Oral Answers to Questions

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Thursday 4th July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Margot James]

I know that in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency and in the rest of Northern Ireland there has obviously been a delay in deploying that budget on account of there being no Government in Northern Ireland. My officials are in discussions with the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy to ameliorate that situation, and I will write to him with the latest details.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

3. What steps he is taking to tackle the potential inappropriate use of algorithms in the (a) public and (b) private sector.

[The Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Jeremy Wright)]

We have asked the Centre for Data Ethics and Innovation to review the potential for bias in the use of algorithms, and it is considering usage in both the public and private sectors on crime and justice, financial services, recruitment and local government. The centre will publish an interim report later this month, and it will make recommendations to the Government early next year. We will then decide how to proceed.

[Chi Onwurah]

The past 10 years have seen the most revolutionary and rapid changes in how technology is used in public services, politics, work and leisure, yet the Government have had to be dragged kicking and screaming to implement the most basic digital protections, and they are behind even Google and Facebook in calling for regulation. The Secretary of State talks about another review, but algorithmic bias is a threat to all our citizens in the form of algorithmic rule. Will he take the opportunity to get on the front foot and put in place regulations to protect our citizens?

--- Later in debate ---

[The Solicitor General]

It is absolutely right that we need to investigate those cases and work closely with stakeholders and inter-agency partners at an early stage, and that is exactly what the CPS and the police are doing. There is an inter-ministerial group on this matter, on which I serve, and we met last month to discuss these issues. A large number of stakeholders are involved in the study we are doing, including Women’s Aid, Refuge, Citizens Advice, the Survivors Trust and the Victims’ Commissioner, and they are all inputting in this important policy area. I am due to meet the Victims’ Commissioner this afternoon to discuss these issues further.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

Newcastle’s sexual exploitation hub brings together the police, victim support and social services to provide a wrap-around service for victims of these horrendous crimes, particularly for vulnerable young women who often cannot access the support available for children, which is something that the Spicer review said needed to change. But there is no statutory funding for the hub; at a time when police and local authority funding is under such pressure, it risks losing its funding and ability to provide this remarkable support. Will the Minister look at providing statutory funding for hubs of this kind?

[The Solicitor General]

I am very pleased that the hon. Lady has raised the important work that is going on in her constituency and am very happy to discuss that with her. I was very pleased to see some joint working when I went to Wales: I saw how the courts and all the inter-agencies were working together—I attended an inter-agency group that was working collaboratively. Collaborative working is essential. I am very happy to meet and to discuss the issue with her.

Discrimination in Sport

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Wednesday 12th June 2019 Commons Chamber

[Dr Allin-Khan]

I expect that the hon. Lady is as keen on my speech as she is on cricket.

Growing up, I was one of the sportiest people in my school. I would give everything a shot, whether on the football pitch, the cricket field, a dojo or the athletics track. Why? Because I enjoyed it—the togetherness, the opportunity to create new friends and the bringing together of communities, teaching young people the positives of good physical health. I even did a BTEC in sport and physical recreation.

The shadow Secretary of State, my hon. Friend the Member for West Bromwich East (Tom Watson), can attest to the incredible benefit sport can bring to people’s mental and physical health. By his own admission, 18 months ago he would have struggled to climb up a step-ladder, yet last month he summited Snowdon.

There is a direct link between good physical health and strengthened mental health, but there is a worrying side of sport, which brings us here today and is plaguing the games we love—namely, discrimination. Discrimination, wherever it occurs, in whatever format, needs to be rooted out and eradicated. In football, if the abuse directed at players on pitches in this country and elsewhere is not stamped out, it will send a worrying message to the next generation of stars and spectators.

Great strides have been made in the fight against racism in recent decades, but we have seen a worrying trend this past season. Alarm bells are ringing. We were all shocked by the blatant racism experienced when England played Montenegro in March, where sustained racist chanting was aimed at England’s black players.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend for her excellent speech. Does she agree that the Football Association and, indeed, the Premier League have a duty of care not to send British players to play on pitches in countries where they will be subject to significant racial abuse, that the sanctions enforced so far have not been sufficient and that we need to do much more to ensure that British football players can play the beautiful game without being subject to unacceptable abuse?

