duties be monitored? Secondly, what additional financial support will be provided to councils that are struggling with the costs of temporary accommodation? Finally, what specific measures within the Government’s homelessness strategy are targeted at preventing families with children from ever reaching the point of rough sleeping in the first place?

Ultimately, this debate is about the kind of country we want to be. A society that allows children to sleep on the streets is a society that has lost sight of its most basic humanity. Ending rough sleeping among families is not simply a policy challenge, it is a moral imperative, and one that this Parliament must treat with the urgency it deserves.

10:00

[Douglas McAllister (West Dunbartonshire) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Dr Murrison. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool Wavertree (Paula Barker) on securing this debate on such an important issue.

The levels of homelessness in our United Kingdom are appalling, and it is shameful that a wealthy country like ours has allowed it to persist to such an extent. In Scotland, the scale of homelessness and rough sleeping today is stark. Under the watch of the SNP Government, homelessness has spiralled: the number of open homelessness cases has risen by 58% since the SNP came to power in 2007. Devastatingly, someone in Scotland becomes homeless every 15 minutes and, as of September last year, a record 10,480 children were living in unsuitable temporary accommodation. That is a disgrace.

Last year, more than 4,500 children were living in poverty in my West Dunbartonshire constituency, putting them in a position of uncertainty and fear, and in uncomfortable surroundings, hungry, cold and often unsafe. This instability takes a toll on children’s mental and physical health, education and sense of security. It is an unthinkable situation for most of us, but a horrific everyday reality for many homeless people with children in my constituency and across the UK.

The consequences can be tragic: new figures released last week show that in 2024, 231 people died in Scotland while experiencing homelessness. Those deaths should be a wake-up call to the Scottish Government and to every Government.

At the root of this crisis is a shortage of housing. House building in Scotland has fallen dramatically—in fact, 5,000 fewer homes are being built every year compared with the years of the last Labour-led Scottish Government. Had the rate under Scottish Labour been maintained under the SNP, 90,000 more homes would have been built in the last 19 years. Imagine how many more families could have avoided homelessness if those homes existed.

West Dunbartonshire has one of the most severe housing crises in Scotland. I frequently see children starting life on the back foot through no fault of their own. We must start building more houses. No one, no matter their personal situation, should be sleeping rough, especially those with children. How will anyone living on the streets improve their circumstances if they are not given the opportunity to rebuild their lives?

Under the leadership of Anas Sarwar, Scottish Labour has set out a plan to deliver 125,000 new homes over five years, across all tenures—expanding affordable housing, reforming planning laws and establishing a housing investment bank to unlock land and finance construction. But we must also give councils the resources they need to meet their legal duties. The Scottish Government must intervene earlier to prevent families from becoming homeless in the first place.

Every child deserves the stability of a safe home and a decent start to life. Rough sleeping among families with children is not just a housing issue but very much a moral one. No child in West Dunbartonshire, in Scotland, or anywhere else in our United Kingdom should ever have to wonder where they will sleep at night.

10:04

[Lee Pitcher (Doncaster East and the Isle of Axholme) (Lab)]

It is wonderful to speak under your chairmanship, Dr Murrison.

Rough sleeping among families and children is one of the starkest signs of a system failing at a point where people need it the most. No child should ever be exposed to that kind of trauma and no parent should ever be in the position of trying to protect their child while having no safe or stable place to go.

This issue matters very deeply to me personally. When I was 15, my own family experienced homelessness. I want to be clear that we never had to sleep rough—we always had some form of roof over our heads—but even without that, the disruption, insecurity and fear leave an everlasting mark. You feel lost, hurt and absolutely scarred for life. But I know that if someone shows love and care, there is hope and there is light. I genuinely believe that this Minister has given the Government the bulb—the Government just need to switch on the light.

When home is uncertain, everything else becomes uncertain too. Schooling and mental health suffer, and family life is placed under an enormous strain. That is why I feel so strongly that when we talk about rough sleeping among families, we cannot treat it as a question only of emergency accommodation. We have to see it for what it is: a crisis that can shape a child’s life for evermore, long after the immediate dangers have passed.

For families with children, the answer must be a Housing First approach. Put simply, we need to start from the principle that a safe and secure home is not the reward at the end of recovery but a foundation that makes recovery possible. If a family is facing rough sleeping, or is at immediate risk of it, the first job must be to get them into stable accommodation quickly, not to leave them cycling through unsuitable temporary accommodation and arrangements—not expecting children to recover while living out of bags in one room and not assuming that the crisis ends at the moment a roof is found. We should not be seeing a mum having to leave a baby during the night to warm their milk in a microwave in a service station, like one mum in my constituency.

I am working with families in Doncaster East and the Isle of Axholme who have been made homeless and are living in hotels. They are no longer sleeping rough, but they are living in deeply unsuitable and unstable circumstances. The priority must of course be to get families off the streets and into a safe place, but their story does not end there, and neither can our concern. That is the point when they need us the most and need the most support, to end the disruption and get back on track.

Alongside housing, there must be proper wraparound support. That means mental health support, help with school continuity, support into work, help with debt, access to children’s services where needed, and practical help for parents trying to rebuild stability post trauma. Without that, we risk addressing the symptom for a night while leaving the damage untouched for years.

A child who experiences homelessness or rough sleeping does not simply bounce back because the immediate risk has passed. The disruption and impact are long term, and the response has to be long term too. If we are serious about ending rough sleeping among families with children, we need to be serious about stability and support at home first, and then the sustained joined-up help necessary to build lives.

I urge the Government to build the social homes, support those with trauma, deliver the toolkit and work across Departments to deliver our homelessness strategy. I can tell Members that for that 15-year-old doing his GCSE coursework on the double mattress, sat next to his mum and sister in that room, it has been a journey. But now he is fast approaching 50, and I am proud to be part of a Government that can, once and for all, end that situation for children going forwards.

10:08

[Mr Bayo Alaba (Southend East and Rochford) (Lab)]

I am pleased to serve under your chairmanship, Dr Murrison.

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool Wavertree (Paula Barker) for securing the debate. I also thank my friend and colleague, my hon. Friend the Member for Doncaster East and the Isle of Axholme (Lee Pitcher) for his impassioned sharing of his very deep personal experiences. Also, he does not look a day over 60.

The fact that children are sleeping rough on the streets of the United Kingdom should appal every Member of Parliament. I certainly find it deeply distressing. The impact of any form of homelessness, including rough sleeping, on young people’s futures is huge, and the number of those impacted is steadily increasing. As we speak, around 176,000 children are believed to be homeless and living in temporary accommodation—the highest amount since records began. That figure is nearly equivalent to the total number of children living in Leeds.

In the first six months of 2025 alone, the homelessness charity Crisis saw more than 100 pregnant women and families with children use its services after being turned away from the support offered by their local councils—councils that are also struggling to cope with the rising pressures of the housing crisis that we are working hard to fix.

This Government, with their comprehensive national plan to end homelessness and their ambition to build 1.5 million homes, have been clear that there is no excuse for children to be sleeping rough on our streets. On that note, I was pleased to see that the Minister had written to councils to reiterate their duty of care to prevent children from sleeping rough.

It is important to recognise the vital role that the third sector plays when it comes to safeguarding young people against the impacts of homelessness and rough sleeping. In Southend, for example, we are fortunate to have HARP, a dedicated homelessness charity that works around the clock to safeguard our city’s most vulnerable residents. I have had the pleasure of meeting Vanessa Hemmings on a number of occasions. With her dedicated team at HARP, she works tirelessly, with passion and empathy, to ensure that even in the most challenging of environments and moments, our residents have somewhere to turn.

Since becoming the MP for Southend East and Rochford, I have been grateful for the chance to visit HARP on several occasions, and have been consistently moved by its invaluable work. This debate is a crucial one, and I strongly hope that it will refocus efforts to ensure that no child has to endure a night without a home.

10:10

[David Williams (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dr Murrison.

I am so grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool Wavertree (Paula Barker) for securing this really important debate, at the heart of which is a simple principle: every single child deserves to be safe and warm, with a roof over their head. That should not be controversial for anyone; it should be the basic foundation of a decent society.

Before coming to this place, I spent 18 years working for the YMCA North Staffordshire, supporting people facing homelessness and housing insecurity. I have seen up close the reality of what homelessness does to people, and when kids are caught up in the mix of that instability, the consequences can really last a lifetime, as we have heard.

A secure home provides more than shelter: it offers stability, dignity and the foundation for a child to thrive. But someone having a roof over their head is only the first step. Across many communities, including my own in Stoke-on-Trent and Kidsgrove, there are families who receive the keys to a home but step inside to find an empty property with no beds for the kids, no sofa to sit on and no table to eat around. That is the reality of furniture poverty, which is far more widespread than many people realise.

Last week, I brought together partners in Stoke-on-Trent, including Stoke-on-Trent city council, Newcastle-under-Lyme borough council and local housing providers, alongside the charity End Furniture Poverty, which is doing excellent work across the country to tackle the issue. End Furniture Poverty, with which my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool Wavertree worked extremely closely for a number of years, is campaigning to increase the percentage of social housing offered on a furnished tenancy basis. I am keen to hear the Minister’s thoughts about its campaign to increase the supply of furnished tenancies among social housing providers, because when a family finally gets the keys to their home, it should be a great moment, but they also need to live there with dignity.

There is a fundamental issue that we must confront: we simply do not have enough affordable social council homes. In Stoke-on-Trent alone, more than 3,500 people are on the council’s housing waiting list. If association lists are not included, the real demand is even greater. Too many people are locked out of home ownership, and without sufficient social and affordable housing, families remain trapped in temporary accommodation or insecure housing.

If we are serious about ending homelessness, especially for families with kids, we must keep building the high-quality, genuinely affordable social homes that the communities we represent desperately need. Ultimately, it is really simple: every single child deserves not only a roof over their head, but a place that they can truly call home.

10:14

[Mr Will Forster (Woking) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Dr Murrison. I thank the hon. Member for Liverpool Wavertree (Paula Barker) for securing this important debate.

In my constituency of Woking, we are fortunate to host the extraordinary work of the York Road Project. For three decades that local charity has supported people experiencing homelessness. It began as a winter night shelter run by local volunteers who simply believe that no one should be left out in the cold. Yet today it is a significant local charity that provides specialist help for people that are experiencing homelessness. They keep people off the street at night in their night shelter, and support them to turn their lives around in their day centre.

It is an unfortunate truth that rough sleeping and homelessness is growing. More people are in crisis, and increasingly that involves families with children. Local authorities are spending more than ever on temporary accommodation to do their best to keep people off the streets, particularly those with families and children. The net cost to councils has risen from £200 million in 2015 to more than £1.3 billion today. At the same time councils are facing a wider funding gap, estimated to be £4 billion. It is a postcode lottery, where some constituencies and councils are struggling hugely. As a result, the system is under huge strain. Temporary accommodation is becoming long-term accommodation—housing for families who are stuck in limbo. From our casework, we see the human impact of that every day.

I highlight that the quality of that temporary accommodation is a huge issue. Although it is vital that we keep families with children off the street, with a roof over their head, the fact that the report by the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee into temporary accommodation’s impact on children made for such stark reading should shock us all. The report found that in the past five years, 74 children had died because of the quality of the temporary accommodation they had been in. Of those 74 children, 58 were under the age of one. That is not acceptable in 21st-century Britain.

I highlight a deeply worrying case in my constituency of Woking. The Conservatives running Surrey county council have withdrawn funding for an initiative that supported single mothers with their children in temporary supported accommodation. That programme provided a safe space for vulnerable women to rebuild their lives, often after instances of domestic abuse or family breakdown. They were able to do that with their children. Without that support, families are now facing eviction. At the last minute, the county council is throwing many vulnerable constituents out of their accommodation and on to the borough council’s housing register when they know that that register is overwhelmed and oversubscribed. That is morally indefensible. Will the Minister condemn that decision by Surrey county council, and will she raise that decision with them to ensure that vulnerable families are not left without safe accommodation?

More broadly, the reality is that sleeping rough and homelessness are symptoms of a deeper structural failure in this country. I have heard that from Members today. Our country is broken, but it can be fixed, and we need the Government to lead on that for us. Across—

[Edward Morello (West Dorset) (LD)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Dr Andrew Murrison (in the Chair)]

Order. The hon. Gentleman came into the debate about half an hour in. It is entirely up to the hon. Member for Woking whether to allow the intervention, but in general I expect people to be in the debate far sooner. A few minutes late is permissible; 30 minutes is not.

[Mr Forster]

I am happy to give way to my hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset. I believe he will attend debates a bit earlier as a result of your comments, Dr Murrison.

[Edward Morello]

I appreciate the steer from the Chair and apologise for the late arrival. My hon. Friend talks about the wider structural issues that drive homelessness, one of which is the winner-takes-all system when it comes to benefits. In that system, families that are breaking up may split child custody on a 50:50 basis, but the benefit awarding system only awards benefits to one parent. That results in the other parent having no access to their children, and often results in them losing their home and ending up homeless.

Does my hon. Friend agree that, as well as the councils and the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, we should also look at how the benefits system can ensure that parents can stay in accommodation and have access to their children?

[Mr Forster]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend; he makes a really valid point. The debate has rightly focused on housing, but there are wider impacts, and the Department for Work and Pensions needs to change our benefits system to ensure that families are properly supported so that we do not have children sleeping rough. I have highlighted the particular case of Surrey county council evicting families with children in my constituency, and I really worry that some of them may sleep rough. Across England, almost 5,000 people slept rough on one single night last autumn—a 20% increase on the previous year. We know the causes: chronic housing shortages, poverty, relationship breakdowns, gaps in welfare support and, above all, a lack of social housing.

[Iqbal Mohamed]

In the late ’70s and the ’80s, more than 80% of Government support for social housing—housing benefit—went to councils. That money was reinvested in housing and repairs, and the surplus was used in other services. In real terms, it was then worth about £28 billion; today it is about £30 billion, so it has not changed, but 20% now goes to councils and 80% goes to private landlords. Whatever 80% of £30 billion is— £24 billion—is now going out of the system, and that is money that was going to councils. Does the hon. Member agree that the right to buy, and councils’ inability to replenish stock, has adversely impacted not just housing but wider public services, and that we must allow councils to buy back homes or build new ones, so that housing benefit goes to councils?

[Mr Forster]

I completely agree. We have privatised our housing welfare system, which has resulted in worse conditions and a higher cost to taxpayers. The Liberal Democrats have been campaigning on housing since before we were the Liberal Democrats. The great architect of the welfare state, the Liberal William Beveridge, characterised the squalor of poor housing and homelessness in the early 20th century as a giant that needed to be defeated, yet we still have not slain that giant.

It is heartbreaking to hear these stories. Will the Minister ensure that sufficient financial resources are available to local authorities so that they can deliver the measures in the Homelessness Reduction Act 2017 and provide accommodation for survivors of domestic abuse? Will the Government ringfence emergency funding for local councils to ensure that they can deliver permanent accommodation for rough sleepers? Will they exempt groups of homeless people, and those at risk of homelessness, from the shared accommodation rule?

The Government have reduced the move-on period for refugees in accommodation from 56 to 28 days. When it was 56 days, rough sleeping notably reduced. It gave refugees a chance to set in motion plans for leaving state support, but 28 days isn’t working. The Government have made an exemption only for those who are pregnant, are over 65 or have a disability. Those are the only exemptions. I do not agree with changing the rule, but I will not ask the Minister to defend that. I ask her to raise it with the Home Office, to ensure that families with children are also exempt.

The Government must address this awful system, which is failing vulnerable children and their families. We cannot have children sleeping rough. The work of organisations such as the York Road Project in my constituency of Woking shows what people can achieve when compassion and community are involved. It is now the Government’s responsibility to match that endeavour and ensure that children and families do not sleep rough.

10:24

[Paul Holmes (Hamble Valley) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dr Murrison.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Liverpool Wavertree (Paula Barker) on securing this debate. She is not just an hon. Lady; to me she is an hon. Friend, and I am delighted to respond to her today on the Opposition’s behalf. I even managed to get out of bed just to do it because she was leading this debate this morning.

The hon. Lady was absolutely right to say in her opening remarks that we should not be here this morning having to debate an issue such as one. However, while we do have to debate these issues, I am pleased that she is on the case and I look forward to working with her, being a successor to her as the shadow Minister with responsibility for homelessness. I know that the welfare of young people across this country, particularly those who have found themselves homeless, is at the heart of what she does, and I congratulate her again on securing this debate.

Rough sleeping among families with children represents one of the most visible and distressing signs of the housing crisis in our country. Behind every statistic is a child growing up without the security of a stable home, a family living with uncertainty, and communities struggling to cope with rising costs of living and other socioeconomic pressures. We can all agree across the House that this is not a matter to procrastinate or prevaricate about.

In its 2024 manifesto, the Labour party promised to,

“develop a new cross-Government strategy…to put Britain back on track to ending homelessness.”

That strategy was not published until 11 December 2025, which was much later than expected; indeed, it was at the tail end of this Session of Parliament. However, I remind the Minister, who I am pleased to see here in Westminster Hall this morning, that in a meeting she kindly offered on a cross-party basis, I assured her that the official Opposition and I, as the shadow Minister with responsibility for homelessness, are committed to working on a cross-party basis to make sure that this strategy works. My comments this morning do not signal that I demur from that approach. However, I will make some comments on some parts of the strategy and I will challenge the strategy regarding where we think it could go further.

My main concern about the homelessness strategy is this. The current time seemed to offer an opportunity, but although the Minister has grabbed that opportunity, it is an opportunity whereby the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government seems to be leading the search for a solution to homelessness, so the chance for a fundamental rewiring of how Government works to tackle homelessness has been missed. As I said, I make these comments in a constructive way. Nevertheless, I believe that the strategy lacks genuine cross-party ministerial oversight.

