Ben Everitt: I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. I totally agree; in fact, I was happy to co-sponsor his ten-minute rule Bill, so I am very familiar with the situation. I found it frustrating and amusing in equal measure that in a recent by-election in Chesham and Amersham, the Liberal Democrats campaigned against development, and yet in Eastleigh, as we have seen, they are acting as both a...
Lucy Frazer: In line with the Tax Policy Making framework, the Government is publishing draft legislation ahead of potential inclusion in Finance Bill 2022-23. This allows for technical consultation and provides taxpayers with predictability over future tax policy changes. Alongside this, the Government is making announcements in a small number of technical areas of tax policy to support the operation of...
Gerald Jones: ...with the issues that matter to people. It is clear that the Government are out of touch, out of ideas and out of excuses. After 12 years of Conservative Government, we have a high-tax, low-growth economy, with the country suffering the biggest drop in living standards since records began, and the highest tax burden since world war two. The Government initially refused to implement...
Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay: I am repeating the following Written Ministerial Statement made today in the other place by my Honourable Friend, the Minister for Media, Data, and Digital Infrastructure, Matt Warman MP: Today, the Government is introducing the Data Protection and Digital Information Bill in the House of Commons. The Bill is being introduced after the Government published its response to the Data: A New...
Matt Warman: Today, the Government is introducing the Data Protection and Digital Information Bill in the House of Commons. The Bill is being introduced after the Government published its response to the Data: A New Direction consultation on 17th June 2022. We now have the opportunity to seize the benefits of Brexit and transform the UK’s independent data laws. We have designed these new updates to our...
John Nicolson: ...definition of pornography and puts a duty on websites not to host content that would fail to attain the British Board of Film Classification standard for R18 classification. The point of the Bill, as the Minister has repeatedly said, is to make the online world a safer place, by doing what we all agree must be done—making what is illegal offline, illegal online. That is why so many...
Consideration of Bill, as amended in the Public Bill Committee [Relevant Documents: Report of the Joint Committee on the Draft Online Safety Bill, Session 2021-22: Draft Online Safety Bill, HC 609, and the Government Response, CP 640; Letter from the Minister for Tech and the Digital Economy to the Chair of the Joint Committee on Human Rights relating to the Online Safety Bill, dated 16 June...
Nigel Huddleston: An assessment of the potential impacts of the provisions set out on the Online Safety Bill on both competition between in-scope internet services and on innovation of in-scope services has been undertaken and was published in the Online Safety Bill impact assessment on 17 March 2022. DCMS will also publish draft legislation to address the far-reaching power of the biggest tech firms as part...
Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay: I am repeating the following Written Ministerial Statement made today in the other place by my Honourable Friend, the Minister for Tech and Digital Economy, Chris Philp MP: This is a joint statement with the Home Office. Some states seek to further their strategic interests by going beyond overt political influence towards more covert influencing activity. These ‘interference’ activities...
Lord Clement-Jones: ...pledge. In the Explanatory Notes, we were at 85% by 2025; this now seems to have shifted to 2026. There has been much government bravado in this area, but it is clear that the much-trumpeted £5 billion announced last year for project gigabit, to bring gigabit coverage to the hardest-to-reach areas, has not yet been fully allocated and that barely a penny has been spent. Then, we have all...
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering: My Lords, I will speak to the stand part notice in my name, on which I am delighted to have the support of the noble Earl, Lord Devon, opposing that Clause 63 should stand part of the Bill. The new sections inserted by Clauses 63 and 64 make provision for all code agreements, when renewed by court order, including those made prior to 2017, to be made on land valuation terms consistent with...
Simon Clarke: ...the £1.3 billion court reform programme. Reform is making our courts more modern, with a wide range of new online services to make the courts more efficient—this includes rolling out a new digital platform to manage 1.5 million annual criminal cases. Finally, on airport delays, the reality is that we are seeing disruption globally in the travel sector as it is reopening, at pace, after...
Rachael Maskell: I thank my hon. Friend for his opening remarks on amendment 14, which I wholeheartedly support. I want to talk first about the importance of the Bill. There are 325 pages about levelling up, yet not a mention of the indices that the levelling-up agenda will be focused around. That seems somewhat bizarre when they are so fundamental to addressing the inequalities and disparities across the...
Alex Norris: ...largest say—on whether levelling up can be a success and be a truly transformative project for the whole country. As the Government’s White Paper identified, the deep-rooted problems in the UK economy, which are holding back our regions, towns and villages, create greater imbalance than in most other comparable countries. Our country’s economic and social geography demonstrates that...
John Swinney: I am pleased to open the final debate on this important bill. I would like to thank the conveners, members and clerks of the Covid-19 Recovery Committee, the Criminal Justice Committee, the Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee, the Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee and the other scrutiny committees, and all the individuals and organisations who have helped to shape and...
Lord Fox: ...my noble friends Lady Kramer and Lady Janke, who normally speak on these issues, are unable to attend today so your Lordships have me instead. This is a small and, in a sense, relatively modest Bill that we do not oppose—indeed, we cannot oppose it due to its nature as a money Bill. We have heard some really knowledgeable input from the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, and the noble Earl,...
Alex Davies-Jones: .... It is also worth drawing colleagues’ attention to the history of issues, which have been brought forward in this place before. We know there was reluctance on the part of Ministers when the Digital Economy Act 2017 was on the parliamentary agenda to commence the all-important part 3, which covered many of the provisions now in part 5. Ultimately, the empty promises made by the...
Chris Philp: It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Roger. Clause 168 is a very short and straightforward clause. Ofcom will be required to publish a variety of documents under the Online Safety Bill. The clause simply requires that this be done in a way that is appropriate and likely to bring it to the attention of any audience who are going to be affected by it. Ofcom is already familiar...
Chris Philp: Clause 170 repeals the video-sharing platform regime. While the VSP and online safety regimes have similar objectives, the new framework in the Bill will be broader and will apply to a wider range of online platforms. It is for this reason that we will repeal the VSP regime and transition those entities regulated as VSPs across to the online safety regime, which is broader and more effective...
Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay: I am repeating the following Written Ministerial Statement made today in the other place by my Honourable Friend, the Minister for Media, Data, and Digital Infrastructure, Julia Lopez MP: On 17 June 2022, we published the Government response to the ‘Data: A new direction’ consultation document, and in the Queen’s Speech on 10 May 2022 it was announced that a Data Reform Bill will be...