Drugging and Sexual Assault of Women

Baroness Hazarika Excerpts

Tuesday 7th July 2026 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Baroness Hazarika]

To ask His Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the findings by the National Crime Agency, published on 2 July, regarding an international network of men who are drugging and sexually assaulting women; and what steps they intend to take as a result.

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Lord Hanson of Flint) (Lab)]

Sexual violence has a devastating impact on victims, and the accounts of drug-facilitated sexual offences are deeply concerning. However, the law is clear: this behaviour is criminal. The Government will relentlessly pursue perpetrators who target women, whether online or offline, and the Home Office is funding a new pilot of undercover police officers to target perpetrators using the internet to facilitate violence against women and girls.

[Baroness Hazarika (Lab)]

I thank my noble friend for his Answer. We were all appalled by the case of the mass rape committed against Gisèle Pelicot in France, but sadly, this is not an isolated case. The reports—and I pay tribute to the National Crime Agency—have revealed that there are vast online communities of men, including here in the United Kingdom, who are getting together online, encouraging each other to drug their female partners, either rape them themselves or have them gang-raped, and then circulate the footage online. These shocking crimes are being done to women in their own bedrooms, in their own homes, by their long-term partners or husbands who they trusted and thought would love, cherish and protect them, and all this behaviour is being organised and facilitated by unregulated online platforms. Can my noble friend tell us what has been done to force all tech companies and internet services, and regulators such as Ofcom, to proactively detect and stop this kind of heinous activity? Will he acknowledge that we are now in a global epidemic of violence against women and girls, and that much of it is technology-fuelled?

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

My noble friend is right. As I have said already, these actions are criminal in United Kingdom and there is a duty on tech platforms to take down criminal activity or face severe fines. I also say to my noble friend that the Government are supporting Project Medusa, a collaborative effort between the National Crime Agency and German, Brazilian, Canadian, French, Hungarian, Dutch, Spanish and United States agencies and Europol to ensure that we break these gangs at source, take them down and pursue them for their criminal activity.