The strategy also lacks the cross-departmental approach that we need, particularly when we consider that homelessness is not just an issue that MHCLG must find a solution to. Homelessness also involves the Department for Education, the Department for Health and Social Care, and the Home Office, in the way that the hon. Member for Liverpool Wavertree described. For example, regarding the involvement of the Department for Health and Social Care, we need to get better at analysing the data around drug and alcohol discharges from hospital.

I am not convinced that the strategy, despite its good intentions overall, really takes the cross-ministerial approach where it needs to go. I look to the Minister to confirm to the Chamber this morning, when she responds to the debate, that she is chairing a cross-ministerial committee on this issue, and that she will continue to do so going forward. I also look to her to say how often that committee will meet.

The hon. Member for Liverpool Wavertree mentioned the problem with data concerning immigration. She is absolutely right that the Home Office has been slightly let off the hook on this strategy; I look to the Minister to provide some reassurances on this data issue when she stands up shortly to respond to the debate.

I think that the strategy goes in the right direction, but there are some concerns about the lack of funding to tackle some of the issues and to enact some of the good intentions that the Minister has outlined over the past few months. For example, the strategy does not give funding to Housing First so that it can be rolled out nationally. Also, the Local Government Association says that a cross-departmental approach is needed, and needs to be embedded at the heart of all Government Departments, within their constitutions. We ask for that approach to be considered.

Lastly on the housing strategy itself, prevention models are still patchy across the whole of the UK and there needs to be an emphasis on national outcomes, to stop people falling into homelessness. Throughout the UK, charities such as The Bread and Butter Thing are really helping on an emergency scale to relieve the homelessness crisis; we congratulate them on what they are doing.

[Iqbal Mohamed]

The right-to-buy scheme, the pros and cons of which I will not go into, led to councils losing big chunks of their housing stock to people who bought their houses at a discount. I know that the scheme has been changed and that the discount has been reduced, but I am not aware where the money that is generated goes, even today. Does the shadow Minister agree that the decision of the then Government and subsequent Governments to take the proceeds of sales, instead of leaving them with councils to replenish the stock, was a mistake, and should the Government now be looking at doing the latter for any further sales?

[Paul Holmes]

The hon. Gentleman asks a perfectly reasonable question. That was a policy decision of Governments before I took this role. I believe in the right-to-buy policy. It was a massive tool to allow people to achieve ownership in a radical way that we need to see again in this country. But in hindsight I accept, given some of the way the system worked, that we needed to see greater investment back into councils so that they could reinvest in stock. I think that is a perfectly reasonable thing to assume, but I will say that under this Government, the social housing fund that has been allocated just is not great enough to ensure that we have the houses that we need to deliver.

The number of people sleeping rough in England is now at its highest level since records began in 2010. Figures from autumn 2025 estimate that 4,793 people were sleeping on the streets on a single night, which was an increase on the previous year. Particularly concerning is the rise in vulnerable groups on the streets. The number of female rough sleepers increased by 8% to 733, alongside 3,938 men and 122 cases in which gender was not recorded. London continues to face the greatest challenge, with 1,277 people sleeping rough—the highest figure in the country—but the sharpest increase was in the north-east of England, where rough sleeping rose by 31% in just one year.

For many families, the pathway to rough sleeping begins long before anyone ends up on the streets. It often starts in temporary accommodation. Between July and September 2025, 134,760 households were living in hotels, B&Bs or temporary flats, which was an increase of nearly 7% compared with the previous year. Of those households, 85,730 include children. These are the highest figures since records began in 2010.

In London, the situation is particularly stark. According to London Councils, one in 50 Londoners is now homeless and record numbers of children are growing up in temporary accommodation. In some boroughs, the pressures are especially severe. Newham has 6,667 households in temporary accommodation, followed by Lambeth with 4,657 and Southwark with 3,828. Statutory homelessness data shows that, across England, 169,050 children are currently homeless in temporary accommodation. That represents a 12% increase in just one year and the ninth consecutive record since December 2022.

Ultimately, the only sustainable solution to homelessness is to increase the supply of homes and, in particular, social and affordable housing. The Government have pledged to build 1.5 million homes during this Parliament. However—I say this again—experts have expressed serious doubts about whether that target can be achieved. Professor Paul Cheshire, a leading planning expert who advised previous Governments, stated that there is “absolutely no way” the current reforms will deliver that number of homes. Let me be clear to Members across the House: that does and should include social homes.

Recent housing statistics raise similar concerns. According to official figures, 208,600 net new dwellings were added in Labour’s first year in office, which is a 6% drop on the previous year, and just 190,600 new homes were built, which is 8,000 fewer than in the final year of the previous Government. If this rate continues, fewer than 1 million homes will be delivered by 2029—well short of the Government’s stated target.

That is a serious issue because housing supply directly affects homelessness. Without sufficient homes, more families are pushed into temporary accommodation and the risk of rough sleeping continues. The scale of the challenge facing families with children demands urgency, co-ordination and long-term solutions. That means tackling child poverty, expanding affordable housing, supporting local authorities and ensuring that strategies are delivered on time and backed by meaningful action. All of us in this House, on both sides, agree that no child should grow up without the stability of a safe home, no family should face the prospect of homelessness and no society should accept rising rough sleeping as inevitable.

I say once again to the Minister that we come here in the spirit of co-operation. I genuinely believe that this Minister wants to achieve her aim of reducing homelessness. She has been going in the right direction to make sure that the Department constitutes what is necessary to deliver that, but we will look to see how this will be carried on across all Departments to achieve what we all want to achieve.

10:34

[The Minister for Local Government and Homelessness (Alison McGovern)]

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool Wavertree (Paula Barker) for securing the debate. She has been dedicated to tackling homelessness for many years, including in her work as the co-chair of the all-party parliamentary group for ending homelessness. Rough sleeping and homelessness are issues that scarred our city region for many years, and I know that everybody at home is very proud of her and the work she does.

As many hon. Members from a number of parties have mentioned, we do not want to be here talking about this issue, but it is so serious that we must. Like all hon. Members, I was extremely concerned about recent reports of families with children sleeping rough. To be absolutely clear, because there ought to be no ambiguity, this should never, ever happen.

Let me say, for clarity, that a household with a child has a priority need for the purposes of the Housing Act 1996. That means that if a household with a child is homeless and is eligible for homelessness assistance, the household must be provided with temporary accommodation until suitable settled accommodation is secured. Where households do not meet the criteria for homelessness assistance, local authorities have a duty under the Children Act 1989 to safeguard and promote the welfare of children who are in need, including by providing them with accommodation where necessary. Let me say, for absolute clarity, that that applies irrespective of the child’s immigration status.

The law is absolutely clear that where a local authority believes that a household does not have a local connection to the district, it remains under a duty to accommodate until a referral to another district has been accepted. It is only when a referral has been accepted that the receiving authority must fulfil any duties to accommodate. There should never be any reason for families to be refused accommodation while there is a dispute about which authority owes that household a duty. There is no grey area here: families with children should never be left without accommodation.

[Jim Shannon]

That is very clear for everyone, and I thank the Minister for it. One example from Northern Ireland that I did not get a chance to mention in my speech was the case of a mother with two children who were sleeping rough in the square. The reason they could not get temporary accommodation was that the Northern Ireland Housing Executive had none at the time. However, because of its duty of care, which the Minister outlined, it made accommodation available in a local hotel until such time as temporary accommodation became available. Is that something that the Minister advocates?

[Alison McGovern]

I am not quite sure that I caught all the details of the case that the hon. Member raised, but if he sends me them I will happily respond to him. He will know that we do not want children to be in B&B accommodation. That is one of the main planks of our strategy, which I will come to later.

As has been mentioned, I wrote to local authority leaders and chief executives last month to remind them of their duties and to ask that they take personal responsibility for making sure that no child in their area is ever left to sleep on the street, in a car or in any other location not designed for living in. I am conscious of the case raised by the hon. Member for Dewsbury and Batley (Iqbal Mohamed). I am sure that he has made every effort to sort that out with Kirklees, but if he has further problems, or Kirklees has specific issues that it wants to raise with me, I trust that he will write to me directly.

We must support councils to meet their obligations, and my Department has been in contact with the councils mentioned in the report to understand how this was able to happen and to ensure that it will not happen again. More broadly, hon. Members will be aware that we recently completed the local authority finance settlement for the next three years, reconnecting council funding with deprivation. That should aid the councils that are more likely to face these issues to deal with them.

The Government are providing more than £2.4 billion this spending review period in support of the Families First Partnership programme, which is introducing reforms to children’s social care. It will ensure children and families can access timely support so that they can get ahead of this problem, as many Members have suggested. Local authorities should use that ringfenced funding to meet their duties under the Children Act. It has been great to speak to many Members and their local authority leaders about how they will do that.

We are providing record levels of investment in homelessness and rough sleeping support, including more than £3.6 billion over the three years from 2026-27 to 2028-29. That is a funding boost of more than £1 billion compared with the previous Government’s commitment, and I pay tribute to the Chancellor for taking that decision. It is right that we are investing that much, because we inherited a homelessness crisis. Members have set out just how bad things have got.

Our long-term vision is to end homelessness and rough sleeping and ensure everyone has access to a safe and decent home. The statistics that we have heard today show that, for far too many people, that is not yet the case. We published our national plan to end homelessness last December to shift the system from crisis response to prevention and to get back on track to ending homelessness.

Our plan is backed by clear national targets to increase the proportion of households who are supported to stay in their own home or helped to find alternative accommodation when they approach their local council for support. That is the prevention goal, and it should underpin everything we do. For reasons that have been mentioned—not least the experience shared by my hon. Friend the Member for Doncaster East and the Isle of Axholme (Lee Pitcher)—we must prevent first. Homelessness is too big of a trauma; nobody should experience it.

By the end of this Parliament, we want to eliminate the use of B&B accommodation for families, except in absolute, dire emergencies, and halve rough sleeping. Of course, we want everyone to have a roof over their head, but some of the problems that we are facing and the experiences of rough sleepers go deep, so we have to go to the toughest of problems.

Our plan is backed by £3.6 billion of funding, including £2.2 billion that councils are free to use to design effective, locally tailored services to deliver better outcomes and reduce reliance on emergency interventions. A number of Members asked about ringfencing. There is tension between allowing local innovation, for which ringfences are unhelpful, and putting clear ringfences around funds to ensure that all councils can tackle homelessness. It is a balance, and that is the way we have taken the decision about the funding.

Our plan sets out how we will tackle the root causes of homelessness by building 1.5 million new homes, including more social and affordable housing than has been built for years. We are also lifting 550,000 children out of poverty through the measures in our child poverty strategy, including by lifting the two-child limit.

Public institutions should lead the way in preventing homelessness. Our plan sets a long-term ambition that no one should leave a public institution into homelessness, and we have cross-Government targets to start that change and reduce homelessness from prisons, care and hospitals.

A number of Members, including the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Hamble Valley (Paul Holmes), were kind enough to say that they believed in my will to get this done but expressed scepticism about other Departments. I hope I can reassure them that they do not need to be sceptical. My experience of working with Ministers in other Departments has been positive.

[Paul Holmes]

Will the Minister briefly give way?

[Alison McGovern]

I was just going to respond to the shadow Minister. The interministerial group will meet quite soon, and we have been preparing for that. Our expert group of advisers met me yesterday, and we got a great deal of things done and discussed. I will come on to some of those, but I want to reassure Members that we have active participation in the interministerial group and across Government.

[Paul Holmes]

I knew the Minister would give me a straight answer, but may I push her a bit further on the remit of the interministerial group? Will she confirm her intention for how often it will meet? Is it constituted to meet a certain number of times during the year?

[Alison McGovern]

The interministerial group will meet regularly.

There are interconnections between homelessness and violence against women and girls, because the third biggest cause of homelessness is people fleeing domestic abuse, so we will do some of what we need to do via our work as Ministers through the violence against women and girls strategy. As a number of Members have highlighted, there is clearly a connection between homelessness and poverty. We are about to take forward the delivery of the child poverty strategy, so some aspects of what we are considering will be taken forward through that discussion among Ministers. I am very conscious that we should have meetings not for the sake of it, but to get things done. We will deliver our objectives through those three interconnected strategies, and Ministers will certainly meet regularly.

[Paula Barker]

I thank the Minister for the contribution she is making. Will she commit to publishing the minutes of the interministerial group?

[Alison McGovern]

I was going to come on to that. I will certainly commit to providing an update. It is beyond my procedural knowledge exactly what we are allowed to publish from ministerial groups, but I will certainly commit to providing an update. I was going to suggest that we might have a meeting with the APPG shortly after, so that we can provide an in-person update, because I think it would be far better for parliamentarians to be engaged in this process.

I will quickly provide an update on the work of other Government Departments, in response to the questions raised. The Treasury is leading on the value for money review of homelessness support, which should pick up the precise point that the hon. Member for Dewsbury and Batley made on the cost of temporary accommodation. We have talked about the disaster this is for families, but what is going on at the moment is also a disaster for taxpayers. The Treasury is working with us and the DWP on that and is actively engaged.

I am working extremely closely with the Department for Work and Pensions on incomes and the homelessness system overall, and it has been very active. With regard to the Ministry of Justice, the Minister for Prisons and I have been working very closely on people leaving prisons; he has exacting targets for reducing the number of people who leave prison to no fixed abode. I have also worked very closely with Home Office Ministers, and I will ensure that they receive a copy of the report of this debate, because I am sure Members want their opinions to be heard by them.

On health, we need to ensure that neighbourhood health services support people who have experienced rough sleeping, particularly in relation to addiction and the trauma that children who have experienced homelessness might go through. On education, Members will know the disaster it is when children have to move schools because of temporary accommodation. The Department for Education has been working closely with us on that. I hope that reassures Members that this is a cross-Government effort. None the less, we will introduce a legal duty to collaborate, to compel public services to work together to prevent homelessness.

As the shadow Minister pointed out, building more homes takes time, but our plan takes immediate action to tackle the worst forms of homelessness now. Alongside the work that the Minister for Housing and Planning is doing to bring forward much more social housing than we have seen in this country for a heck of a long time, we will increase the emergency accommodation reduction pilots into a programme backed by £30 million of funding to tackle a wider range of poor practice, including B&B and unsuitable out-of-area placements. As I mentioned, I met our expert group yesterday, and we intend to move very quickly on the toolkits that we need. Much of the information exists already; we just need to get on and do it.

We are helping more vulnerable people off the streets and into stable housing by investing £150 million in supported housing services and £15 million in our long-term rough sleeping innovation programme, to help councils with the greatest pressures to deliver more personalised and comprehensive support for people with complex needs. I could talk about that for a long time, but I will not. Members here will understand that, sometimes, complicated personal circumstances sit behind someone’s homelessness, and we need really skilled caseworkers to support people with those. Likewise, we want to get on with the work on allocations, which is under way, and I am making sure it moves quickly.

The latest data showed progress against two of our new targets. The percentage of duties owed where homelessness was prevented or relieved with accommodation secured for six or more months is up 3.7 percentage points year on year to 46%. That means a higher proportion of households at risk of homelessness or already homeless was helped to secure accommodation than over the same period the year before. That includes an increase in households helped to find accommodation before experiencing the traumatic experience of homelessness—that is the target that I really want to see go up.

The quarter in question also saw a reduction in the number of families in B&B accommodation over the statutory limit of six weeks, to 1,670. That number is still far too many, but it is the lowest since the beginning of 2023 and down 55% year on year. I am confident that we are going in the right direction on B&B use, but we need to go faster and do more.

The figures do not mean the job is done—far from it—but they show that prevention is improving and that fewer families are spending long periods in unsuitable accommodation. I have confidence that we can achieve the targets we have set ourselves, but we need to make sure that we maintain focus and, as Members have suggested, keep working right across Government to deliver.

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool Wavertree for securing this debate. As I said, our city is very proud of her. I hope we will never have cause to discuss families with children sleeping rough again, but I trust that Members here will secure other debates so that we can keep our focus on our homelessness strategy and make progress, as I have suggested, over the years to come.

09:30

[Paula Barker]

I thank all hon Members for their thoughtful and knowledgeable contributions. I also thank the Opposition spokesperson, the hon. Member for Hamble Valley (Paul Holmes), and the Lib Dem spokesperson, the hon. Member for Woking (Mr Forster), for their contributions, as well as the Minister for hers. I look forward to working with her constructively in the months and years ahead.

I place on the record my thanks to Crisis for its incredible work. I particularly thank Dan Hewitt and ITV for keeping this all in the public domain—the work they do is incredible. I hope that, collectively, we can all use the moral clarity that we have found today in these abhorrent cases to spur us on to build a better Britain where nobody experiences homelessness.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered the matter of rough sleeping among families with children.

09:30

Sitting suspended.

UK-based Tech Companies

Wednesday 11th March 2026 Westminster Hall

[Mr Clive Betts in the Chair]

11:04

[Peter Fortune (Bromley and Biggin Hill) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered Government support for UK-based tech companies.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Betts. I am pleased to have secured this debate.

It is hard to measure the true economic value of the technology sector in the UK, but I think we can all agree on the sector’s huge importance for economic growth, productivity and society as a whole. That importance will only grow in the future, so nurturing and supporting our domestic technology sector is vital. To be clear, as a Conservative, I believe in the importance of competition as a driver for innovation and economic growth. To have true competition, we need to challenge monopolies. If our tech sector is to thrive in the future, competition is vital; otherwise, we will see innovative firms leave the UK.

Today I will focus particularly on our domestic app ecosystem. The UK’s mobile app ecosystem generates £28 billion annually in gross value added—equivalent to nearly 1% of GDP. It also supports around 400,000 jobs: the highest number in any country in Europe. However, despite that huge contribution to our economy, app developers face significant challenges.