[Dr Allin-Khan]

I thank my hon. Friend for her very important intervention. I work very closely with the Premier League and the Football Association, and I know that they take racism and the treatment of fans and players extremely seriously. However, we all have a collective responsibility to ensure that this blight on our beautiful game is stamped out. My hon. Friend is right to raise that issue.

Callum Hudson-Odoi’s international debut for England should have been the proudest moment of his career to date, but he talked afterwards about hearing monkey chanting throughout the match. Raheem Sterling and Danny Rose also bravely spoke out, calling on world football’s governing bodies to do more. Montenegro was fined €20,000, which is a measly figure, given how much money we all know makes its way through the football ecosystem every single month.

I am sure that many in this House will agree that this problem is not just experienced by England when they play away from home. There is a deep problem on our own soil as well.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Allin-Khan]

I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention, articulated perfectly as usual. She is absolutely right that no international competition should be held anywhere where fans, players, coaches and the wider public at large are persecuted for being of a minority group.

It will surprise no one in this Chamber that the discriminatory views I have outlined are plaguing social media platforms. This abuse is mostly left unpunished on social media. Racists, sexists and homophobes can leave awful comments, but without the use of specifically harmful phrases the algorithm does not notice how discriminatory those posts are. These comments would be indefensible in a court of law and indefensible in front of an employer, yet they go unpunished on social media. With social media, it is direct and it is personal. I know that many Members in the Chamber have themselves experienced abuse on social media. We use Twitter daily and not just for our work. We scroll through when we wake up in the morning, while we travel to work or are on a tea break. When something hateful is directed at us, the pain and fear runs deep. It is personal; it is disgusting; and it is wrong.

For our sportsmen and sportswomen, who often carry millions more followers than the average MP, the abuse, and the pain that is felt, is magnified. Faceless accounts are run by bullies in bedrooms, sitting in their underpants, where an attacker can keep their anonymity and post vile replies to tweets. These people can be identified, but only through a police investigation. We want a system introduced where this information is sent to our sports’ governing bodies and clubs, so that offenders can be banned from attending matches and sporting events. To be clear, a minority of fans take part in homophobic, sexist or racist chanting and it is important that we do not tar all fans with the same brush.

[Chi Onwurah]

I thank my hon. Friend for the fantastic points that she is making. I want to emphasise her last point: it is wrong to tar all fans with the acts of a few. British football—indeed, English football, which I am more familiar with—has come a long way since the ’60s and ’70s, when homophobic, racist and sexist abuse was more common in stadiums across the country.

[Dr Allin-Khan]

As an avid football fan who stands on the terrace alongside many other fans, I always feel very welcome. My hon. Friend is absolutely right to say that we have come a long way, but we have not come far enough. We need to stamp out any form of discrimination that makes any fan—even one—and any player—even one—feel unwelcome and as though there is not a place for them enjoying the sport that they love on any terrace in our country.

WhatsApp Data Breach

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Wednesday 15th May 2019 Commons Chamber

[Margot James]

I will answer the questions that I can answer. I cannot speak for what Facebook and WhatsApp are doing, but I can assure my hon. Friend that, as part of the general data protection regulation across Europe, the Data Protection Act has put in place the strongest privacy standards, rules and laws anywhere in the world. In our Information Commissioner’s Office we have the best resourced ICO in Europe, and we gave the commissioner enhanced powers last year. The ICO has shown itself to be superb in utilising those powers.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

This WhatsApp scandal demonstrates again that the Government’s online harms White Paper is too little, too late, as it deals only with harms arising from user-generated content. What we need is a robust regulatory framework that assigns rights and responsibilities.

When a vulnerability is identified, as the Minister has said, it is essential to install an update as quickly as possible. Too many of our citizens still do not have access to fixed wireless broadband and will be obliged to install the update over a mobile network, incurring significant charges. Who should pay those charges?

