Oral Answers to Questions

Rishi Sunak Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd December 2025 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Doughty]

My hon. Friend raises a crucial issue on behalf of her constituents. Incidents such as the attack on Jaguar Land Rover serve as a stark reminder that cyber-threat is not just an abstract concept, but one that has real-world costs. We are working closely with international partners. We are a founding member of the Counter Ransomware Initiative that in October led the agreement of supply chain resilience guidance endorsed by 67 countries, and we are working closely with other partners through the United Nations and other bodies.

[Rishi Sunak (Richmond and Northallerton) (Con)]

In the past 12 months, nationally significant cyber-incidents have doubled, many backed by hostile foreign states, as the Minister will know. The National Cyber Force is clear that offensive cyber-operations play a part in ensuring our national security, so given the environment in which our adversaries are co-operating, will the Minister continue to deepen our co-operation with our Five Eyes partners in this domain, not least because I know at first hand how much they value the particular capabilities that the UK brings to bear in this area?

[Stephen Doughty]

The former Prime Minister is absolutely right to raise this issue. The level of hostile state activity is significant and it is growing. That is why we are working closely with international partners. We have provided almost £30 million in support for international cyber-security capacity building, including for Ukraine and working with other partners. We are also working on issues such as sanctions: we have sanctioned 26 cyber-criminal support entities linked to malicious cyber-activity and 16 Russian military intelligence officers, including an attribution of cyber-units within the GRU, so our co-operation with Five Eyes partners and others is crucial.