Apple and Google control 95% of all mobile operating systems in the UK, and the Competition and Markets Authority formally designated them with strategic market status in October 2025. That does not mean that Apple and Google just run the app stores; they have control over far more than that. Those companies can control what developers can say within apps, block developer communications with consumers, hide customer details from developers and prevent them from telling users when something is new, better or cheaper—all the while taking up to 30% of every transaction. That not only stifles the sector domestically, but pushes up prices for ordinary consumers and drives British innovation overseas. We simply cannot afford to allow such a growing industry to be lost.

[Mr Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Slough) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Member on securing this important debate on Government support for UK-based tech companies. My Slough constituency is a huge tech and data hub; indeed, it has the second largest concentration of data centres anywhere in the world. Does he agree that it would be an act of folly for the Government not to designate Slough as an artificial intelligence growth zone, given that £1 spent there provides a much greater return for the UK economy? We as a nation would not want to lose that.

[Peter Fortune]

I have a list of Government follies here, if the hon. Member would like me to pass them on. In all seriousness, I completely agree with him on the importance of the industry and those jobs, and I am sure that the Minister will pick that up when he responds.

To give an example of the issues with these monopolies, Amazon was forced to remove the “Buy book” button from its Kindle app on iPhones because Apple demanded a 30% cut of every e-book sale. Authors simply cannot afford to forgo that 30%. Instead, readers had to—this is absurd—close the Kindle app, log on to the Amazon system separately, complete their purchase and then reopen the Kindle app. It was only thanks to a court case in the United States that forced Apple’s hand that the “Buy book” button returned.

Spotify cannot include a “Subscribe” button in its iOS app, nor can it tell users in the app what a subscription costs or that a cheaper option exists outside the app. UK Spotify Premium subscribers have faced three price rises in two years, partly because Apple’s 30% cut has to be absorbed somewhere. Every Spotify user in the UK is paying more, and Apple’s rules are a direct reason why.

There are many similar cases in which Apple and Google are inserting themselves directly into the relationship between developers and consumers by forcing developers to use their payment systems. That takes away a consumer’s ability to choose their preferred payment method, causes greater friction when there are issues such as refunds and cancellations, and prevents consumers from properly benefiting from lower prices or discounts.

The UK’s Competition Appeal Tribunal ruled in October 2025 that Apple’s payment restrictions were neither necessary nor proportionate for security or privacy purposes. They were designed to eliminate competition. It is as simple as that. It is estimated that removing the restrictions would release £1.75 billion a year that is currently taken from UK developers and consumers, rising to over £4 billion annually by 2029. That money could go back into British engineering, creative content and the next generation of app businesses built and scaled here. We could unleash the true potential of these industries.

The ability to remove the restrictions and hand UK app developers back their rights already exists in legislation. The Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024 gave the CMA conduct-requirement powers—the ability not just to levy fines, but to mandate specific behaviours. The CMA can end Apple’s and Google’s control over in-app communication, ensuring that developers are free to know their own customers and tell their own customers what their own product costs and where to buy it at the best price. Could the Minister outline the Government’s view on pressing the CMA to issue conduct requirements that protect competition?

Another area that we must look at is cloud computing. The UK’s digital economy is underpinned by cloud computing, but cloud has been increasingly monopolised. The CMA’s cloud services market investigation estimated that Amazon Web Services and Microsoft control 70% to 90% of the UK’s cloud computing market. That concentration poses a number of dependency risks, including operational, financial and security vulnerabilities, and restricts market innovation and customer choice.

Just months after the Government published their “Chronic risks analysis”, there were three global cloud outages within a matter of weeks. In two of those, Amazon Web Services and Microsoft were directly impacted, highlighting the risks of over-reliance on a limited number of cloud hosts. Governments, businesses, digital platforms, AI services and individuals were materially impacted by the outages, with US companies alone suffering losses of between $500 million and $650 million. Indeed, the recent CrowdStrike outage is estimated to have cost the UK economy between £1.7 billion and £2.3 billion.

Competition can be the key mitigation for the UK’s digital dependency and, again, it is the CMA that holds the levers to tackle anti-competitive conduct and address the risks of cloud concentration. I am not calling for more legislation or regulation. We do not need it. With the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act, brought in by the last Conservative Government, we have already legislated for stronger digital competition, but slow implementation and weak early enforcement risk squandering a rare pro-growth and pro-SME opportunity.

Only a small number of designations have been made so far. For Google’s and Apple’s mobile ecosystems, the CMA has relied on non-binding “commitments” rather than imposing binding conduct requirements. These non-binding commitments have no clear statutory basis under the 2024 Act, carry no legal consequences if breached and are not contemplated anywhere in the CMA’s published guidance. Their use risks weakening the regime and forcing the CMA to restart enforcement if firms fail to comply, which is precisely the outcome that the last Government sought to avoid. It is also concerning that a requirement for Google to negotiate fair terms with news publishers has been pushed back by at least 12 months, despite the CMA having previously committed to use that power in the first half of this year.

The Government must reaffirm that robust digital competition enforcement is pro-growth and central to the UK’s industrial strategy. Moreover, the CMA must ensure that there is robust competition enforcement. The levers to achieve that were put there by the last Government; it just requires some political will. Fundamentally, the UK cannot build globally competitive tech firms while a handful of dominant platforms control the routes to market, search, app stores, mobile ecosystems, cloud and key AI infrastructure.

The potential for huge economic growth from our tech sector is there, but competition is key. If competition flourishes, we will see more innovation, improved services and lower costs for consumers.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

Order. We have five speakers, which gives each of them between eight and 10 minutes, so that we can get the Front Benchers in after that. I call Chris Evans.

10:19

[Chris Evans (Caerphilly) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Betts—and I genuinely hope you have some good news about Sheffield Wednesday in the next few days.

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

Order. The hon. Gentleman has not been reading the media—we had some good news this morning, which has moved us forward. I just wanted to make sure everyone is up to date with the important information.

[Chris Evans]

I stand corrected, Mr Betts—I was in meetings all morning, so I have not seen the sports news yet.

For constituencies like mine, which were dependent on heavy industry, the development of high technology offers new growth opportunities that we can harness in our valley communities once again. I want to focus my comments on a company called Academii. Academii helps organisations improve their workplace training by replacing one-size-fits-all learning with streamlined content, smart delivery and measurable outcomes. It is used by major employers in the energy and utility sectors, as well as by the NHS, community health boards and international clients.

Earlier this year, the business secured £700,000 of investment from the Welsh Labour Government to further develop its platform and expand its workforce. Academii is a powerful example of what a talented team of entrepreneurs and technicians can achieve when united behind a cutting-edge idea. I firmly believe that this spirit can be fostered in our universities, which can become the powerhouse of technological change across south Wales.

Clusters in university campuses can form the basis of spin-out companies, which, under the umbrella of a higher educational institution, take groundbreaking research and transform it into a market-ready product or service. Spin-outs are widely recognised for their highly effective, lucrative and sustainable business models. Their success is driven by their dynamic and entrepreneurial culture, which involves faster decision making, greater flexibility and a higher appetite for risk taking.

[Mark Sewards (Leeds South West and Morley) (Lab)]

I recently visited the Nexus innovation hub at the University of Leeds, which does the things that my hon. Friend was just describing, with innovative spin-outs and companies genuinely innovating in really challenging areas. However, they struggle to access Government procurement because they do not have things like Cyber Essentials, but they do have the equivalent accreditation from international organisations. Does he agree that the Government should do more to recognise these accreditations, so that we do not stifle innovation?

[Chris Evans]

I am always happy to take interventions, but my hon. Friend seems to have written my speech for me, because I will develop that argument as I go along. I note he is from Leeds—Leeds pinch all of Sheffield Wednesday’s best managers, do they not, Mr Betts?

Spin-outs offer postgraduate students the sought-after opportunity to work in a start-up, allowing them to develop skills and experience outside of academia. At a time when many graduates are struggling to navigate the job market, spin-out companies can be a fantastic place to start their career. Places like Wales, Northern Ireland and the north-east have traditionally been reliant on public sector work and have a lack of entrepreneurship, but spin-out companies can remedy those problems. Young people can found these companies, and young people can work in them. Their success boosts employment, the economy and investment in higher education. In 2024 alone, spin-outs channelled a record £3.35 billion of investment into university research. Such investment not only benefits the economy but ensures that promising technologies are not abandoned due to lack of funding.

While much of this funding is awarded to spin-outs in the golden triangle of Oxford, Cambridge and London, Swansea University has bucked the trend. It has emerged as one of the UK’s leading academic institutions for generating spin-out companies, having established 58 spin-outs since 2011. Swansea’s recent successes include Ail Arian, a business that recovers silver from printed electronics, and Corryn Biotechnologies, which has designed wound dressing that mimics the natural healing process of the skin. Celtic Vascular Ltd is another Welsh spin-out that deserves recognition for its groundbreaking work. Its team of researchers has pioneered AI-driven software that detects coronary heart disease with 92% accuracy.

I am proud that Welsh universities are leading the way in generating spin-out companies and inspiring others outside the golden triangle to do the same. However, the Government must do more to support spin-out companies. The biggest challenge that academics face when spinning out is finding the financial support to bridge the initial gap from the lab to the market. The UK Government recognised that challenge in their 2024 autumn Budget, in which £40 million was allocated to early-stage spin-out companies. Although that funding is welcome, it falls short of what is needed. For context, £40 million is approximately the cost of bringing just two drug-discovery programmes from inception to their first in-human clinical trials. Yet for a share of the Government’s first £9 million tranche in 2025, UK Research and Innovation was overwhelmed with more than 2,750 expressions of interest. There is a huge gap in funding at the point when researchers want to bring their discoveries out of the lab.

UK-based investors largely avoid scale-up investments, unwilling to take risks on products that have not yet been prototyped or introduced to the market. The grants awarded by Innovate UK are simply unreliable. They reached a peak of £150 million in 2023, but the funding for spin-outs fell by 44.5% in 2024 to £83.3 million. That reflects a shift in the Government’s wider investment strategy: the allocation of research and innovation grants is becoming more targeted and selective. Early-stage spin-out companies have directly lost out to this new strategy. In January 2026, Innovate UK paused its smart grants programme, which was designed to bring original, high-impact innovations to the marketplace. In its place, a new growth catalyst programme has opened, targeted at spin-outs that are ready to scale. Grants for the scheme must be aligned with private investment, which means that eligible companies are expected to be market-ready.

It has been said that a “valley of death” has subsequently emerged between the lab and the market, which many potentially game-changing innovations fail to span. To avoid that, as my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds South West and Morley (Mark Sewards) said, they are forced to rely on the US for capital. In return, the facilities and workforce are based across the Atlantic.

Ministers have a duty to turn the tide on this issue. With better UK-based support, this country’s technology, healthcare and life sciences sectors, let alone the economy, would be emboldened and much richer. I therefore ask the Minister whether the Government will provide more financial support for projects in pre-investment phases of development, beyond the £40 million set aside in the 2024 autumn Budget. Will they allow the British Business Bank to play a key role in providing that support, given its recent expansion and its position at the heart of the Government’s growth agenda?

I do not need to tell the Minister, who is a fellow Welsh MP, that Wales is home to a wealth of talent, innovation and entrepreneurial spirit. I want to see this nation thrive, but that will happen only if the Government provide the support and investment needed to unlock its full potential. I call on them to do just that, before other states around the world do it for us.

14:48

[Mike Martin (Tunbridge Wells) (LD)]

It is an honour to serve under your chairship, Mr Betts. I congratulate the hon. Member for Bromley and Biggin Hill (Peter Fortune) on securing this important debate. We have heard from both sides of the Chamber that the British tech sector spreads into all our constituencies, so it concerns us all.

When the Government came to power, they said that their central mission was to provide growth. I posit that a key way to do that is by supporting our small and medium-sized businesses, because that is where growth comes from.

[Rachel Gilmour (Tiverton and Minehead) (LD)]

Does my hon. Friend share my view that, although we can be rightly proud of having the third most valuable tech ecosystem in the world, we cannot be complacent, especially amid increasing international uncertainty? Shearwell Data in my constituency is exactly the sort of business that he refers to. A family-run business, founded by Richard Webber in 1992, it now exports livestock management systems internationally. Mr Webber is a true local champion: he not only runs that fantastic family businesses, but works at the heart of our community in Wheddon Cross. Does my hon. Friend agree that the flight of UK tech companies to other markets such as the United States shows that we must do more to ensure British companies can start, stay and scale here?

[Mike Martin]

I thank my hon. Friend for her comprehensive intervention, which speaks to exactly the issues that I will raise.

The key example is DeepMind, which was the world-leading AI company. We, the Brits, failed to create the ecosystem, funding and risk-taking capital to enable it to scale fully. It was then bought by Google, and now the British Government contract with Google rather than with DeepMind. That is exactly my fear: even though we are the world’s third AI power, that could move away from us very quickly if we do not create the right ecosystem to support our tech firms.

If this Government are serious about supporting growth, we need to look at small and medium-sized enterprises. It will not surprise hon. Members that I have some examples from my Tunbridge Wells constituency. First, Capital Web develops AI software to help businesses to improve productivity. That is on the application side of AI; we are never going to compete on the frontier model side of AI, but the UK can certainly compete on how we implement those frontier models to work cases. I will also give a bit more detail about Adzuna, a firm based in Tunbridge Wells that helps people to find jobs.

The problem in the UK is one of scaling up. We often have support for businesses that are very small. We might have research and development tax credits or innovation grants, or we might help them to spin directly out of universities. However, what just does not happen in the UK is moving them on from the position where they have a concept and patent and are perhaps ready to scale rapidly. Those firms are left to go abroad, be taken over, or perhaps wither and see the market move on and eclipse them. That is the real danger.

[Dan Aldridge (Weston-super-Mare) (Lab)]

I held a roundtable in my constituency with the Startup Coalition just two weeks ago. We found that one of the biggest barriers was not an absence of talent or expertise in my town, but a poverty of access to information, advice and guidance. No one had heard of small business start-up loans, the £500 to £25,000 Government-backed loans, which are really critical. That was one of the things people critically needed. That is a big issue. I would ask the Minister how we improve communication to places such as Weston-super-Mare.

[Mike Martin]

That is an excellent point. It is very much something that the Government can do, because they understand where capital can be found and how to create the legal and regulatory ecosystem that enables these companies to thrive.

Let me touch briefly on access to capital—I am thinking of slightly larger amounts than those the hon. Gentleman just mentioned. Pension funds are a huge source of capital. In the UK, trillions are under management in our pension funds. This is something that Canada does very well. Canada’s pension funds operate almost like specialist investors, pumping billions of dollars into AI, infrastructure and software. To pick another example that is dear to my constituency, South East Water, which many hon. Members will have seen me rail against, is 25% owned by NatWest pensions—our favourite cuddly UK bank—which makes its money by selling debt to South East Water at a rate of 10% interest. That is not pension fund investment that is driving growth in the UK. We must do better. We must think about how we can push and guide our pension funds, and all those millions that are under investment, to invest in growth sectors in the UK, rather than going abroad.

Let me turn to reforming public procurement. At the worst end of the spectrum is probably the Ministry of Defence, where it takes six years from first contact to signing a contract. That is just to sign the contract, not to deliver the piece of military hardware and test it or have it in service. The stories out of MOD procurement would not be out of place in an episode of “The Thick of It”.

That is the worst case, but then there is the Department for Work and Pensions. Andrew in my constituency founded Adzuna, which is effectively a super-duper job search thing that uses AI to match people’s profiles to the skills needed and so on. It took him two and a half years from approaching the DWP to signing a contract. Andrew started out with a laptop at his kitchen table, and businesses that size cannot wait two and a half years. Cash is king—and they will either have gone out of business or decided to go somewhere else by the time that contract is offered.

Whether in defence, where people actually need to contract much more quickly because of the pace of technological change, or Government, who actually need an effective job search tool on their websites, these timescales need to be compressed. In that way the Government will open themselves up much more to small firms instead of just the big firms that are able to take two and a half years on a punt for a contract with the DWP.

To sum up, there are a number of things that the Government could do around information sharing—I thank the hon. Member for Weston-super-Mare (Dan Aldridge) for making that point—and access to capital, particularly encouraging pension funds to invest. They should also look at procurement and focusing that on small businesses, because small businesses are the ones that deliver growth. That is where we get growth in our economy—much more so than from big businesses. The Government have a huge set of levers to pull, so I implore the Minister, “Could we perhaps start pulling them?”. I look forward to his remarks.

14:56

[Alison Taylor (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship today, Mr Betts. I thank the hon. Member for Bromley and Biggin Hill (Peter Fortune) for securing such an important debate—a debate that is of significance to my constituency and the role it plays in supporting UK-based tech companies.

In my former career as a chartered surveyor, I worked on a project in the constituency to create an innovation zone around Glasgow international airport, funded in part by the UK Government’s city deal. The Chancellor has now committed to further support with £30 million of direct investment from the UK Government to expand that project. This Labour Government’s commitment to continue to invest directly in such long-term initiatives is most welcome, and it has made a huge impact on the economic and upskilling opportunities for generations of residents in my constituency.

The zone, which includes the Advanced Manufacturing Innovation District Scotland—also known as AMIDS—would not be there without UK Government support, which has helped to fund large infrastructure works including two new bridges, land reclamation, decontamination and active travel routes. All that preparatory construction work paved the way for the iconic anchor building, the National Manufacturing Institute Scotland, to be completed. Its completion has already acted as a catalyst for future investment. It is helping to make tech companies more productive, resilient and sustainable. It also pioneers and harnesses AI to drive smarter, data-led production, turning breakthrough ideas and inventions into high-impact industrial products. The National Manufacturing Institute Scotland is also a leader in the circular economy and in recycling industrial products such as wind turbine blades.

Working in conjunction with academia from across Scotland and the local West College Scotland, that collaboration drives innovation and new technologies. The new innovation zone supports emerging sectors such as photonics, which is important for medical imaging, solar power and high-speed telecoms. Advanced manufacturing in the zone will also support sectors such as net zero shipping, energy-efficient aerospace, the circular economy and green jobs. It is a model for how the Government can drive growth and support innovation in the tech sector.

