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Written Question
Clare Melford and Imran Ahmed
Thursday 12th March 2026

Asked by: Baroness Kidron (Crossbench - Life peer)

Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask His Majesty's Government whether they plan to make any public statements about the government of the United States of America sanctioning the British citizens Imran Ahmed and Clare Melford.

Answered by Baroness Chapman of Darlington - Minister of State (Development)

As the government stated publicly at the time, the UK is fully committed to upholding the right to free speech, and - while every country has the right to set its own visa rules - we support the laws and institutions which are working to keep the Internet free from the most harmful content. Ministers and officials in the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office are in constant discussion with their US counterparts across a wide range of issues.


Speech in Lords Chamber - Wed 11 Mar 2026
Crime and Policing Bill

"My Lords, I will speak to Amendments 404, 405, 431 and 432. In the light of the hour and the spirit of my conversations with the Minister, I will not go through my amendments in detail, nor the very long journey it has been to get here. In short, they …..."
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Speech in Lords Chamber - Wed 11 Mar 2026
Crime and Policing Bill

"..."
Baroness Kidron - View Speech

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Speech in Lords Chamber - Wed 11 Mar 2026
Crime and Policing Bill

"I thank all noble Lords who have supported this, not just tonight but on previous occasions, and I thank the Minister. Earlier this afternoon, we were looking for the perfect words. When she stood up, she said “clearly irrelevant” to the death of a child, and that would have been …..."
Baroness Kidron - View Speech

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Speech in Lords Chamber - Tue 10 Mar 2026
Victims and Courts Bill

"My Lords, I join the Minister’s fan club and thank her for her engagement on this, which has really helped get this to a better place. I am grateful for that. I believe we will hear from her what the Government’s plan is, but can she also assure me on …..."
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Speech in Lords Chamber - Tue 10 Mar 2026
Victims and Courts Bill

"My Lords, I added my name to Amendment 14, alongside that of my noble friend Lord Russell, and he has adequately explained the gap.

I started, unfortunately, looking at child sexual abuse in 2012. Unfortunately, in the period since then, I have had the misfortune to look at a great …..."

Baroness Kidron - View Speech

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Speech in Lords Chamber - Mon 02 Mar 2026
Crime and Policing Bill

"No, I dare not tackle the noble Baroness on legal matters—what we do and do not do in the law—but, if you accidentally poison children’s food, you do not get a free pass. There are all sorts of places and spaces that have to—..."
Baroness Kidron - View Speech

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Speech in Lords Chamber - Mon 02 Mar 2026
Crime and Policing Bill

"My Lords, as a point of information, I feel it would be useful to say that Clauses 64 and 65, to which the Minister refers, are in fact a narrowing of an original amendment, laid by me and other noble Lords, that the Government deliberately narrowed so that it deals …..."
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Speech in Lords Chamber - Mon 02 Mar 2026
Crime and Policing Bill

"I say to the noble Lord that there is only one way to prevent a Division on this issue, which is either to stand at the Dispatch Box and say that it is covered, or that we will keep it alive until Third Reading so that we can make sure …..."
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Speech in Lords Chamber - Mon 02 Mar 2026
Crime and Policing Bill

"If I was in the same meeting as the Minister, officials were unable to say that LLMs and generative models would be covered by that amendment. Indeed, they said that the policy of the Government was chatbots only. Chatbots are the subject of another amendment that I have tabled, which …..."
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