Jaguar Land Rover Cyber-attack

Derek Twigg Excerpts

Tuesday 9th September 2025 Commons Chamber

[Derek Twigg (Widnes and Halewood) (Lab)]

(Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade to make a statement on the cyber-attack on Jaguar Land Rover and on what assistance the Government are giving to businesses to help protect them against cyber-attacks.

[Mr Speaker]

I welcome the Minister to his new job.

--- Later in debate ---

[Derek Twigg]

I am grateful to you, Mr Speaker, for granting this urgent question—as a north-west MP, you know what a large employer JLR is in the region. As we have heard, this serious cyber-attack on Jaguar Land Rover has stopped production and halted sales, and staff have been instructed to stay at home. The car plants at Halewood in my constituency and in Solihull, and other production facilities around the world, have been unable to operate. From what has been reported, JLR shut down its IT systems in response to the attack. I believe that dealerships have been unable to register new cars and—initially, at least—garages that maintain JLR vehicles were unable to order the parts they needed.

The JLR Halewood plant in my constituency is an important and valued employer. Many of my constituents are employees, which is also the case for my neighbouring Merseyside MPs. Thousands of jobs in the supply chain have been affected. I am disappointed that despite the cyber-attack happening just over a week ago to one of our most important businesses, which has nearly 33,000 direct employees and, of course, a huge supply chain, no statement has been made to Parliament on what actions have been taken to help the company or to prevent future attacks.

The latest attack raises wider issues following on from the attack on Marks & Spencer. The two instances in themselves are very worrying. One would like to believe that all companies reviewed their cyber-security after the M&S attack. If these attacks continue, there could be an ongoing and even more serious effect on our economy. What are the Government doing to help protect our businesses from cyber-crime? I have heard what the Minister has said today, but it is in our national security interest for them to work closely with business. Is there an underlying weakness in how business is dealing with cyber-security? In that regard, we heard from Ciaran Martin, former head of the National Cyber Security Centre, on the “Today” programme this morning, suggesting that companies are perhaps focusing more on protecting customer data at the expense of the security of their operations.

This House needs to hear more in the coming months about what the Government are doing to work with business and to help prevent these attacks being successful, because they are a threat to our economy and to national security.

[Chris Bryant]

First, I commend my hon. Friend on seeking this urgent question and you, Mr Speaker, on granting it. My hon. Friend makes the important point that Jaguar Land Rover is not only an iconic national brand, but a very significant employer—it employs 34,000 people in the UK, including in his constituency, and 39,000 worldwide. He is right that we need to ensure that cyber-security is something that every company in the land take seriously, and every public sector organisation. In my previous ministerial role I was conscious of the attack on the British Library, which was actually one of the most financially significant attacks heretofore, and it pointed the way for some of the other issues arising across the economy, which is why we have been keen to bring forward a Bill on this, as stated in the King’s Speech. We will introduce such a Bill “soon”—I think I can get away with that with the Chief Whip and the Leader of the House, although, in the words of Humpty Dumpty, when I use a word it means precisely what I choose it to mean, no more and certainly no less. As my hon. Friend says, there are serious issues that we need to address across the whole of the economy to ensure that we get this right.

My hon. Friend pointed to one person; I point to another—Richard Horne, the chief executive officer of the National Cyber Security Centre—who recently stressed that the UK faces increasingly hostile activity in cyber-space. We simply cannot afford any degree of complacency in this. There are major criminals operating in this space, as well as some malicious state actors, and some 40% of companies in the UK reported last year that they had faced some kind of cyber-attack. It is a very important issue that we take seriously.