I will conclude by thanking the Government for undertaking recently to identify barriers to growth, including considering further measures to support access to finance, which is crucial for the emerging tech sector. All those measures are most welcome.

15:00

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

As always, it is a real pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Betts; thank you for all you do for us in relation to Westminster Hall. I also thank the hon. Member for Bromley and Biggin Hill (Peter Fortune) for raising this issue and thereby giving us all an opportunity to participate in this debate—and it is always good to see the Minister in his place. I wish him well in the role that he plays and we very much look forward to hearing his response to the debate.

I always say good things about Northern Ireland, but today I want to talk about the things that I believe put us at the top of the tree when it comes to cyber-security. Northern Ireland has become the cyber-security centre of Europe—it is increasingly possible that it might even be the global cyber-security centre—but that situation did not simply arise out of nowhere. There has been a dedicated focus on investing in the sector, and on training young people to think differently and to become involved in it.

My parliamentary aide attended a grammar school that typically focused on maths, English language and science, yet she recalls a careers day when an adviser from Queen’s University in Belfast came in and advised her and her classmates to consider tech and computer science, saying that those would be the future of employment and job security in Northern Ireland. That was back in the year 2000. How right and how prophetic that university adviser was.

Sometimes along life’s way we meet people who will have an incredible influence on our lives; we all have those people, when we look back. That university adviser was one of those people; he had a vision, and in particular a vision for young people. Many of the people he taught are now in that category themselves, in that department or that section.

[Dan Aldridge]

I just want to pay tribute to a number of lecturers at the universities in Northern Ireland. I used to work for the British Computer Society and the Northern Ireland branch was phenomenal. If the hon. Gentleman has not yet made contact with that branch, to speak to it about its cyber-security work in Northern Ireland, it would be a fantastic group of people for him to connect with.

[Jim Shannon]

I thank the hon. Gentleman very much for that intervention; it is always good to get an intervention that reinforces the point of view that I am putting forward. Obviously, he has a personal knowledge of this issue and we thank him for that, too.

Due to the dedication and focus of universities in Northern Ireland, in particular Queen’s University in Belfast, cyber-security quickly became a focal point for careers. Subsequently, Northern Ireland, because of its unique combination of world-class academic research, a high concentration of global firms and a stable, highly skilled talent pipeline, has developed a well-established reputation in this field.

However, we all know that we can never rest on our achievements or laurels, but must continue to strive for more. That is why it is imperative that funding exists to keep pace with and even outstrip our competitors in providing skilled workers and innovation, supported by world-leading university structures. Northern Ireland leads the way in that regard and it is good that it does so.

The Centre for Secure Information Technologies at Queen’s University in Belfast is the primary driver of world-class academic research, and we need to retain and enhance funding for that research to continue. The centre is the UK’s innovation and knowledge centre for cyber-security and is the largest of its kind in Europe, recognised by the National Cyber Security Centre as an academic centre of excellence in both research and education. Those are big plaudits for Queen’s University and its work.

Belfast has consistently ranked as the No.1 global destination for US-based cyber-security foreign direct investment, with more than 100 cyber-security businesses and teams located within just three miles of the city centre, hosting European or global security operations for firms including Rapid7, Proofpoint, IBM Security, Microsoft, Nvidia and Nihon Cyber Defence, as well as international financial giants such as Aflac, Allstate and Citi, which has established its global cyber-security operations centre in Belfast. Again, that is an indication of the confidence across the world in Belfast, in Queen’s University and in Northern Ireland.

We have the highest percentage of qualified IT professionals in the United Kingdom and Ireland, with more than 77% holding degree-level qualifications. Added to that is the fact that operating costs in Northern Ireland are approximately 40% to 55% lower than in other parts of western Europe. With a 40% reduction in typical salary costs compared with London, it is easy to see the attraction. The money that has been invested in growing this space has had a real return for the local economy—plenty of high-paying jobs and opportunity.

The sector generates more than £258 million in direct gross value added for the local economy annually, and supports almost 2,800 roles across more than 120 companies, with the average advertised salary in the sector exceeding £53,000, which is significantly higher than the regional private sector median. The recent £3 million investment in the Centre for Secure Information Technologies is estimated to unlock some £10.7 million in broader economic impact across the United Kingdom.

I am not quite sure if the Minister, in his role, has had a chance to go to Northern Ireland? If he has not, I encourage him to go. I think he would be impressed. Everyone knows that I am in favour of support for the Union; I think we are all better together. We have no Scottish nationalists or Plaid Cymru here to say otherwise. In this great United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, we all help each other, and there are great advantages to being a part of this, the best Union in the world.

If the Minister gets the opportunity to go, he would be impressed. He may tell me he has been there. If he has, that is fantastic news. Investing in growth in this sector is a must. I look to the Minister to ensure that Northern Ireland sees her share of investment, because we have proven already that we can not only provide the goods, but do so much more.

15:06

[Edward Morello (West Dorset) (LD)]

It is an honour to serve under your chairship, Mr Betts. I congratulate the hon. Member for Bromley and Biggin Hill (Peter Fortune) on securing this important debate. I suspect that, at this point, I am in danger of labouring the points already made by other hon. Members, but I will persist. Perhaps it is a sign that we all know what needs to happen. I am sure the Minister will speak to those issues.

The UK tech sector employs more than 1.7 million people and contributes more than £150 billion to the UK economy. Our technology ecosystem has created more than 185 unicorn companies, which are start-up companies valued at more than £1 billion. I suspect that, at the end of this debate, a word cloud would have the word “ecosystem” as the largest word, but there is good reason for that.

Innovation does not happen on its own; it requires the right conditions, such as access to funding, clear regulation, market confidence, skilled workers and a Government who understand the importance of helping companies grow. That is particularly important for small and medium-sized businesses, which form the backbone of the UK economy. In the UK, there were 5.7 million SMEs, including 5.4 million microbusinesses, in 2025. Those companies often develop some of the most exciting ideas, but they also face the greatest challenges when trying to scale up.

One area where the UK has a huge opportunity is climate technology. As the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on ClimateTech, and having spent nearly a decade working in renewable energy finance before entering Parliament, I have seen how much potential this sector has. Between now and 2050, the world will need to remove 165 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, with annual removals reaching about 10 billion tonnes a year by the mid-century if we are to limit global warming to between 1.5°C and 2°C. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has made it clear that without carbon-removal technologies, those goals will not be met.

[Alison Taylor]

The hon. Member mentions a specific sector of the tech economy. Does he agree that tech companies do best when they are clustered together, particularly in innovation zones, so that they can share emerging knowledge and technologies, and link in with academia?

[Edward Morello]

I certainly agree that, if we want to become a market or world leader in a particular technology space, it is vital that we channel funding and support into those areas where we have the most opportunity and a competitive advantage.

Climate technology is not only an environmental priority, but a huge economic opportunity to lead a sector the world will need for decades to come. The UK’s greenhouse gas removal sector alone is now valued at £1.2 billion, with investment increasing by more than 39% in 2024—faster than the technology sector as a whole. According to analysis aligned with the Climate Change Committee’s seventh carbon budget, greenhouse gas removal technologies could support over 60,000 high-quality jobs in the UK by 2050. The Government have already taken some positive steps: funding for carbon capture and storage clusters, investment in innovation programmes, such as direct air capture and bioenergy carbon capture, and plans for new clean tech innovation challenges. Those are all important developments.

However, challenges remain, particularly when companies try to move from early innovation to large-scale deployment. Many climate technology companies face what is often called the valley of death. Early-stage funding can help to get ideas off the ground, but when companies reach pilot or demonstration stage, that funding often disappears. Data shows that although almost all seed-stage companies move forward, only one third successfully progress beyond series B investment. At that point, the technologies often require significant capital investment to scale, which requires the Government to project confidence to the sectors and investors. Without stronger support mechanisms, whether through the National Wealth Fund, the British Business Bank or other targeted policies, many promising technologies risk stalling before they ever reach market.

In other sectors, there is more the Government can do. A fantastic company called Sintela in Dorchester in my constituency develops advanced fibre-optic sensing systems capable of detecting movement and activity across long distances of infrastructure. The technology has applications in security, energy systems and environmental monitoring. Last year, the company secured orders from US Customs and Border Protection worth more than $90 million. That contract has now been expanded to $200 million through to 2028, which represents the largest contract globally for distributed fibre-optic sensing technology.

Small companies like Sintela can struggle to gain the same level of access to Government support and trade opportunities as larger firms. When business delegations travel abroad with Ministers or during state visits, the companies included are often the same large multinational businesses, but SMEs are often where some of the most exciting innovation is happening. If we want to support British tech companies properly, we must also ensure that small and medium-sized firms are included in trade missions, international delegations and export promotion.

The UK needs a clear long-term approach to science and technology. That includes raising research and development spending to 3.5% of GDP, investing in digital infrastructure, supporting local government capacity and ensuring that the benefits of technology are spread around the country. It also means continuing to invest in green technologies, which is essential if we are to tackle the climate crisis, while creating new industries and job opportunities. The UK has many of the ingredients needed for success: world-class universities, strong research institutions and an entrepreneurial technology sector. What we must do now is make sure that the environment is right for those companies to grow.

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

We now come on to the Front Benchers. Everyone is entitled to at least 10 minutes, but I think you can work out that you have a little bit more if you want to take it.

15:13

[Victoria Collins (Harpenden and Berkhamsted) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Betts. I commend the hon. Member for Bromley and Biggin Hill (Peter Fortune) on securing this essential debate.

Entrepreneurship is in my blood. Both my parents ran their own businesses. My mum launched the website for her business over 15 years ago and was so tech-savvy that she had a larger Twitter following than me—and that is when it was called Twitter. As someone who went on to launch my own tech company and took part in the New Entrepreneurs Foundation, I have met so many fantastic entrepreneurs and I am so pleased that we are debating Government support for UK tech, but, boy, do we need more from the Government.

On one hand, the UK tech sector is an immense success story, and one that we should be proud of, built on the legacy of Ada Lovelace, Alan Turing and Tim Berners-Lee. My hon. Friend the Member for Tunbridge Wells (Mike Martin) mentioned DeepMind. We have the third most valuable tech ecosystem in the world at nearly £1 trillion. On the other hand, the UK tech sector is a story of frustration, stifled potential and a looming threat that great companies and ideas that are incubated here will be sold off because of a ceiling of funding.

I felt that the most powerful way to tell that story today was to amplify the voices of tech leaders themselves. These are the people who are passionate about growing world-class companies here in the UK, but their frustrations are real. It often seems more of a fight to innovate than a celebration of progress. I thank the scores of tech leaders who shared their views with me. Sadly, I cannot get them all in today, but that shows how vital this debate is. I hope that the Government will give this issue more time at some point.

I have five requests, and I ask the Minister to address as many as he can. The first one is “procurement, procurement, procurement”. Even the National Audit Office concluded that the Government’s procurement strategy actively favours large, predominantly foreign suppliers, which was brought up in a debate yesterday. Stephen Kines, the co-founder of Goldilock, an award-winning cyber-hardware company, called for the Government to buy UK products and said,

“Don’t endlessly innovate in ‘innovation theatre’ programmes only”.

I also heard from Doug Monro, the CEO of Adzuna—I am pleased to hear from the hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells that Adzuna was able to get a public contract eventually, after two and a half years. Doug urges the Government to

“buy tech and AI from British startups, not build in-house or buy from massive American companies”.

He shared the powerful message that,

“We can transform public services, cut the welfare bill, and reduce taxes if you’d only let us.”

The Government should be celebrating “made in Britain” by buying “made in Britain”. That is why the Lib Dems have called for a comprehensive public sector technology policy and investment plan and tabled digital sovereign strategy amendments to the cyber Bill. As the hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells mentioned, this is about growth.

My second call is to fix funding fast. The funding desert for scale-ups, that valley of death that we heard about, is well known, but it is worrying how normalised it has become. Ben Rose, the co-founder of Supercede, warns that many tech firms are forced to attract capital from overseas to continue growing at pace—we all know that story, unfortunately. Mark Thomas, the CEO of Appnalysis, notes that the £250,000 limit of the celebrated seed enterprise investment scheme has been eroded by inflation and rising costs to the point that it barely buys 12 months of runway. He asks that the Government look at increasing the limit of the scheme. Leo Rogers, the CEO of Curvo AI, calls for R&D tax credits to be extended to cover compute costs, which in the world of AI are really important. The hon. Member for Weston-super-Mare (Dan Aldridge) mentioned the important issue of financing smaller start-ups, which was mentioned by several entrepreneurs who contacted me. They said that would be helpful to get off the ground and to keep going. Sometimes the funding is there, but the communication of where to find it is not.

That is why the Lib Dems have called for, among other policies, an increase in R&D spending to 3.5% of GDP and better support from the National Wealth Fund and the British Business Bank to de-risk and unlock innovation. We also want a review of IR35, because that is where a lot of the workforce in tech are. The university spin-out support that the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Chris Evans) mentioned is important. The hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells talked about pension funds, and the use of those mega pension funds and where that money can go will be vital to unlocking a lot of innovation in the UK.

My third point is that we must treasure our talent. Great talent helps to grow great companies, not only by upskilling at home but by attracting experts from overseas. There are many calls to align, for example, the innovator founder visa with Innovate UK. Claudia Radu, the CEO of Circe, says that we must make sure that talent visas are easier to get. The hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) talked about the skills for the next generation, and we must ensure that our talent and workforce planning as a country is aligned with the skills we need for the future. That is why the Lib Dems believe that there needs to be a national people strategy alongside an industrial strategy, because without those skills and that talent, we cannot deliver on economic ambition.

My fourth call is to “think smart regulation”. Tech founders understand the importance of avoiding a race to the bottom, but they are often bogged down in red tape. The App Association warns that tech companies are

“overburdened with regulation, tax, and uncertainty caused by ever-changing rules”.

That is why I increasingly believe in standards and smart, outcome-focused regulation that supports innovation—and the pace it requires—and helps to build trust. The hon. Member for Bromley and Biggin Hill talked about the use of competition, which is a vital aspect of that.

The fifth call, which is also vital, is to lift up small businesses and start-ups—do not forget them. Not only are SMEs and start-ups the backbone of our economy, but all scale-ups started there; several were mentioned today. Karen Atkinson, the CEO of Mediaholix, says,

“I don’t feel that there is any support for small companies. It feels like the government are focusing on the big companies like Meta and Google, which really doesn’t benefit this country in the long run. Quick wins and vanity rather than a true understanding of what it takes and how. Overall the Government are making it exceptionally difficult for small companies to grow.”

Another founder put it more starkly, saying,

“Currently, Parliament has gamified the system against the success of British SME and micro-SME innovators.”

That support in the beginning, whether staff costs or business rates, is something that the Liberal Democrats have raised the alarm on. We call on the Government to do more. Finally, Alex from Synthesia sums it up well. He says,

“Buy software made in the UK, simplify procurement for British start-ups, and keep regulation simple and outcome-focused.”

I have a dream that we will grow our fantastic UK tech landscape. As my Friend the hon. Member for West Dorset (Edward Morello) mentioned, we can solve the biggest problems, such as climate change. We can drive that change, but more than that, we could be the country that takes in scale-ups and does not fear that the companies that incubate here will go elsewhere. Anthropic, for example, may not be welcome in the US; I hope it would be welcomed in the UK. The Government must do more to back British tech for our security, economy and the great people driving innovation in Great Britain and around the globe.

15:21

[Julia Lopez (Hornchurch and Upminster) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Betts. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Biggin Hill (Peter Fortune) on securing this incredibly important debate. He brings a unique blend of glamour and tech nerdery to the House. Frankly, it is something Parliament could do with much more of.

I am grateful for the valuable contributions from the hon. Members for Tunbridge Wells (Mike Martin), for Strangford (Jim Shannon), for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Alison Taylor), for West Dorset (Edward Morello) and for Caerphilly (Chris Evans). There is a real showing of strength for the tech sector across the country, which I welcome.

As we are debating Government support for UK-based tech companies, I would like to do a bit of scene-setting. Before 2010, Britain’s digital economy was fragmented and under-developed; London’s emergence as Europe’s tech capital was not destiny; the Silicon Roundabout was only nascent; Government digital services were scattered across thousands of outdated websites; and the connection between our world-class universities and a thriving start-up ecosystem had not yet been fully realised.

In Government, the Conservatives deliberately worked with the tech sector to create an environment in which it could grow—the hon. Member for West Dorset made a point about how we need to do that—which included targeted measures on start-ups, such as the seed enterprise investment scheme. Scale-up has been mentioned as a real challenge that remains today, as has inflation in relation to the SEIS. We supported Tech City, which turned east London into a global hub for start-ups and innovation; we modernised Government services through the creation of the Government Digital Service and platforms like gov.uk; and we invested heavily in digital infrastructure, substantially expanding gigabit broadband coverage. The hon. Member for Strangford talked about how our parties like to help each other to help every corner of the United Kingdom. I remember that particular help on gigabit broadband was given to the DUP when a particular political deal was done a few years ago.

Over the following decade, that strategy paid off. Entire sectors, from fintech to artificial intelligence and from cyber-security to digital health, took root and expanded. Today, the UK digital sector generates well over £200 billion in GVA and employs 2.6 million people in its digital companies. In 2025, the combined market valuation was $1.2 trillion. It is the largest tech ecosystem in Europe, and among the largest outside the US and China. I confess that when Labour wangs on about 14 years, I say, “Yes, 14 years in which Britain built Europe’s most dynamic tech sector and the economic output of our digital sector more than doubled.”