[Margot James]

I reassure the hon. Lady that we already have robust legislation in place through the introduction of GDPR. We also have competition law and a number of agencies. Indeed, Opposition Members usually complain that we have too many regulatory bodies in this space. We have the Competition and Markets Authority, Ofcom and the Information Commissioner’s Office, and we will be setting up a powerful regulator on the back of our online harms White Paper. People should be taking more responsibility for the security of their devices, and the NCSC has very good user advice on its website.

UK Telecoms: Huawei

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Thursday 25th April 2019 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Wright]

My hon. Friend is right. It is important that we recognise the need to ensure this technology serves our whole population and that its potential is properly developed. As he will know, the Government, in conjunction with others, are attempting to develop this technology in test beds, particularly, as he will know, in rural applications, which I hope will be of benefit to him and his constituents. I believe that that can transform how our citizens connect to the essential services we now all use.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

I should declare an interest, having spent 20 years building out mobile and fixed networks around the world, working with a variety of vendors including Huawei and latterly for the regulator Ofcom.

Mobile networks are an increasingly critical part of our national infrastructure, but the regulatory framework has not kept pace since 2010. For example, it has not matched the resilience and security requirements of fixed networks. 5G makes mobile networks part of the everyday infrastructure of our lives, but it will be built out using existing components and network parts where, in many cases, Huawei is already present—it is based on 4G, for example. Does the Secretary of State agree that we need a transparent principles-based and standards-based resilience and security regulatory framework? Will he comment on why Ofcom has not provided that under the duties set out in section 105 of the Communications Act 2003? Will he ensure that in the future Ofcom has the resources and the powers to ensure it does?

[Jeremy Wright]

The hon. Lady is right. The importance of the review is that it deals with the need to ensure security is in place for the mobile network, as it is elsewhere. That becomes increasingly important as we move towards extensive applications of 5G. That is the logic for the review. That is why it is important and that is why it is happening now. Ofcom will have its part to play in that process. She will understand why I do not talk now about the conclusions of the review, but I will discuss them when they are available. I have no doubt that she will wish to participate in that conversation.

Online Harms White Paper

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Monday 8th April 2019 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Wright]

I agree with my hon. Friend that that is indeed the balance to be struck. I hope that I can reassure him that it is our intention to do so and that we believe that free speech and safety online are not mutually exclusive. We can do both; we must do both. That is what the White Paper intends to do. As he says, it simply would not be right for Government to seek to determine the answers to the questions that we are concerned with. There must be an independent regulator to do so. It must be properly funded and must be properly robust in the opportunities that it has to hold online companies to account.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

Having spent 20 years in the tech industry, I can say categorically that the harms that the White Paper begins to address were well identified five or even 10 years ago, but it does nothing to address the growing harms associated with algorithms, artificial intelligence, the internet of things and data dominance. The Secretary of State says that other Departments or consultations will address them but, like the world we live in, those harms are all interconnected. Why is the Secretary of State allowing a piecemeal, ad hoc and at times knee-jerk legislative framework to develop, when what we need is a comprehensive, cross-departmental, evidence-based, forward-looking review of digital rights and responsibilities, so that we can have a regulatory framework fit for the future?

[Jeremy Wright]

I do not wish to damage the atmosphere of consensus that has helpfully emerged this afternoon, but I have to say that I think that the hon. Lady is completely wrong. What we have set out is exactly designed to deal with the problem that she has identified: that if we are reactive—if we chase harms that emerged some time ago and do not think about harms that are yet to emerge—we will indeed miss the point. However, that is exactly what a duty of care is designed to do. Those who are subject to a duty of care will be obliged not just to look at the harms that they already know about, but to scan the horizon. If they see a harm coming and choose to do nothing about it, they will be answerable for that failure. That is exactly one of the advantages of the duty of care model.

