Improving Cyber Resilience

Lord Harris of Haringey Excerpts

Wednesday 21st May 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)]

My Lords, when parliamentary time allows, there will be a cyber security and resilience Bill, and I am sure that, at that opportunity, we will discuss this in detail. I look forward to doing so with the noble Lord.

[Lord Harris of Haringey (Lab)]

My Lords, I refer to my interest in the register as chair of the National Preparedness Commission. Like the noble Baroness, Lady Foster, I congratulate my noble friend on her ubiquity in terms of policy today. There has been a sequence of very bad cyberattacks and, although I am sure that Marks & Spencer, the Co-op and so on address very carefully their cybersecurity expectations, it is very difficult for any organisation to withstand what may be a state-inspired, state-sponsored or state-supported attack—I do not know, and I am sure the Minister will not be able to comment on, whether these were such cases. Therefore, is it not important that the National Cyber Security Centre provides enough guidance and encouragement to support businesses in recovering after they have been hacked, providing them with, if you like, a plan B for recovering and dealing with the consequences of a successful attack?

[Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)]

I thank my noble friend for the question. He is absolutely right: there is a clear role here for the National Cyber Security Centre, both during an attack and afterwards, as it works with experts. My noble friend is right that I cannot comment on the details of the current attacks. I reassure noble Lords that the NCSC has a sector-specific trust group, where 60 CEOs from the retail sector have come together, both during the attack and afterwards, to make sure that best practice and information are shared in real time, so that other retail organisations can make sure that they are not subject to similar attacks.