We were also alive to the risks that a strong tech sector could pose if it was not managed correctly. That is why we introduced major legislation to shape the digital economy, and promoted competition and consumer choice. Principally, that was the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024, which addressed the market powers of the largest digital platforms. The principle behind that legislation was simple and profoundly Conservative. We believe that in a strong, competitive, capitalist economy, success should come from innovation, talent and providing a great product to the customer, not from gatekeeping power or monopoly control.

That brings us to the challenge at the heart of this debate, which is that in digital markets, power has been concentrated in a handful of global firms. Those firms are brilliant; they bring many tools and skills, and they bring scale. However, that scale has consequences. If we are to prevent it from being used to steamroller other businesses that may be more innovative or provide a better product to the consumer, and if we are to generate more growth and retain more value in this country rather than see it taken abroad, we need digital markets to be open and competitive.

One obvious place for intervention is the mobile app ecosystem. For many digital businesses today, the app stores operated by Apple and Google provide incredibly useful and efficient distribution platforms. However, that value comes with a toll, because it creates huge gatekeeping power for those companies. Consumers may not realise it, but that risks costing them and our economy significantly. Developers are often required to use the platform’s payment systems and to pay commissions of up to 30% on digital purchases. That is a gigantic revenue stream generated from not doing an awful lot.

Those companies may argue that they provide security and maintenance and so on, but app store commissions for Google and Apple are thought to generate up to £2 billion each in net revenue from their UK operations. That means higher prices for consumers, fewer resources for innovation, greater entrenchment and platform dominance. Then we throw up our hands and ask, “What can realistically be done? What is the alternative to those companies?” It becomes a downward spiral where we have less power to deal with these challenges.

Google and Apple’s power extends far beyond simply running app stores. They can control direct communications and what developers can say to customers, insist on particular payment platforms, prevent developers from informing users when products are cheaper elsewhere, and so on. My hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Biggin Hill listed some critical examples, but he also mentioned companies such as Amazon. We are all familiar with the sheer power of Amazon, but if it cannot sufficiently challenge app store market power, what chance does a smaller British tech company have?

The legislative framework to address this exists in the DMCC Act, which gave the Competition and Markets Authority conduct requirement powers and allowed it to mandate specific behaviours. However, developers, competition lawyers and tech businesses tell me that they worry the CMA has gone soft, with long investigations and voluntary remedies. They believe it reflects political direction.

This exposes a wider problem with the Labour Government. We left them with the strongest tech ecosystem in Europe, but I fear they have no real plan for growth. As a result, they have a troubling reliance on big tech companies, because they are telling them they will give them big investment headlines—but that risks entrenching dependency and stifling home-grown innovation.

In their first set of returns, Labour Ministers had met big tech firms roughly 70% more often than their Conservative predecessors. That culminated in the US-UK tech deal, where there were a lot of big headlines, but I am not entirely sure what the substance was. There were interesting articles in The Guardian this week about some of those deals and I think there was a lot of circular investment going on. There was also a very interesting debate yesterday in this Chamber in which Labour MPs began to question some of what was going on; they were worrying about the dependency being created, along with the security and economic implications that brings.

Last year, the Government asked the competition watchdog to support

“the overriding national priority of…economic growth.”

However, if growth is defined as just bringing in big tech, it is predictable how the regulator will act. In February, the CMA approved voluntary commitments from Apple and Google. In fairness—I have spoken to it about this directly—it contends that this could deliver faster results. However, smaller tech firms worry that it will delay action on the substantive issue of fees.

As we highlighted in yesterday’s debate on tech sovereignty, the UK risks drifting into a position of high dependency and low resilience, where too much of our digital economy relies on infrastructure and platforms that we simply do not have any control over. That matters not just for innovation but for economic strength, consumer protection and national security.

I must stress that this is not an argument against American companies; it is an argument about competition and the dangers of its absence. In fact, courts in the US have already upheld these principles to the benefit of smaller US tech firms. We must ensure an open digital market that rewards innovation from wherever it comes and gives UK consumers and developers the same freedoms that American developers can now enjoy because of that court ruling.

The same problem exists with the CMA’s cloud inquiry, which is examining the extraordinarily important issue of market concentration. We expect a determination this month. Amazon Web Services and Microsoft dominate the cloud market, and the Government recognise this as a chronic risk. It is a red light that will be flashing more urgently after the three recent global cloud outages, not to mention the destruction of AWS data centres in the Gulf. The answer to our chronic dependency must surely come through robust competition measures. We await the CMA’s strategic market status decision with bated breath.

The rapid development of AI could, in the best-case scenario, inject real competition into these markets, with AI agents empowering the consumer. Or—this is my real worry—it could entrench the market dominance and power consolidation that we have seen in other parts of the digital economy. Will the Government and the regulator start to think about the power of agentic AI in particular? What happens when an AI starts to curate products for the consumer in ways that shut out smaller vendors from the picture, or necessitate expensive deals with the AI giants to get products into the agent’s selection?

What kind of digital economy do we want? Do we want one that is dominated by a handful of global gatekeepers, or one where a broad range of innovative companies can compete, innovate and grow on merit, delivering a diverse economy and benefits to the consumer? As Conservatives, our view is very simple: we have to give UK tech firms the tools to win. Those are: low taxes, so that innovators can invest and scale; cheap, abundant energy and high-quality digital infrastructure; access to the best global talent; and the celebration of successful people, not taxing them out of the country with envy-driven politics. It is about public procurement that backs British innovation, deeper pools of investable capital and, critically, strong competition policy that ensures that no company, no matter how large or powerful, can use its market position to drive up prices and crowd out competition. That was our approach in office, and it remains our vision for the future of Britain’s tech economy. I hope that the Minister can set out some specifics about how he, too, recognises the importance of competition in the digital sphere.

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

Can the Minister make sure that he allows two minutes at the end for the mover to wind up?

15:32

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology (Kanishka Narayan)]

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. 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.

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. 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. 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. 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. 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. 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. 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. 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. 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.

[Edward Morello]

Shortly before the debate, the Minister said he would like to visit Weston-super-Mare and other locations. I invite him to beautiful West Dorset to visit the fibre optics company Sintela, which is one of the UK’s biggest success stories.

[Kanishka Narayan]

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.

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. 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. 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. 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. 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. 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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

15:47

[Peter Fortune]

I thank everybody for their contributions. Let me start with the party spokesmen. I pay tribute to the shadow Secretary of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Hornchurch and Upminster (Julia Lopez), for her wisdom and her towering intellect in recognising the self-evident glamour that is dripping from me even as I stand here—it takes one to know one. As ever, she made informed points—and of course I agree with them, because she is my boss.

I thank the Minister for his response. There were many points in it that I agree with and some that I would like to have further conversation on—particularly the points about procurement. That is really important and will become an increasing challenge as we move forward.

The Liberal Democrat spokesperson, the hon. Member for Harpenden and Berkhamsted (Victoria Collins), set out a five-point plan that I would struggle to disagree with. In particular, outcomes-focused regulations would ensure that we have proper competition. It was encouraging that all three party spokespeople spoke from an informed and passionate place. That bodes well for the future.

I turn to the Back-Bench contributions. The hon. Member for Caerphilly (Chris Evans) talked about what a targeted group of engineers can do when they are given the space to flourish. He made some important points about UKRI and how it needs to be reorganised. We recently met the new chief executive, and there is a lot of work to do there, so perhaps the Minister would like to focus on that and push the way that UKRI distributes those funds.

I turn to the hon. and gallant Member for Tunbridge Wells (Mike Martin). I had a quick look on Wikipedia and found out that we were in the same regiment; I did not know that before. I think he was a young second lieutenant when I was a mere legend of history. We will meet afterwards and swap some stories. He highlighted the absurdity of losing potential unicorns—companies that start and can grow here—which are not able to get to the place they need to because there is no incubator for growth. That point was very well made.

The hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Alison Taylor) talked about how important access to finance is for the great companies that she highlighted, not just in her constituency but right across Scotland. If there were an injection of capital, we could see some glowing achievements.

The hon. Member for West Dorset (Edward Morello) talked about how technology can be used, and he especially focused on climate. We will face problems over the next 10 or 20 years, and we will need to develop that technology, some of which will have to be sovereign technology so that we can face those challenges.

Last but never, ever least, the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) rose to his feet to say that he has many great things to say about Northern Ireland; we all know that Northern Ireland has many great things to say about him. I was amused when the hon. Member for Weston-super-Mare (Dan Aldridge) asked whether he had spoken to a company in Northern Ireland. He has spoken to everybody in Northern Ireland—twice. He made an important point about how the cyber-security industry has grown in the past 20 to 30 years, and I want to push the Minister gently on that. Something that was highlighted to us at Space-Comm last week was the need to develop the defence investment plan and get it out as quickly as possible. I will not put the boot in, because the debate has been good natured, but a lot of people in industry are really looking for that to be brought forward.

I am encouraged by this debate, which has been good natured and well informed. We all agree that if we get this right, with the right focus, we can be a world leader in this industry. We will punch not just above our weight but as technological champions. We have the opportunity to take the UK economy into the second half of the 21st century and beyond. I thank hon. Members for their contributions.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered Government support for UK-based tech companies.

15:51

Sitting suspended.

Public Body Data Collection: Sikh and Jewish Ethnicity

Wednesday 11th March 2026 Westminster Hall

15:58

[Preet Kaur Gill (Birmingham Edgbaston) (Lab/Co-op)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered Sikh and Jewish ethnicity data collection by public bodies.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Betts. I welcome my hon. Friend the Minister to her role. For more than 40 years, Sikhs and Jews have been recognised in law as both ethnic and religious groups. That is long-established; it was confirmed by the 1983 Mandla v. Dowell-Lee judgment and reaffirmed by the Equality Act 2010. Yet, in practice, our systems still fail to acknowledge what the law clearly states.

Nearly six decades after racial discrimination laws were introduced, public bodies still do not collect ethnicity data on Sikhs and Jews. This is not a technical oversight; it is a structural problem with the way public bodies and our Government collect ethnicity data—one that prevents us from understanding inequality, recognising discrimination and properly protecting communities the law says we must protect.

In December 2024, I introduced my ten-minute rule Bill, the Public Body Ethnicity Data (Inclusion of Jewish and Sikh Categories) Bill. The Bill provides that where a public body collects data about ethnicity for the purpose of delivering public services, it must include specific Sikh and Jewish categories as options for a person’s ethnic group. This is about how the United Kingdom delivers its public services; it is not a theological discussion, as the Office for National Statistics has told all public bodies that they can use only—this is really important—the current ethnicity data categories for service delivery.

Time and again, national reviews have shown that Sikhs and Jews are missing from the datasets that shape decisions about public services. In 2018, the Women and Equalities Committee heard that the Government’s race disparity audit had identified around 340 datasets across Government, yet not one included data on Sikhs. My own written parliamentary questions have revealed that Government Departments do not collect ethnicity data on Sikhs and Jews.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I commend the hon. Lady on all that she does on behalf of the Sikh community. I am very happy that we have developed a friendship over the years through freedom of religious belief and that we are able to stand together for each other, and that is something that always encourages me.

Does the hon. Lady agree that although Sikh and Jewish people are legally recognised as ethnic groups under the Equality Act 2010, current public data collection often reduces them solely to a religion, which is wrong? Does she agree that Jewish and Sikh people, and other minority communities, face both subtle and overt forms of discrimination, and that it is therefore imperative that public bodies collect accurate ethnicity data? That would send a clear message that Sikh and Jewish people, and others, are valued, visible and protected in every part of this great United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

[Preet Kaur Gill]

The hon. Gentleman makes a really important point, and I will come on to why this is important in practice. We are both legislators in this House, and he is right: we both take our responsibilities very seriously and want to see all communities treated fairly under the law, so we must implement it. I really value his intervention and thank him for it.

As I said, my own written parliamentary questions have revealed that Government Departments do not collect ethnicity data on Sikhs and Jews. As the hon. Member has just said, the only information collected is religious data, but religious data is inconsistent and incomplete, and is rarely used in designing or delivering services. It also excludes people who are ethnically Sikh or Jewish but do not practise their faiths. User need has been clearly evidenced by the plethora of evidence available, and that simply cannot be ignored by the ONS.

[Calum Miller (Bicester and Woodstock) (LD)]

I congratulate the hon. Member on securing the debate. My constituent Dan has written to me to express his strong support for Sikhs and Jews being able to identify as an ethnic group. He is Jewish, but not religious, and says it is important for him to be able to register as belonging to a group not currently permitted under the census data. Does the hon. Member agree that Jews and Sikhs do face discrimination, whether they are religious or not, and that it is important for their identity and the delivery of public services to be able to identify their ethnicity?

[Preet Kaur Gill]

Absolutely; I think that is really important. I have a staffer who, equally, is Jewish and does not feel that he is religious, and he wants the option to tick his ethnicity because, as he says, “I am Jewish.” This is simply giving people the option; no one is forcing anyone to tick any other box—they can tick any box they think reflects their ethnicity. But given the Equality Act, and given race hate and the rise in antisemitism, we absolutely should be collecting ethnicity data. My staffer should not be invisible.

[Peter Prinsley (Bury St Edmunds and Stowmarket) (Lab)]

I wish to make a medical point. Considering the clear evidence for the genetic propensity of Jews to develop certain medical conditions and diseases, is it not right that, in terms of data, the NHS and the Department of Health and Social Care treat Jews as both a religious and an ethnic group?

[Preet Kaur Gill]

My hon. Friend makes an important point, and I really value his expertise in this House. Health inequalities are an area where we really see this issue being played out. The NHS is doing some directed work with the Jewish community; I know that, because it is happening in my constituency. That is because many Jewish women of Ashkenazi descent are predisposed to breast cancer, for example, and I can give lots of similar examples about the Sikh community. That is why we must consider the real-life experiences of those in our communities—they are not only invisible, but the health inequalities they face are not being addressed, as a result of the situation we find ourselves in.

[Sarah Coombes (West Bromwich) (Lab)]

I am proud to represent a very large Sikh community in Sandwell, which is near my hon. Friend’s constituency. What she campaigns for—for ethnicity data about the Sikh community to be recorded—is really important for organisations such as the NHS as well as for Home Office data and crime data. We have suffered some very serious anti-Sikh hate crime in West Bromwich recently, which the community is very upset about, and I am standing with them against it. Can she say more about how recording this data will help not just NHS and health data, but other types of public data?

[Preet Kaur Gill]

My hon. Friend does some fantastic work locally with her communities, and I know that she supports this campaign and really understands the real-life impact it has. She talked about anti-Sikh hate. We have seen a rise in hate crime across communities, but it is especially marked in the latest Home Office data. The data shows that there has been an increase of 20% in religious hate against the Sikh community. I will go on to say a bit more about how hate crime is recorded for both the Jewish community and the Sikh community.

When public bodies do not count a community, that community is invisible. That is clearly the case for Jews and Sikhs. My Bill addresses that gap. It would give Jews and Sikhs the simple and fair recognition that the law already promises. As legislators, it is our duty to ensure that the law is upheld and implemented. It is not optional for arm’s length bodies or Government Departments; the law is the law.

Covid-19 showed us what is at stake when communities are not counted. When the ONS belatedly analysed covid outcomes by religious group, it revealed that Sikhs had died at disproportionately high rates, even adjusting for deprivation, region and other socioeconomic factors. Critically, Sikhs were affected differently from other south Asian groups, proving that the existing ethnic categories failed to capture the reality, and for the Jewish community, the death rate was almost twice the rate of the general population. If we are serious about tackling health inequalities, we must be serious about collecting accurate data. After all, it is about life and death. If the evidence from this work is not compelling enough for the ONS, then I really do not know what will be.

As my hon. Friend the Member for West Bromwich (Sarah Coombes) stated, we have recently seen horrific incidents of anti-Sikh hate crime in the west midlands. There have been two separate racially aggravated rapes of Sikh women, including one just outside my constituency, and a brutal physical attack on two Sikh taxi drivers. Of the 115,990 hate crimes recorded by the police in England and Wales between April 2024 and March 2025, 71% were recorded as being “racially aggravated”. Yet despite the Home Office requiring police forces to provide the ethnicity of victims since April 2021, we only know the ethnicity of victims in 40% of offences, and within that 40%, Sikh and Jewish categories are not offered. So the racially aggravated rapes that those two Sikh women were subjected to were not recorded as anti-Sikh hate crimes.

As I said earlier, of the 9% of hate crimes that were recorded as being religiously aggravated, Home Office data shows a 20% increase in crimes specifically targeting Sikhs. Are we saying that Jewish and Sikh victims do not matter? I think that is a reasonable question for both communities to ask.

The Jewish community continues to face horrific abuse, having the highest rate of religious hate crime of any group. The terrorist attack at Heaton Park synagogue in Manchester was an awful reminder that there is still much more to be done to fight antisemitism and keep British Jews safe.

The lack of accurate data collection for the offence of racially aggravated hate crime is hiding the true severity of anti-Sikh and anti-Jewish hate crime, which means that the police and the Government cannot put proper targeted protections in place. The Sikh community is asking the Government, the Home Office and the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government why they are not recognising and recording anti-Sikh hate crimes. What are they saying to that? That it is because the ONS asks them to only use the existing ethnic categories.

The ONS does not seem to understand that Jews and Sikhs face racial hatred, which is distinct from religious hatred. How are we meant to track and combat this religious hatred without data? Why does the Minister think the ONS is treating Sikh and Jewish communities in this way, given the levels of hate that they have recently faced and the decades they have spent campaigning for fairness and equality?

After many meetings and much correspondence from me over the past eight years, the ONS has acknowledged that ethnicity standards must reflect the United Kingdom’s diversity. The Government Statistical Service, led by the ONS, recently consulted on additional categories for the ethnicity harmonised standard, but the criteria for the evaluation of the responses, which were published last week, leave me apprehensive. Despite assurances to the contrary, I was disappointed that the criteria were almost identical to those used to decide the categories for the last census, in 2021, in which Sikhs and Jews were in the last four groups to be considered from a list of 55. Those should not be treated as the same exercise. The harmonisation standard is primarily intended to assist public bodies to meet their equalities responsibility—I say that again: to meet their equalities responsibility—and best serve all Britain’s diverse communities. The purpose of the census is, of course, much broader.

