Crime and Policing Bill

Debate between Baroness Morgan of Cotes and Lord Young of Cookham

Committee stage
Wednesday 7th January 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, I added my name to the amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Vaux. Like him, I served on the Select Committee on fraud, ably chaired by my noble friend Lady Morgan of Cotes, that produced a very substantial document indeed. After we produced our report, the Government published a consultation document headed Preventing the Use of SIM Farms for Fraud. In December 2023, the Government published their response to that document. I want to quote briefly from three paragraphs of that response.

Referring to the responses they got, the Government said:

“A few responses noted that banning physical SIM farms alone is likely to result in displacement to eSIM farms”,


which is the point that has just been made. They went on:

“However they acknowledged that if eSIMs were included to the proposed ban, the Government’s definition of SIM farms should be adapted to ensure it excludes smartphones that can hold more than four eSIMs”.


The Government’s response to that section was:

“Responses noted that the definition could also include eSIMs and mobile apps. However, we did not receive sufficient evidence at consultation to include them in a proposed ban, due to their complexity and ongoing pace of development. This could be further addressed by the proposed powers to extend the ban to other forms of telecommunications equipment and articles used to perpetrate fraud”.


They referred to a further final paragraph headed “Government response”:

“The Government considers it important to ensure that the ban is flexible and can be used to rapidly prohibit other types of technology where these are identified in the future. Some such technologies are mentioned above, whilst others may emerge in future and the Government will continue to review fraud methodologies closely for changing patterns and new technologies being used, such as eSIM farms and others. However, the Government agrees with respondents that any powers to ban through secondary legislation ought to have clear parameters for their use”.


That was the last Administration, of course, and it would be helpful to know whether the Government agree with that line.

The question I want to ask the Minister is this. Referring to the clauses on SIM farms, Clause 114(4) says:

“The Secretary of State may by regulations amend this section (other than this subsection)”.


Is that in effect giving the Secretary of State powers to introduce by secondary legislation something that the previous Government said should not be done by secondary legislation? I leave that question hanging in the air while the Government seek advice from the Bench to see what the answer is.

[Baroness Morgan of Cotes (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I will briefly speak to Amendment 358. It is a pleasure to follow the noble Lords, Lord Vaux and Lord Young of Cookham. Because we are going to be discussing this and a later amendment on fraud, I declare my interest as a director of Santander UK.

It was a huge pleasure and privilege to chair the Lords inquiry into online and digital fraud, which reported in 2022, and I would like to think that we had some impact in raising the issues, which are of huge importance to the public. Fraud is one of the crimes that people are most likely to be victims of. I know the Minister knows that because he is the Anti-Fraud Minister in the department.

Noble Lords have already spoken about the importance of this amendment, the need for the law to be kept up to date as the technology develops, and the fact that allowing as much flexibility in legislation as possible to enable that to happen is important. The reason we talked about the “fraud chain” in the report is that, obviously, people encounter fraud in myriad ways. Fraudsters are, as we have heard, incredibly flexible, and entrepreneurial—for all the wrong reasons. Of course, telecoms—people’s smartphones or phones—is where many people will first encounter the fraudster, who will then try, as we heard in our evidence, to get them away from technology and strike up some kind of relationship which unfortunately ends in people often losing life-changing amounts of money.

I do not want to pre-empt the debate on Amendment 367, which I hope we will also reach today, but the question, perhaps now or for later, is whether the Minister is confident that the previous Government’s and this current Government’s ask of the telecoms industry is strong enough given the frequency with which the public encounter fraud via their telephones. I will ask the question now, but I am sure we will come back to it. We are all waiting for the forthcoming fraud strategy from the Government, which we understand is—I hope—close. Can the Minister give us a little precursor of whether that will impose tougher asks and potential penalties on the telecoms companies for the reasons that we have already heard?

Business of the House

Debate between Baroness Morgan of Cotes and Lord Young of Cookham

Thursday 1st December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

I agree with what the hon. Gentleman has just said. He will know that that issue was raised yesterday in Northern Ireland questions, and he may have heard what my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State said. I understand the disappointment of the young person who did not receive the medal in the way in which they hoped, and I understand the very strong feelings that have been aroused. I remind him of what my right hon. Friend said when that point was made yesterday:

“The right hon. Gentleman makes an interesting point. The armed forces are a wonderful example of people from right across the community working together.”

He went on to draw on the example of the Royal Irish Regiment and the work that it has done in securing

“representatives from right across Northern Ireland and the Republic”.—[Official Report, 30 November 2011; Vol. 536, c. 925-926.]

I very much hope that we can move forward in a more consensual way than that particular gesture indicated.

[Nicky Morgan (Loughborough) (Con)]

I know from personal experience and from my postbag in my Loughborough constituency that the lack of access to affordable child care is critical in preventing women from going back to work. May we have a general debate on child care policies?

[Sir George Young]

I would welcome such a debate, and on Tuesday it may be in order to discuss that. We have announced that we will invest an additional £300 million in child care support under universal credit, on top of the £2 billion in the current system. At the moment, that provision is available only if someone works more than 16 hours, but we are going to remove the minimum hours rule. I very much hope that my hon. Friend welcomes that announcement.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Baroness Morgan of Cotes and Lord Young of Cookham

Thursday 20th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman that those comments were not helpful. I hope that one of the benefits of setting up the liaison group will be that we will now have a proper forum for consultation between IPSA and the House, and that there will be no need to resort to public acrimony in the newspapers. I hope that we will be able to have a sensible discussion and iron out some of the real difficulties that exist, without experiencing the kind of incidents to which the hon. Gentleman has just referred.

[Nicky Morgan (Loughborough) (Con)]

Earlier this week, because IPSA had failed to tell me that it had put in place a direct payment to my landlord of my London rent, as I had requested, I also paid her for my January rent. This makes for one very happy landlord and one less happy bank manager. Does my right hon. Friend agree that better communication between IPSA and MPs is vital if the expenses system is to operate in a fair and efficient way?

[Sir George Young]

I am sorry that my hon. Friend has had to dig into her own resources to pay her landlady twice. One of the initiatives that I and other Members are anxious to drive forward is the removal of the need for payments to go in and out of MPs’ bank accounts. If we can move more towards direct payments by IPSA or the use of a credit card, the sort of misunderstanding that has just occurred could be avoided.

Business of the House

Debate between Baroness Morgan of Cotes and Lord Young of Cookham

Thursday 17th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

That is a wilful misrepresentation of what I just said. I said that I think the House should have a serious debate about its sitting hours, when it sits in the summer and whether the 82-day summer recess that we have had in the past is the right way forward. I think all parties might consider whether party conferences are immoveable or whether there is a more intelligent way of reorganising the political year. I accept that it is not a matter for one party, but one for all parties and the House. I hope that the House will engage in that debate in the spirit in which I launched it.

[Nicky Morgan (Loughborough) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend find time for a debate on the actions of bailiffs? The subject was mentioned in the coalition agreement and I am sure that many hon. Members have examples of constituents who have been targeted by bailiffs. As I understand it, that area of law is unclear and it would be helpful to have a debate.

[Sir George Young]

The coalition agreement is specific on the matter. We will provide more protection against aggressive bailiffs and unreasonable charging orders, ensuring that courts have the power to insist that repossession is always a last resort and to ban orders for sale on unsecured debts of less than £25,000. Better regulation of bailiffs will be one of the strands of that policy as we develop it.