Leaving the EU: Mobile Roaming Charges

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Thursday 7th February 2019 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Wright]

As far as I can tell, we are discussing an urgent question about whether mobile roaming charges will apply after our departure from the EU. I will repeat what I have said already: we should all want, when we have the opportunity, to exercise our democratic rights to prevent no deal and vote for a deal instead. If that does not happen for any reason and no deal occurs, the Government intend to be ready for it. We intend to give consumers the protection that we still can and look forward to the Opposition’s support in doing so.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

The abolition of roaming charges was just one of the ways in which the European Union stood up to the tech giants in the interests of ordinary consumers. Given the Government’s absolute reluctance to do the same—they are only now looking to address online harm and are still completely ignoring algorithmic control and data exploitation—will the Secretary of State commit to matching evolving European Union tech regulation, or explain why not?

[Jeremy Wright]

I am afraid I do not accept the hon. Lady’s premise. It is not true that the Government have only now started to talk about online harms: we produced a Green Paper on internet safety some considerable time ago and we have talked about it repeatedly. The hon. Member for West Bromwich East (Tom Watson) and I have discussed exactly the tone of the Government’s likely response and the hon. Lady will see a White Paper shortly. I am sure she would expect that we approach this subject in the proper way, so that when we produce the actions that we intend to take they stick, have effect, are robust and achieve what she and I both want to see.

Oral Answers to Questions

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Thursday 31st January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mims Davies]

As the Prime Minister said last year, the UK Government would support a bid to host the 2030 FIFA World cup. I welcome that transparency and the football associations are free to decide whether to pursue that opportunity. The English FA is already working with the FAs of Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and Ireland to explore the feasibility of such a joint bid.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

I am sure the Minister will join me in welcoming the fact that the 2021 rugby league world cup opening ceremony will take place at Newcastle’s St James’ Park. Does she agree that all sport played at St James’ Park should be played in the interest of the fans, not of finance, and that the Premier League would do well to learn that?

[Mims Davies]

The hon. Lady, adorned in black and white, makes her point once again. It is a very exciting announcement for the cities involved, and it is right that she continues to stand up for her football club and for the great sporting prowess in her constituency. It is right that we send the message that Newcastle should continue to play its part.

Centre for Data Ethics and Innovation

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Tuesday 20th November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Margot James]

The inquiry I referred to in the previous answer has been reported on by the Information Commissioner, and she is setting forth a code of practice for political parties to sign up to on their use of data and how data are processed.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

A dating service that optimises short-term relationships to ensure repeat business. A taxi service that charges people more when their phone battery is low. A recruitment service that prioritises men for higher paid vacancies. I welcome the new centre but, with respect, those examples do not require ethical investigation; they require regulation and enforcement. When will we get that?

Oral Answers to Questions

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Thursday 1st November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Wright]

I am not available for selection, but there is a huge amount to be done to encourage people to participate. We have talked about facilities, but this is also about people: those who play, those who coach and those who encourage. We need to do more on all those things.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

Grassroots football, and football in general, will be improved by greater financial transparency, so what are the Government doing to ensure that club owners cannot sell part of a club’s assets without clearly reporting it?

[Jeremy Wright]

As the hon. Lady will know, rules already exist around the handling of money in relation to criminal activity, and it is important that we have as much transparency as possible. I will consider her specific point and, if she will forgive me, get back to her on it.

Oral Answers to Questions

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Thursday 6th September 2018 Commons Chamber

[Margot James]

This is a live and ongoing independent investigation by the commissioner and a number of legal proceedings are under way. We continue to expect that all organisations, including Facebook, fully co-operate with the ICO.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

The Government know that data is the driving technology behind so much of our new economy and social change, yet they have done absolutely nothing to put out a coherent data regulation framework. Will the Minister commit to undertaking a data review so that we can identify who owns data and how it should be processed?

[Margot James]

To some degree the hon. Lady’s concerns have been addressed by the new provisions in the Data Protection Act and the incorporation of GDPR, but she does make the good point that data extends beyond what has already been covered by that Act, and the Government are in the process of reviewing the whole issue of data with the idea of publishing a national data strategy in due course.