With that in mind, I was struck by the lack of any legal test. Sikhs and Jews have been legally recognised as ethnicities for decades. We know that religion data is not used by public bodies that implement this standard. In fact, the ONS knows this, and has publicly acknowledged it. Surely the GSS, led by the ONS, needs to consider the bigger picture and form a harmonised standard with its implementation in mind. If Sikhs and Jews are legally protected ethnicities, public bodies have a legal duty to monitor their outcomes and deliver services to address inequality. The GSS should want to develop a harmonised standard that allows public bodies to meet their legal obligations.

The ONS has claimed in meetings that there are apparently hundreds of potential ethnicities that could be included, but in the landmark 1983 case Mandla v. Dowell-Lee, the Law Lords made life easier by establishing crucial criteria for defining an ethnic group. The Minister should signal to the GSS that, as legislators, we expect the starting point of its considerations to be legally recognised ethnic groups such as Sikhs and Jews, given the protections in the Equality Act 2010.

The second criterion—assessing whether there is a lack of alternative sources of information for the group—similarly demonstrates the ONS’s short-sightedness. Although many Sikhs may choose to record their religion as Sikh, the ONS knows that the question is optional, is not used to inform policymaking or service delivery, and is irrelevant to the execution of ethnicity equalities duties.

Finally, the subjective “acceptability” criterion does not give me faith that the ONS has learned any lessons from past oversights. In the run-up to the 2021 census, the ONS pushed aside calls for a Sikh ethnicity tick box, citing divisions in the community—an argument that I am disappointed has been repeated since. I remind the House and the ONS that nearly 100,000 Sikhs and 65,000 Jews ticked “other” and wrote in their ethnicity in the census. That is hugely significant, because this huge number of respondents from the two communities is far bigger than the number of responses to any consultation, focus group or exercise that the ONS may choose to carry out.

Citizens want democracy to work for them, so that they can have trust in our political system. That is our duty as legislators. I am therefore keen to understand what the Government are saying to the 165,000 Jews and Sikhs who clearly sent a message to the ONS and Government that they want the option to tick “Jewish” or “Sikh”.

I am not advocating or forcing anyone to identify in a certain way. Respondents would still be able to record their ethnicity as they choose, as would any person from any background. The question is whether the GSS and ONS give greater weight to established legal precedent or a few dissenting voices in a focus group.

That brings me to the relationship between the Government, the ONS and Parliament more broadly. In a recent meeting, the ONS made it clear that it expects the Government to tell it their data needs, yet in all my correspondence on this issue over past years, Ministers have responded by stating that they are relying on the GSS and ONS. Let me be clear: it is right that our country’s official statistics are independent of Government. However, at some point the relationship has shifted, and we have lost our way. The Government should obviously not be able to write their own scorecard, but that does not mean that Government Departments should not engage proactively with the ONS to outline what frameworks they need to best serve the British public.

I tabled questions to every Department asking whether they fed into the consultation on the harmonised standard. The responses I have gotten back have been hugely disappointing. Many Departments dodged the question, telling me to wait for the ONS’s response to the consultation later this year to see whether Departments fed in. How does that give Jewish and Sikh communities any faith that, while they are dying disproportionately, we in this House are committed to addressing that inequality? It is a simple question. This is about transparency.

I am grateful that the Home Office confirmed that it provided an organisational response. The relationship between the Government and the ONS should be reciprocal. These Departments hold the data, but many of them say that there is no data. They deliver services that are not directed at these groups, so they should be working with the ONS to push for better data that ensures that they can meet their legal equalities duties.

The ONS is funded by the taxpayer and consists of civil servants. Civil servants must deliver for the public. In January, I tabled a question on ethnicity pay gap reporting and received an interesting response. The Minister who responded, my hon. Friend the Member for Feltham and Heston (Seema Malhotra), stated that the recent consultation on ethnicity and disability pay-gap reporting considered whether ethnicity data should be collected following the GSS and ONS current harmonised standard, which does not include specific “Sikh” and “Jewish” categories. Will the Minister outline what provisions would be available for Jews and Sikhs to challenge ethnicity pay gap reporting if they are not included? This also demonstrates that some Departments recognise that they are not required to follow the GSS framework. I gently encourage Ministers across Government to consider whether the GSS harmonised standard is adequate for them to meet the equalities duties.

To conclude, this campaign has the support a broad coalition: the Board of Deputies, the Community Security Trust, the Antisemitism Policy Trust, the Sikh Federation, the Sikh Council UK, the UK Gurdwara Alliance, many health professionals, local police and local government. Those organisations understand the lived reality of their communities. They see the consequences of missing data every single day in healthcare, public safety, education, housing and employment.

In June last year, Birmingham city council became the first local authority in England to include Sikh and Jewish ethnic categories when collecting data and delivering services. I am grateful to the Birmingham Labour group for its leadership on this issue, but will it really take every council in the country passing its own motion for Sikhs and Jews to be counted? What we are asking for is simple: fairness. For more than 40 years, Sikhs and Jews have been recognised as ethnic groups in law. It is time for public bodies to recognise them in practice and for legislators to implement the law.

16:17

[The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office (Satvir Kaur)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Betts. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham Edgbaston (Preet Kaur Gill) for tabling this important debate, and I thank other Members for joining us. Over many years my hon. Friend has championed the rights of Sikh and Jewish communities. Those communities contribute so much to British life, and both our families are great examples of that.

The science of statistics helps us to understand the world and our place in it. As my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham Edgbaston has made clear, that is particularly the case for minority groups, who so often feel unseen and unheard by their Government. We should always strive to identify data gaps that need addressing. The issues raised today regarding Sikh and Jewish data, and the impact of data gaps relating to those groups, could not be more relevant or timely. As we speak, these topics are under active consideration by the Government Statistical Service as part of its review of the harmonisation of ethnicity standards. That is a critical process. I know that my hon. Friend and I will follow its progress closely and look forward to reading its findings when they are published in the autumn.

My hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham Edgbaston eloquently set out the impact of the current data gaps regarding Sikh and Jewish communities. As she mentioned, those became particularly apparent during covid and in administering other public services. That is at the heart of this debate, and the Government are committed to serving all our minority communities. My hon. Friend and other Members can be reassured that, as part of the review, the ONS has committed to looking at adding more ethnicity tick boxes, including options for Sikhs and Jews.

As my hon. Friend is aware, as part of the review the ONS held an open consultation between October 2025 and February 2026. The general public and all Government Departments, including the Government Statistical Service, were invited to respond to the consultation. The heads of profession for statistics in every Department were contacted on the day the consultation launched and again in January, a month before it closed. The ONS has committed to publishing all the submissions it received in April. I have personally asked the ONS to contact my hon. Friend directly when the information is available, as she has raised concerns about when that will happen.

Additionally, as part of the consultation process, the ONS engaged with key leaders in the Jewish and Sikh communities, the Board of Deputies of British Jews, the Health and Care Jewish Staff Network, the Institute for Jewish Policy Research, the Jewish Association for Mental Illness, the Sikh Federation UK and the Supreme Sikh Council UK. Now that the consultation has closed, the submissions are being analysed.

Last week, the Government Statistical Service published the evaluation criteria for assessing the proposed new tick-box response options. The three headline criteria are the strength of user need, the lack of alternative sources, and acceptability, clarity and data quality. I hear my hon. Friend’s concerns about these being the same as before. I have spoken directly with the chair of the UK Statistics Authority and the permanent secretary of the ONS on the specific matter of Sikh and Jewish ethnicity tick boxes, and I have been assured that this will be considered as part of the review. I have further been assured—and I am confident of this—that at this stage the option to add tick boxes for Sikhs and Jews as ethnic groups is an open question and that the ONS will reach an impartial, evidence-based decision.

My hon. Friend mentioned the ethnicity pay gap, which I am happy to take away.

On the issue of legality, the Equality Act 2010 and the public sector equality duty are key components of the Government Statistical Service review, and the user need for data to support equality monitoring for protected characteristic features predominantly in the evaluation criteria. Under the Equality Act, race is defined to include colour, nationality, and ethnic or national origins. That means that, under the Act, Sikhs and Jews are a racial group by reference to their ethnic origins. Both are also religious groups under the Act. Let me be clear: the Government, the ONS and the Government Statistical Service all recognise that, as my hon. Friend highlighted, Sikh identity and Jewish identity are ethnic as well as religious identities.

It is important to clarify that the Act does not specify particular ethnicities as being protected. Apart from anything else, that would mean that we live in a country that has unprotected ethnic groups. I am sure my hon. Friend would join me in agreeing that that would be completely unacceptable. In fact, the Equality Act provides protection to everybody on the basis of their ethnicity, and of their religion or lack of religion. The Act protects all ethnicities, not some over others.

However, protection under the Act does not legally mandate the inclusion of a tick-box option for data collection purposes. Indeed, there are many other ethnicities—hundreds, in fact—all of which are recognised by the Government, that also do not have a tick box, such as Kurdish, Persian and Hispanic/Latino. Because there are so many ethnic groups that do not have their own tick box, individuals are given the option to write their ethnicity. In the 2021 census, 287 different ethnicities were recorded and published. Tick-box response options in the survey form simply cannot include all the ethnic groups, which is why the tick-box option should never be seen as a list of official or recognised ethnicities.

As I have set out, decisions on tick boxes involve a number of factors, including user need for the data, data quality, public acceptability, clarity for respondents, and the impact on comparability of data over time. I hear what my hon. Friend said about the need and the possible gaps, which is why the ONS is analysing and considering this issue as part of its review. It will publish it findings in the autumn, which she, I and other Members keenly await—alongside many in the Jewish and Sikh communities, as she mentioned—and we will go from there.

I thank my hon. Friend and other Members for raising the important issue of hate crime. We are united in our determination to tackle these abhorrent crimes in the UK. Everyone in this country deserves to feel safe and live their lives free from violence. My hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham Edgbaston will know that the UK Government Statistical Service is decentralised. How hate crimes are recorded is determined by the police, not the ONS. It is something I strongly encourage her to raise directly with the Home Office, as I know she already is.

[Preet Kaur Gill]

Can I seek clarity from the Minister? All the correspondence I have had from the Home Office says that it has been told to use existing categories in the census, according to the ONS, and that is why it does not collect the data.

[Satvir Kaur]

I am happy to take that away.

I thank my hon. Friend for raising this important topic, and for her ongoing hard work advocating for the Sikh and Jewish communities. I am keen to emphasise that whether Sikh and Jewish ethnicity tick boxes should be introduced is an open question. I reassure my hon. Friend that a clear and credible procedure is in place to make an informed decision. The Government should not and will not pre-empt the ONS’s ongoing, independent and impartial piece of work. That means we all eagerly await the publication of the Government Statistical Service’s findings this autumn, at which point I anticipate that she and I will be in regular contact about the next steps, based on the ONS’s findings.

Question put and agreed to.

Disability Equipment Provision

Wednesday 11th March 2026 Westminster Hall

16:26

[Seamus Logan (Aberdeenshire North and Moray East) (SNP)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the provision of disability equipment.

I am grateful to the Speaker’s Office, which oversees the ballot that leads to the selection of debate topics. I am truly very pleased to have secured this debate to provide us all with the opportunity to shine a light on the issues that many people across the country are facing in accessing disability equipment.

I particularly welcome Milana Hadji-Touma, who is representing herself and a number of others today; I thank her for attending. I also thank the 653 people who have shared their experiences and provided moving testimonials, which have been invaluable in my preparation for this debate. I appreciate the time and energy that has gone into each response, and I reiterate my thanks and appreciation for all those who contributed.

I want to begin by offering some quotes from the responses, including some from my constituents:

“My daughter had to wait two years for her wheelchair.”

“I wouldn’t be able to function without my stairlift, my powered wheelchair and my crutches.”

“It is about my safety, my dignity and my ability to live independently.”

“I use a shower chair and a toilet frame which might seem small items but they have transformed my day to day safety and confidence.”

“With the correct equipment, I was able to complete a master's degree at a top university, become a teacher, learn to drive, hand cycle across eleven countries and live a full and rich life.”

Around 25% of the UK population are disabled, so access to disability equipment is essential. It alleviates everyday struggles and allows thousands of people to live safe and independent lives, which boosts personal confidence and mental wellbeing. Whether it is wheelchairs, living aids or home-adaptation items like grab rails, the devices offer numerous and powerful benefits, transforming lives so that the activities of daily life become more manageable, both for those dealing with disabling conditions and for those who provide care, including family members, friends and care workers.

Those benefits were echoed throughout my survey. One respondent stated:

“My disability equipment is my entire life”,

while another reported:

“It simplifies tasks, turns impossible activities into manageable ones with the right support, eases physical pain, reduces moments of embarrassment or vulnerability, and—most importantly—fosters greater independence and less dependence on others.”

Despite the benefits, 64% of respondents revealed that waiting times for disability equipment were longer than expected. As I said, one person reported that their daughter waited for a wheelchair for nearly two years, while one of my constituents highlighted the issues that arise from delayed equipment provision, stating:

“Without proper assessment and provision, disabled people can be left living in environments that actively worsen their health or place them at risk of injury.”

The testimonies I have shared show that there is a growing belief that the system to provide disability equipment is becoming increasingly unsustainable. With complaints about waiting times, quality of equipment and poor communication around access, it is no surprise that over 650 people responded to my survey in the space of four days. In addition, hundreds more people gave testimonies to inform the latest report from the all-party parliamentary group for access to disability equipment, published last October. Among stories of frustration and disappointment, the report revealed that 63% of carers and 55% of equipment users felt that services were getting worse.

[Edward Morello (West Dorset) (LD)]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for securing this important debate. I agree with absolutely everything he has said. He talks about the problem with access to equipment; I know of one case, which is representative of many that come across my desk, that concerns the inability to hand back equipment after use. A constituent contacted me whose mother had died after two years of home care. She had a hospital bed, three commodes, an orthopaedic chair and a walking frame. The NHS provider had gone into receivership and there was no method whatsoever for her to hand back the equipment. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that we are compounding the problems for people getting equipment by not reusing the stuff that is already out there?

[Seamus Logan]

I do agree. Indeed, that problem causes a massive cost to the taxpayer as well.

It is no surprise that 74% of equipment providers were aware of patients experiencing delayed hospital discharge due to unavailable community equipment. The APPG’s report recommended and called for the implementation of a national strategy to ensure the cohesive and comprehensive delivery, monitoring and financing of disability equipment.

Complaints about the current system and provision of equipment have been reported by various other organisations, including the UK charity for young wheelchair users, Whizz Kidz, which described wheelchair services as “underfunded, inaccessible, and fractured.” In June 2025, it was reported that Citizens Advice receives a new complaint about faulty aids every hour.

My own pedigree in this area goes back many years—in fact, to 1996, when I first joined a health and personal social services commissioning organisation, under the leadership of my great friends Mary Wilmont and Kevin Keenan, both former directors of social services in Northern Ireland. We examined in great detail the wheelchair services for people who were deaf or blind, hard of hearing or visually impaired. One report stands out in my memory—not because I authored it, but because it was a simple idea to address the challenges facing people in getting to a hospital appointment. We called it “Getting There”. That was 30 years ago.

Although this Government need to “get there”, the challenges in the existing system are more profound. In England and Wales, the provision of equipment is currently run by the NHS and local authorities, which are primarily responsible for facilitating care needs assessments and subsequently approving and providing equipment. As a result, available equipment, the length of waiting times and the quality of adaptations are increasingly becoming a postcode lottery.

[Rachel Gilmour (Tiverton and Minehead) (LD)]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the patchwork system to which he referred is, through delay and dysfunction, denying many disabled people the independence they deserve? A 56-year-old constituent of mine in Somerset with a progressive muscle wasting condition has been left effectively housebound and in severe pain for months while trying to obtain essential wheelchair adaptations. May I appeal to the Minister’s extensive good will and ask him to look at that case?

[Seamus Logan]

I agree with the hon. Member, and that highlights the need for a national strategy and a review of the current organisational arrangements.

Age UK has noted that, due to a lack of national guidelines on timelines, long waiting lists are common, partly due to shortages in that noble profession, occupational therapists. To mitigate the situation, multiple organisations have been set up with the sole purpose of supporting those in need of disability equipment in the face of a failing system. They include Back Up, a UK-wide charity that works with people affected by spinal cord injury and provides vital wheelchair skills training. The Motability Foundation has awarded £36.4 million in grants to customers of its Motability scheme to help them access adequate and good-quality equipment, as many people have resorted to self-funding permanent or temporary equipment. The foundation has also conducted an economic assessment of wheelchair provision in England and recommended that greater integration across services is needed to prevent variation in the quality of provision.

In Scotland, the handling of disability equipment and adaptations is carried out by integrated authorities—united bodies in which local authorities and NHS services work together to provide more cohesive and community-focused health and social care planning. To guide those bodies, the Scottish Government agreed a memorandum of understanding some years ago, setting out a standardised approach for the provision of equipment to maintain consistency across all local councils. During engagement with voluntary organisations in this field, I was told that the Scottish approach is paying dividends. I recommend to the Minister that a similar approach should be considered for implementation in England and Wales, because the system needs change now.

Thousands of people across the UK are sick, sore and tired of being unheard after countless complaints. When will their voices be taken seriously? Greater national leadership is urgently needed to put an end to the insecure and uncertain system in which someone’s ability to obtain necessary life-supporting equipment is based on where they live rather than their need. Everyone has a right to access disability equipment and live a safe and independent life. The pressure is on the UK Government to step up and redesign the system, and respond to the many calls to establish a national strategy.

