Written Statements

Tuesday 7th January 2025 Written Statements

Tuesday 7 January 2025

Steel Strategy: Next Steps

Tuesday 7th January 2025 Written Statements

[The Minister for Industry (Sarah Jones)]

Today the Secretary of State for Business and Trade and I will convene the first meeting of the renewed Steel Council. This forum brings together leaders from across the sector to provide strategic guidance and external expertise in the development and implementation of our steel strategy.

Steel has for too long been a neglected industry in this country. Staggeringly, steel production has declined by more than 50% in the last 10 years. Internationally, unfair actions by some overseas nations have undermined free trade, meaning our steel companies are not able to compete on a level playing field.

I believe steel should and could become a positive story. We are not naive to the scale of the challenge, or the situation we inherited. We know these are tough circumstances and it will take time to make things better. This Government will not let the UK lose our steel industry.

In Victorian times, we were the country which invented the modern way of steel production. Now is the time to find our next approach which enables steel growth and innovation. We are the Government determined to make the hard-headed decisions to make that happen. This is why we have committed to publishing a steel strategy in spring 2025.

Such a strategy will need to set a strong vision for the future, combat those factors which undermine competitiveness, and highlight the opportunities and future demand for green steel made in the UK.

As part of this steel strategy, this Government will look seriously at options to improve steel capabilities across the supply chain, including in primary steelmaking. As such, I am also announcing today that the Materials Processing Institute, a not-for-profit research and innovation centre based in Teesside, will lead an independent review into the viability of technologies for primary steel production, including direct reduced iron. The MPI will produce a recommendation to the Government on the viability of iron making and primary steel production technologies in the UK with a view to the current and potential future market.

Our new Steel Council will help us develop the strategy together. It will put the expertise of its members at the heart of our policy making process. It will provide a vital link between the Government, industry, workers, and our innovative thinkers.

Following the publication of the primary steel review and the steel strategy, we will continue to convene the council throughout this Parliament so we can make sure we drive implementation of the strategy and we make great use of the up to £2.5 billion of funding that we have committed to help rebuild the sector.

The council will be chaired by the Secretary of State for Business and Trade and co-chaired by Jon Bolton, who has extensive experience of working in the sector both at home and aboard. Its membership includes representative from steel producers, the supply chain, research and development, trade unions and the devolved Governments.

We have published the full membership on gov.uk at the following link: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/government-sets-out-plan-to-secure-the-long-term-future-of-steelmaking-and-safeguard-steel-communities We will be uploading the terms of reference for the Steel Council and the primary production review to this page in due course.

[HCWS355]

Intimate Image Abuse and Sexually Explicit Deepfakes

Tuesday 7th January 2025 Written Statements

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Alex Davies-Jones)]

Advances in technology have meant that intimate images can now easily be taken or shared without consent. The technology to create realistic deepfake sexually explicit images of any person, without their consent, is also readily available. These behaviours cause untold harm to victims’ lives, particularly the women and girls who are so often targeted. We must ensure our criminal law is adequately equipped to protect victims and punish those responsible.

Today I can confirm that we will, in the crime and policing Bill which will be introduced later this year, introduce new offences for the taking of intimate images without consent and the installation of equipment with intent to enable the taking of intimate images without consent. These are crucial steps in delivering on our ambition to halve violence against women and girls within a decade. We must ensure our criminal law enables us to tackle perpetrators, better protect victims and survivors, and deliver effective justice.

To that end, we will repeal two existing voyeurism offences that relate to the recording of a person doing a private act, and recording an image beneath a person’s clothing—the so-called “upskirting” offence—in sections 67(3) and 67A(2) of the Sexual Offences Act 2003 respectively and replace them with three new offences that will cover a broader range of behaviour, improving the protection for victims.

First, the legislation will create a “base” offence of taking or recording an intimate photograph or film without consent or reasonable belief in consent. Secondly, there will be an offence of taking or recording an intimate photograph or film without consent and with intent to cause alarm, distress or humiliation. Thirdly, there will be an offence of taking or recording an intimate photograph or film without consent or reasonable belief in it, and for the purpose of the sexual gratification of oneself or another. Offenders who commit the latter offence may be subject to notification requirements, commonly known as being on the “sex offenders register”. These new offences for taking an intimate photograph or film without consent cover a broader range of behaviours than current offences, providing greater protection for victims. For example, is it not currently an offence for an abusive person to take an intimate photo of their partner, without their consent, to shock and upset them or humiliate them by taking the photo of them in that intimate state. Under our new legislation, this will be criminal.

We will also introduce new offences that criminalise someone if they install or adapt, prepare or maintain equipment, and do so with the intent of enabling themselves or another to commit one of the three offences of taking or recording an intimate photograph or film without consent. Victims of any of these new offences may qualify, where applicable, for anonymity and special measures. We will also amend the sentencing code to ensure courts have the power to order, upon conviction, that the offender be deprived of any images in respect of which they were convicted of a taking or recording offence, as well as anything on which the images were stored, such as a computer or hard drive. The courts already have this power in relation to offenders convicted of sharing intimate images without consent.

These offences are designed to complement, and in some respects mirror, the offences of sharing or threatening to share, intimate images in the Sexual Offences Act 2003, as inserted by the Online Safety Act 2023. Taken together, these measures give law enforcement a holistic package of offences to effectively tackle this abhorrent behaviour. They will offer victims whose images have been taken or shared without consent the clear and comprehensive protection they deserve.

It is already a criminal offence to share, or threaten to share, a sexually explicit deepfake without consent, but not an offence to make one. The Government made a clear manifesto commitment to ban the creation of sexually explicit deepfake images, a central aspect of our commitment to halve the prevalence of violence against women and girls within the decade. We are bringing forward legislation to honour that commitment in the crime and policing Bill which will be introduced later this year, making this behaviour criminal so that perpetrators can be brought to justice.

[HCWS354]