A consolidated approach holds the potential to improve oversight, reduce waiting times and ensure consistent and reliable access to disability equipment for everyone, no matter where they might live, so let me pose just one simple question to the Minister: in responding to the debate, will he please set out the reasons why he would not agree to take forward a national strategy in this area?

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

Order. Six Back Benchers want to speak in the debate, so I suggest about five minutes each as a guideline.

16:38

[Daniel Francis (Bexleyheath and Crayford) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Betts. I declare an interest as chair of the all-party parliamentary groups for access to disability equipment and for wheelchair users. It is also well known that one of my children has cerebral palsy and uses a wide range of equipment, from a wheelchair to postural seating for eating and for bathing and so on, so I have become a bit of an expert in some of these matters over the years. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Aberdeenshire North and Moray East (Seamus Logan) for securing the debate. There will be a separate debate later this year, through the Backbench Business Committee, on wheelchair provision, which I will be sponsoring.

On the point made by the hon. Member for West Dorset (Edward Morello), the collapse of NRS Healthcare last summer has caused real issues across the country. My Bexleyheath and Crayford constituency borders Kent and I know that there have been issues there, as there have been for other local authorities, and I have been working with organisations to try to reduce them. However, recycling continues to be an issue, and it is addressed in the recommendations of the APPG’s report.

As chair of the APPG for access to disability equipment, I am delighted to contribute to this debate, and I pay tribute to Newlife, the charity for disabled children, and the British Healthcare Trades Association for their dedication and hard work in advocating for users of disability equipment. As has been said, our first report, “Barriers to Accessing Lifesaving Disability Equipment”, was published in October. The report resulted from our inquiry—our first inquiry, in fact—into the systemic barriers that prevent millions of disabled children and adults across the UK from accessing the medical and community equipment that they need to live safely and independently.

I want to highlight some of the evidence that we heard. We found that 71% of people feel that the system providing hoists, grab rails and other essential medical equipment is not currently meeting their needs, and our first key recommendation was the implementation of a national strategy. Currently, there is no cohesive national strategy for community equipment and care provision, which has resulted in inconsistent experiences across the country. The APPG recommended that a national strategy should be overseen by a Minister, who would ensure that a national directive is issued to local authorities to clarify whose responsibility it is to provide equipment. That would ensure consistency and reduce confusion.

The APPG heard evidence that the system responsible for delivering essential community equipment is fragmented, inconsistent and too often failing the people it exists to support. Responsibility is split between local authorities and integrated care boards, but in practice that joint responsibility—I know this at first hand—frequently leads to unclear accountability, variation in provision and what many families and professionals describe as a postcode lottery. Often, delays are such that families order equipment and then wait a year or two, by which time it is obsolete. We heard that in the feedback we received for the report.

The report highlighted the consistently long waits for assessments and equipment, which worsen conditions and increase costs. In fact, 74% of professionals and equipment providers said that they are aware of patients who have experienced delayed hospital discharge because essential equipment was unavailable at home. Not only do those delays increase the financial strain on the NHS and pressures on hospital beds and staff time, but they slow down elective care and place further strain on the social care system.

One of the report’s key recommendations is to implement a co-ordinated national plan that includes clear targets, workforce investment and the streamlining of processes to reduce delays and prevent unnecessary hospital stays. Maximum service timeframes should be aligned with the wheelchair service standard of 18 weeks to ensure consistent, accountable delivery. Equipment providers from across the country said that every authority works differently, with little alignment between local areas and very limited national oversight of how services are delivered. Our inquiry found that 33% of equipment users are still waiting to receive approved equipment, with one in five waiting more than two months. That highlights the real consequences these failures have for the people who rely on the support. Despite the scale and importance of this sector, there is no single Minister with clear responsibility for ensuring that services are working effectively for patients.

It is clear that the system needs change, and I would be grateful if the Minister would consider the APPG’s recommendations to introduce a national strategy for community equipment and wheelchair services in order to eliminate the postcode lottery in provision and provide proper national oversight and monitoring of services, and to introduce of a co-ordinated national plan to reduce delays in the provision of community equipment. The APPG will be meeting on 26 March, and the Minister and all other Members will be welcome, if they can find time in their busy diaries, to join us.

16:42

[Richard Foord (Honiton and Sidmouth) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Mr Betts. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Aberdeenshire North and Moray East (Seamus Logan) for securing this debate.

Disabilities impact the lives of many people in the south-west of England, with older people some of the most affected. Age UK says that disabilities affect 40% of people over 60 but 75% of people over 80, and they are a particularly pressing concern for people in mid and east Devon, where a third of residents are aged 65-plus. Hearing loss is one such disability. It is all too common among older people and has some serious consequences. The Royal National Institute for Deaf People and SignHealth report how people with hearing impairments are less able to take advantage of other health treatments. Access to healthcare is obviously necessary for older people, and any obstacle is a great concern.

Devon’s provision of hearing aids faced a major shake-up last year, when Chime Social Enterprise, which had been praised by its users, stopped providing NHS audiology services in Devon. Chime had provided rechargeable hearing aids, along with drop-in clinics for emergency repairs, based out of community hospitals. Since Chime’s departure, there has been frustration about the provision. A constituent in Honiton whose ears were damaged when he was doing national service with the Royal Artillery, wrote of being redirected endlessly to different bodies for a simple hearing aid repair. A constituent from Seaton told me that models offered by the new providers are “shoddy”. He has already had two hearing aids become unusable because the tubes slip out of the rubber mould. That would have been a simple £60 replacement with Chime, but now, he wrote, he wonders whether the

“next stage is a conch shell”.

I wish to draw particular attention to the case of Mary Dickinson. I met Mary last year at a remembrance service in Sidmouth. She is aged 92. She was an NHS nurse for most of her life and to this day volunteers at Sidmouth Hospice at Home. For those acts of service, she was awarded a lifetime achievement award by the British Red Cross. Mary, like many others, was provided by Chime with rechargeable hearing aids, which worked very well. She has paraesthesia and arthritis in both hands, so the idea that she should now be able to replace the batteries in her hearing aids is really quite wild. She said that if I wanted to obtain batteries for hearing aids, the best place I could look would be down the side of her settee, because there are many down there.

The NHS stated that it cannot offer Mary the rechargeable hearing aids any more, despite them being the only ones that she can use at the age of 92. Mary is a pensioner with no savings, yet she was told that her only solution, if she was adamant that she wanted rechargeable hearing aids, was to buy them herself. Given that she is in receipt of only a small pension she appealed to the NHS board, but without success. Scrivens, the new provider in Devon, has likewise refused to offer her the rechargeable hearing aids. If Mary is sat with somebody in the course of her work at Hospice at Home, she wants to be able to hear them speak and to be able to speak with them, much as she has done with patients throughout her life. If NHS Devon in particular, and the NHS more broadly, wants to ensure that everyone has access to disability provision such as hearing aids, it must really ensure that the equipment it provides is appropriate each and every time.

16:46

[Sir John Hayes (South Holland and The Deepings) (Con)]

I want to speak about three things in this debate, which was helpfully secured by the hon. Member for Aberdeenshire North and Moray East (Seamus Logan).

The first has already been dealt with but requires some amplification: the system is not working as well as it should. The figures that we heard quoted about access to wheelchairs, for example, are stark and surprising. In researching for the debate, I was surprised that, according to figures from NHS England—and we heard it again from the hon. Member—70% of wheelchair users wait more than three months for their chair, 30% wait more than six months, and 15% more than 12 months. Those are pretty astounding figures.

I say to the Minister: do not let the perfect be the enemy of the good. If those people could be provided with some help—perhaps not the chair ideally suited to their needs but something that assisted them—through a recycling scheme, I am sure that they would feel that the authorities were at least making an effort. If someone is sitting at home, hearing nothing and getting nothing, they must get increasingly frustrated. Let us be more creative in how we improve those numbers. Recycling equipment has to be at the heart of that. It is not a perfect solution, because equipment often has to be tailored to the specific requirements of the individual concerned, but it might help.

The second point I want to raise is about housing. There are real problems with adapted housing, with the obligation on developers to build enough adapted houses, and with local authorities facing up to their responsibilities. I know that you are a great expert in this field, Mr Betts—a greater expert than me—but I would like to go back to the days when adapted housing was built for the elderly, the infirm and the disabled, perhaps with a resident warden who would take personal care in their interests and be available night and day for their needs. I am talking not about a distant individual obtained by means of a telephone or—heaven forbid—online, but about someone with hands-on knowledge of local residents. That existed in our lifetimes, and it does not exist now in any significant shape or form. Let us think again about best practice from past times in respect of housing, and create some obligations on local authorities and private developers to build a sufficient number of adapted homes.

It is not just me; various reports have indicated the need. Analysis published in January 2026 by the Office for Equality and Opportunity, “Disabled people’s lived experience of housing in the UK: an evidence review”, stated that there are specific requirements or financial provision to provide suitable housing, but that the physical design of adaptations needs more understanding of individual needs, and that too often adaptations were not focused on the quality of life, wellbeing or independence of the person living there. Let us do more, and better, in respect of housing.

My final point—I said I was only going to make three—is perhaps something that others will not raise, or certainly have not so far: the way that the provision of all kinds of other services can support disabled people. For example, various organisations that represent the blind and partially sighted have reported that flat bank cards have been a huge disadvantage to partially sighted people. Access to cash is actually quite important, because coins, which can be felt and are tactile, are important for small transactions. These small things make a huge difference to people’s lives. We need to think more laterally, and give considerably more thought to such small ways in which we as a Parliament, and the Minister as part of a Government, can make a huge difference to disabled people in all our constituencies.

16:54

[Alison Bennett (Mid Sussex) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Betts. I am grateful to the hon. Member for Aberdeenshire North and Moray East (Seamus Logan) for securing this debate, which is timely because I want to highlight the case of a constituent and ask the Minister to work collaboratively with colleagues in the Department for Work and Pensions to intervene urgently in what has become a deeply troubling example of administrative failure in the DWP’s Access to Work scheme.

My constituent lives with cerebral palsy and ME. She wants to do exactly what Government policy encourages people to do: work, contribute and maintain her independence. To do that, she requires a wheelchair through the Access to Work programme—an essential piece of equipment that enables her to remain in employment. My constituent has done everything asked of her ever since her first application in July 2024. Her assessment was completed, quotes for a suitable chair were submitted and the case had progressed to the point of an award. Then, the system failed her. In September 2025, her case manager informed her that he was retiring, and that the case had been passed to a colleague, who would contact her. That contact never came.

Despite my constituent’s repeated attempts to follow up, no one in the Access to Work scheme took ownership of the case or progressed the order. Instead, months later, she was told that her case had been closed due to “no contact” since July, which was demonstrably untrue. When my office intervened, the Department acknowledged the issue, and stated that it would contact my constituent within 10 working days. That deadline then passed. When she attempted to chase the matter herself, she spent nearly an hour on hold, only to be told that the manager was unavailable. What is perhaps most concerning is the reason now being given: the Department would prefer my constituent to submit a completely new application for the wheelchair, rather than reopen the existing case, purely because reopening it would affect its management information.

[John Milne (Horsham) (LD)]

Last year saw the first fall in Access to Work approvals in more than a decade, including a 16% drop in approvals for aids and equipment, despite the alleged surge in disability claims overall. That suggests that, behind the scenes, the Government have instructed the DWP to get tougher on approval criteria, but without announcing any formal change to policy in public. Does my hon. Friend agree that that is a strange way to go about improving employment prospects for the disabled?

[Alison Bennett]

My hon. Friend makes an important and interesting point, and I very much want to get underneath the detail of why that change has happened.

Returning to my constituent’s case, I want to ask the Minister three questions to which I believe my constituent deserves a response; if he is not able to answer them, perhaps he can write and raise these matters with the correct Minister. First, does the Minister agree, as I hope he does, that the case should urgently be reopened? Secondly, does he disagree with the DWP’s apparent position that the integrity of its management information is more important than ensuring that a disabled person has the equipment that they need to work? Thirdly, will he ask his colleagues in the DWP to review the so-called integrity of the Department’s management information, given the serious concern that cases may be closed and replaced with new ones in a way that creates the appearance of efficiency, when the reality for constituents like mine is repeated failure?

At its best, Access to Work is a transformative scheme, but when the system fails and the metrics appear to matter more than the people who the scheme exists to support, confidence is undermined. My constituent is not asking for special treatment; she is simply asking for the Department to finish the job it started. I hope the Minister will help me to swiftly put that right.

16:55

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

It is again a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Betts—it has been a long afternoon for you and for me. We have been here together all this time.

I thank the hon. Gentleman for Aberdeenshire North and Moray East (Seamus Logan) for leading the debate. Debates in Westminster Hall give us a chance to recollect things that we sometimes forget about. The hon. Gentleman bringing this issue forward has, all of a sudden, flooded our minds with examples from the last year of our constituents’ needs.

I hope the Minister will know that I will give a Northern Ireland perspective of where we are, to add flavour to the debate and highlight some of the problems that we have. Provision of disability equipment is of paramount importance to many disabled people across the United Kingdom. When equipment works well, it can significantly improve independence and quality of life. The Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency has concluded that, according to the 2021 census data, 24.3% of the population of Northern Ireland—almost quarter, or some 463,000 people—had a long-term health condition or disability that limited day-to-day activities. I regularly see those people in my office back home. The hon. Gentleman for Aberdeenshire North and Moray East reminded me of the particular problems that we have.

A significant majority of people will require adaptations and equipment to help support them. It is crucial that they have access to the support that they need. The hon. Member for West Dorset (Edward Morello) mentioned equipment that is unused because someone passes away or they have to go into a home. That includes disabled beds, commodes, walking frames, crutches and sometimes even stairlifts. Stairlifts are there for people to get up to their bed and they might still be workable. If they are compatible and useable, they should be collected. It is not just a problem in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency, but a problem in mine as well.

I want to make a wee plea for wheelchairs. Many of the people who come into my office have acute, complex and severe disabilities. They need a modern wheelchair. I am not being critical—it is never my form to be so—but the ordinary wheelchair was probably okay years ago when it was just a matter of getting about. Today, for people to have a decent life, they need to have a wheelchair that is compatible, workable and gives them freedom.

I know the Government cannot fund it all, but many people have crowdfunded or have done charity drives to acquire those wheelchairs. I am going to age myself with this example, but when I was younger my first pair of glasses were what they called the Milky Bar Kid glasses; they were the round ones, and I can well remember them. We progressed on from that and, to be fair to the Government, they will keep that progress going. People deserve to have a quality of glasses that they are happy with and can relax with, and the same applies for wheelchairs.

My office is contacted weekly, or even daily now, by constituents who are awaiting occupational therapist assessments to adapt their homes to their needs. Most recently, people have been waiting for up to a year for assessments, and for further years for works to be carried out. I am sure that it is the same on the mainland, including in Scotland.

We dealt with a recent case where a constituent’s occupational therapist had done the assessment and said that her bathroom was in no way suitable for her needs. To make it accessible, they needed to take the bath out, put a shower in, put a stool in the shower and make the doors wide enough—I am not smarter than anybody else, but I am involved with these cases regularly, so I understand fairly quickly what people need.

The lady is in pain daily and is struggling to do the bare minimum, from showering to using the toilet. After two years, she heard from her contractors last Friday—this is a fresh story—who agreed the plans, got things measured up and said that they would see her the next week. They were due back at 8 am yesterday to commence the work, but they never showed up. I understand that making adaptations for disabilities is not always a profitable job for contractors, but if they commit to something, they should turn up and do it, for goodness’ sake. I am not one to blame anyone, as issues arise and priorities shift, but there must be a level of accountability for the completion of works.

Furthermore, we must take the extra step to ensure that in businesses and work places, adaptations for those who are disabled are prioritised. For example, businesses across the United Kingdom have automatic doors for people who are disabled and in wheelchairs. They are not just a convenience but a vital accessibility feature that ensures that all customers, including those with disabilities, can enter and navigate premises safely and independently. That is just a small point, but it is one that I have noticed, as have Members across this Chamber, I am sure. Automatic doors support people using wheelchairs or mobility aids, as well as parents with pushchairs, and they create a more inclusive environment that meets both legal accessibility standards and modern expectations of equal access.

These are all things we should talk about, but it is all well and good for us to talk about it. I understand the issues; we are here not to criticise the Minister or the Government, but to try to find a constructive and helpful way forward. More often than not, funding is the critical issue. I would gently suggest that the Government need to ensure that physical support can be accessed, and the reasons for the delays must be tackled at their root cause. I believe that the UK Government, and the Minister, will collaborate closely with the Northern Ireland Executive to tackle backlogs for assessments for disability equipment by co-ordinating funding, and by streamlining procurement, which is also important—if the Government buy 10,000 disability beds to distribute across all the United Kingdom, there must be a better way of doing that procurement. Again, I am trying to be helpful with that. I am sure that they will also share best practices.

I thank you again, Mr Betts, for your patience and for your chairship—you have done incredibly well.

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

We now move on to the Front Benchers. The Liberal Democrat and Opposition spokespeople will have five minutes, and the Minister will have 10. There is a bit of flexibility on that time, so we can be a little more generous if required.

17:03

[Helen Maguire (Epsom and Ewell) (LD)]

I thank the hon. Member for Aberdeenshire North and Moray East (Seamus Logan) for securing this debate. I also thank you for your chairmanship today, Mr Betts.

There are fantastic organisations in Epsom and Ewell that support my disabled constituents, including Mid Surrey Mencap, which I met last year. Its work is profound, but without the right equipment, organisations can only do so much. A lack of equipment often leaves people reliant on family members to manually help them with essential tasks, including going to the toilet and washing. From grab rails to shower seats, equipment can mean the difference between dependence and independence.

The report on this issue from the APPG for access to disability equipment revealed that staff shortages, supply chain delays and inconsistent local authority processes cause widespread delays to equipment provision. It is clear that we need structural change, and the NHS reform Bill provides an opportunity to deliver a co-ordinated, national approach on disability equipment. Will the Minister commit to using that legislation to deliver this?

It is widely recognised that access to wheelchairs varies significantly across the country, and demand is skyrocketing. In September 2025, the charity Whizz Kidz was forced to close its wheelchair waiting list for the first time in its 35-year history because of high demand. Moreover, the average wait time between being discharged from hospital after life-altering injuries and being assessed for a wheelchair is 10 months. Although the Liberal Democrats welcome NHS England’s wheelchair quality framework, I am concerned that with ICBs facing cuts and reorganisation, a framework may not have the impact necessary to deliver change.

What makes matters worse is that equipment wastage in the NHS is huge, and we only need to go to the local tip to see it. In July, I wrote to the Minister for Secondary Care following concerns from a constituent about NHS equipment wastage. In her response, she highlighted the Design for Life road map, which includes a framework for decontamination infrastructure across NHS trusts to enable the safe sterilisation and reuse of medical equipment. I find it shocking that disabled people are waiting months or even years for equipment, while other patients are forced to throw away useful equipment that could be reused once they have recovered. Will the Minister confirm how much equipment has been diverted from waste since the road map was published over a year ago?

The debate has reinforced a simple but vital truth: everyone deserves to live independently and with dignity. After the Conservatives left social care in disarray, the Liberal Democrats are committed to ensuring that people with disabilities have access to suitable housing, meaningful employment and the opportunity to enjoy the activities that make life fulfilling. I ask the Minister to make the simple commitment that specialised services and disabled equipment will no longer be treated as an afterthought but as an essential part of enabling people to live full and independent lives, and to work if they can do so, and that more equipment is reused.

17:06

[Dr Luke Evans (Hinckley and Bosworth) (Con)]

It is lovely to see such a thoughtful, thought-provoking debate, with cross-party unity on the question of how we can better support our constituents who are suffering. It could be with a stairlift, a shower, a home aid or an adaption. When I was a GP, I saw what difference that can make to people. More recently, I visited Mounts & More in Stoke Golding, a company of specialists who support wheelchair users. Margaret and her family started Mounts & More in Market Bosworth in 1996; it fits mounting systems, such as for augmentative and alternative communication, to wheelchairs. The company’s best example is of Professor Stephen Hawking—it fitted the specialist holding position for such equipment. It also drives innovation and the small business side of things that we so long for in the UK.

I am keen to dive straight into some of the questions asked, as time is short, but before I do so, I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Aberdeenshire North and Moray East (Seamus Logan) for being so succinct in his well thought out speech. He is a rare parliamentarian in that he had only a single question for the Minister. I congratulate him on that. He raised a significant point about strategy. The Government say they do not have a plan to bring forward an equipment strategy, and they tend to point towards the ICBs as the commissioners on this.

There is going to be some difficulty, though, if the ICBs are cutting their staff by 50%. I do agree with the Liberal Democrat spokesman, the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Helen Maguire), who asked whether there is an opportunity to look at what can be done in the forthcoming health Bill. I would be grateful if the Minister would set out whether this is a consideration when it comes to dealing with support for people with disabilities.

I have another question for the Minister on the disabled facilities grant. The Government have done a review, which is welcome, and recently published their look at the issue. As more and more people become infirm—the good news is that they are living longer, the bad news that they have more disabilities—the need will go up. It is not clear from the information that has been published just how that will be monitored. How will we ensure that the funding is going to the right place and working? There is a calculator on the website that says how it will be redistributed, but I point out that clarity on accountability will be hugely important. I would welcome input from the Minister on what that will look like.

[Sir John Hayes]

On that specific point, the Government have said that that additional money for the grant will provide about 5,000 additional home adaptations. It would be really useful if the Minister, when he responds, could describe how local authorities will access that funding, how those 5,000 adaptations will be distributed across the kingdom and what kind of adaptations we are talking about. Are we talking about adaptations to new build houses or long-standing traditional houses in the private or public sectors? A bit more detail on that would be very welcome.

[Dr Evans]

My right hon. Friend has hit the nail on the head. This is part of the problem in how we get different parts of the system to work together to get a full understanding of the situation; that is most important for those who are affected, but also for the commissioners who are trying to make the decisions on where the equipment goes. I hope the Minister has heard that and will be able to work it into his response.

I was very pleased to hear the hon. Member for Bexleyheath and Crayford (Daniel Francis), the chair of the APPG, raise the very important issue of the insolvency of NRS Healthcare. For those who do not know, NRS Healthcare accounts for about 40% of coverage, covering 15 million people and 21 local authorities across the country. Its insolvency showed a weakness in the way we deliver our supply.

I wrote to the Government back in the summer to try to find out what was being done and what lessons had been learnt. I received a generic response early on in August, saying that things are being kept under review. It stated:

“The Department continues to monitor the situation closely and will support LAs to learn lessons and consider the implications for future resilience in this market.”

I followed up very quickly and wrote back in September to ask more questions, but unfortunately I have not as yet received a response. I have with me a copy of the letter that was sent asking questions, particularly about what lessons have been learnt in this case and, more importantly, what is being done to implement more resilience in the supply chain. I would be grateful if the Minister could take a look.

If such a thing were to happen again, given the stark economic situation we are facing, which I appreciate is outside the scope of this debate, it would have knock-on effects for some of the most vulnerable in our society. I would be grateful if the Government would set out exactly what they are doing to make sure the supply chain is secure.

Finally, I want to raise concerns about the better care fund. The Government have been clear in the 10-year health plan about their promise to reform the fund, which has been very useful in bringing pooling together. However, we have already noticed that NHS England has already reduced the amount of additional voluntary funding it was putting in by £388 million. The example given by my right hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Sir John Hayes) goes to the heart of the question: looking from the top down, how do we make sure these things are all integrated? How do we understand what ICBs, councils, the NHS and charities are doing through their provision?

I would be grateful if the Government could set out where they see that better care funding fitting in and when we will actually see the outcome of the changes they propose. It appears that there have been delays in the national neighbourhood health service guidance and delays in the better care fund. Without that structure and without joining it all together, it is very difficult for those scrutinising the system and, more importantly, those working in and using the system to understand exactly what to expect and when. I would be grateful if the Minister would be kind enough to set that out.

I thank Members for their thoughtful contributions today, because, at the end of the day it is really important to shine a spotlight on those constituents who suffer the most and get on with it the most. They are the most pragmatic, fantastic people, and their support is paramount.

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

Minister, it would be helpful if you could allow a couple of minutes at the end for the mover to respond.

17:13

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Dr Zubir Ahmed)]

Mr Betts, it is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. I start by thanking the hon. Member for Aberdeenshire North and Moray East (Seamus Logan) for securing the debate, as well as all Members who contributed.

We, of course, want disabled people to access and experience healthcare services on an equitable footing and to have a healthcare service that is responsive to their needs. That includes making sure that they have the right equipment at the right time to maintain independence for as long as possible, whether that means wheelchairs, mobility aids or other assistive technologies.

We recognise the profound impact that delays in receiving disability equipment have on people’s quality of life, and I will set out the action that the Government are taking. Before I do so, however, I want to take a moment to acknowledge the points raised by the hon. Members for Tiverton and Minehead (Rachel Gilmour) and for Mid Sussex (Alison Bennett), particularly the cases they raised. I will certainly ensure that I take a personal interest in the case described by the hon. Member for Tiverton and Minehead and that the relevant DWP Minister also has an opportunity to address that particularly harrowing case.

The Liberal Democrat Front Bencher, the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Helen Maguire), asked for an update on the Design for Life statistics on recycling and reusing, and I will get my officials to get back to her on that.

We are committed to ensuring that disabled people have access to the services and support that they need. The Opposition spokesperson, the hon. Member for Hinckley and Bosworth (Dr Evans), asked about our NHS reforms and whether that might be an opportunity to think about better end-to-end commissioning and strategising on the topic. I can assure him that those conversations are being had both in the context of disability and, with regard to special educational needs and disabilities, in the Department for Education. There are a number of topics that, if we are honest with ourselves, have been often neglected in the last couple of decades and have a material impact on the quality of life for disabled people, sometimes for want of very simple changes to practice and, potentially, legislation, so I am very happy to take that on board with the Bill team.

The reforms that we are taking forward in the health and social care space will hopefully help us to achieve what I have outlined. The 10-year health plan specifically identifies disabled people as a priority group for the development of neighbourhood healthcare, offering more holistic and ongoing support. We are making £4.6 billion of additional funding available for adult social care in 2028-29, compared with ’25-26, to support the sector in making some of those improvements. In July ’25, the Government announced that they would develop a new plan for disability, setting out a clear vision to break down barriers to opportunity for disabled people. That of course aligns with every Department having a Minister responsible for disability. We meet regularly to discuss challenges, particularly some of the ones highlighted during this debate, which often do not fit neatly into one Department’s purview.

As hon. Members will be aware, health and social care are largely devolved across the UK. I will talk mainly about England, but of course I am the representative of a Scottish constituency, like the hon. Member who opened the debate, and he will understand if I just mention that we are committed, through the Barnett formula, to funding the NHS in Scotland, as we are doing in England; there is a £9.1 billion real-terms uplift in the Scottish budget over the period of the spending review.

In England, integrated care boards are responsible for commissioning services to meet the health needs of their local population, and responsibility for providing community equipment to disabled people typically falls at the moment, as has been outlined, to local authorities. They have a statutory duty to make arrangements for the provision of community equipment to disabled people in their area. That equipment can be free for the recipient if the person is assessed as having eligible needs. Types of support include equipment to enable people to live more independently, such as grab rails, walking aids and wheelchairs for short-term use. Responsibility for managing the market for these services rests with local authorities.

For people with long-term, complex mobility needs, support is provided by the national health service, based on assessed need. That may involve the provision of specialist equipment adapted to the specific needs of the individual, and can include both powered and manual wheelchairs.

[Liam Conlon (Beckenham and Penge) (Lab)]

As someone who, growing up, spent a long time on children’s wards at the Royal London hospital and the Royal National orthopaedic hospital and relied on disability equipment, I know that often this service provision is very patchy. Whizz Kidz has described the system as “underfunded, inaccessible, and fractured” and I have also heard that from constituents in Beckenham and Penge. Does my hon. Friend the Minister agree that the Government should look at how we can ensure that high standards are common right across the country on this?

[Dr Ahmed]

I am very grateful to my hon. Friend. He always channels personal experience in such a productive way and he is a credit to this House in the way he conducts himself. I remember his maiden speech with great fondness in that regard. I do agree, and I will come later in my speech to how we can maintain quality more persistently across the whole system.

Access to temporary wheelchair provision to support hospital discharge is also determined locally by ICBs. We recognise that elements of the NHS—despite it being on the road to recovery—are functioning below par and that many people are waiting too long to access equipment such as wheelchairs. During the pandemic, some wheelchair services experienced lower referral rates, which led to a surge in referrals post pandemic. Because of that, providers not only reduced their services but now, of course, face a backlog of referrals. That has meant unacceptable waiting times for both adults and—sadly—children, and those have fluctuated as services work to recover.

However, action is being taken to address waiting times in England. In October 2025, we published the NHS medium-term planning framework, requiring all ICBs and community health services to actively manage and reduce waits above 18 weeks and to develop a plan to eliminate all 52-week waits. The community health services situation report will be used to monitor ICB performance against waiting-time targets in 2026-27, and it currently monitors waiting times for children, young people and adults under

“Wheelchair, orthotics, prosthetics and equipment”.

These targets will guide the system to reduce the longest waits first.

[Sir John Hayes]

Have the Government made any assessment of the return and reuse of equipment? That is not always possible, as I said earlier, but it would be an incredibly powerful message to send to many of those people who have waited so long, and, I think, a very straightforward thing to do. If that assessment has not been made, will the Minister commit today to making such an assessment? That would be a positive outcome from this debate.

[Dr Ahmed]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman, and to those who raised this matter earlier in the debate. It does trouble me deeply that we have a situation in which equipment is going unused when there is that need in another part of the system. I actually feel that quite acutely. Hon. Members may know that I am a vascular surgeon; at times, unfortunately, some of my job involves having to amputate people’s limbs for end-stage vascular disease. I see for myself that transition from someone being able-bodied to needing assistance, and, where that assistance is not available, the impact that has, especially when people know there is this lack of productive exchange of equipment in the system highlighted by hon. Members today. I am therefore very happy to take the issue forward with my officials to see what can be done further to marry the demand and the supply together in the country.

Regarding wheelchair provision, NHS England has developed policy guidance and legislation to support ICBs to commission effective, efficient and personalised wheelchair services. I again nod to the remarks from the hon. Member for Aberdeenshire North and Moray East on making sure we get better, more efficient and personalised service provision.

In April 2025, NHS England published the wheelchair quality framework, developed in collaboration with the NHS England national wheelchair advisory group. The framework is designed to assist ICBs and NHS wheelchair service providers in delivering high-quality provision that offers improved access, outcomes and experience. NHS England introduced personal wheelchair budgets, including legal rights, in 2019, providing a clear framework for ICBs to commission personalised wheelchair services that are outcomes-focused and integrated. Those budgets give people greater choice over the wheelchairs that they are provided with. Additionally, the model service specification for wheelchairs sets out that wheelchair assessments should take place in the most suitable environment based on the needs of that individual.

NHS England is aware, as am I, that several complaints have been made about the quality of services commissioned by some ICBs. NHS England is working through the appropriate regional teams to gain intelligence from those ICBs on quality concerns and contracting arrangements, to fully understand the issues being raised.

[Dr Luke Evans]

Will the Minister give way?

[Dr Ahmed]

In the interest of time, I will not, but I think I know where the hon. Gentleman wants to go with this, with the NRS. I will be happy to write more fully—

[Dr Evans]

It was a different point.

[Dr Ahmed]

Well, I have not got time. I will write more fully regarding his correspondence. I am genuinely disappointed, if it is true, that he has not been responded to since September.

In addition, the 10-year plan makes a commitment to reviewing the complaints regulations. NHS England and the Department are developing those together to achieve better accountability. The Government are also taking wider action to support disabled people through the 10-year health plan. On neighbourhood health, the neighbourhood health service will support disabled people to have choice and control over their care. That includes increasing the uptake of personal health budgets, which provide individuals with that greater choice and control over how their health is assessed and their wellbeing needs are met.

One aim is to have a neighbourhood health centre in each community, bringing the NHS, local authority and voluntary sectors together to create a holistic offer that meets people’s needs in the place that they are. We expect these services to be designed in a way that reflects the specific needs of disabled people, with a focus on personalised, co-ordinated care. I particularly think that this is an opportunity, as we move care from hospital to the community, to address some of the concerns raised in the debate today.

On social care, the Government are also driving forward improvements for disabled people. We are enabling people to have more choice and control over their care—through greater use of direct payments, for example. We are also expanding care options to boost independent living at home and have recently confirmed £723 million for the disabled facilities grant in 2026-27. The total DFG budget across 2025-26 and 2026-27 is £150 million more than the total budget across the previous two years. That represents an 11% increase and will support more disabled people to get the vital home adaptations that they might need.

The Better Care Fund, which took effect in April 2025, is a framework for ICBs and local authorities to make joint plans and pool budgets to deliver better joined-up care. That can include the provision of assistive technology and equipment, such as wheelchairs. This financial year, ICBs and local authorities plan to spend £440 million on assistive technology and equipment, and we have introduced care technology standards to help them to choose the right support. In addition, as we move from hospital to community, commissioners can, if they wish, think about better co-commissioning, transcending traditional boundaries between local authorities, social care and the NHS.

I am grateful to the hon. Member for Aberdeenshire North and Moray East for securing this important debate and I want to respond to a question he asked. Whether we call it a strategy or a framework, there is a real opportunity at this time of change in the NHS—including the development of a national quality board at NHS England, which will come into the Department of Health and Social Care once NHS England is abolished —to genuinely think about how we define “quality” for disabled people and about the equipment and the spaces that they use. Again, I will be very happy to discuss that with my colleagues in charge of the quality board. I will write to the hon. Gentleman with specifics that we can perhaps tease out after this debate today.

We recognise the life-changing impact that having timely access to suitable disability equipment can have on the lives of disabled people across the United Kingdom, in every nation. The Government are dedicated to ensuring that all disabled people have access to the services and support that they need to live a fulfilling life; the presence of disability Ministers in each Department is certainly progress in that regard. Our work to reform health and social care, alongside the new plan for disability, will also help us to achieve that.

17:26

[Seamus Logan]

The breadth of the debate today has demonstrated that an hour is simply not enough to deal with this topic. As the right hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Sir John Hayes) said, housing and domestic adaptations are a topic all on their own, as is access to work under the DWP. There is also transport to consider; we could have spoken about transport issues for hours.

I am disappointed by the number of Members present for the debate, but of course it has been a very busy day so it is perfectly understandable. However, I encourage colleagues who are present, especially the right hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings, to try to raise this topic with the Backbench Business Committee so that we can get this whole discussion into the main Chamber in future.

I particularly thank the chair of the APPG, the hon. Member for Bexleyheath and Crayford (Daniel Francis), as well as all Members who have contributed to the debate today, especially the Liberal Democrat spokesperson, the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Helen Maguire), the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Hinckley and Bosworth (Dr Evans), and the Minister himself. It has been a very busy day for the Government—even a difficult day, at times—so I appreciate his time and the passion with which he spoke about this topic. He genuinely wants to see improvement in this area. If the July 2025 new plan for disability can bring forward a framework, strategy or improvement, we would all very much endorse that.

Finally, I thank the Chamber engagement team. We sometimes take them for granted, but they are responsible for helping parliamentarians such as myself to bring informed debates to the main Chamber and Westminster Hall. I thank them very sincerely. With that, I will close.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered the provision of disability equipment.

17:28

Sitting adjourned.