Amazon Web Services

Debate between Lord Leong and Viscount Stansgate

Tuesday 21st October 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Leong (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend for those questions. There is no evidence that this was caused by any malicious activity, and we have to be very careful that we do not speculate otherwise. AWS has publicly stated that the outage was initially caused by an issue with its configuration of the domain name system, or DNS, and some wider related complications. Departments independently determine which suppliers to use based on their use cases. Some cloud providers are strategic suppliers, but departments make decisions on adoption based on not only reliance but cost, capability and their staff’s expertise. We are working to diversify the UK’s cloud ecosystem and encourage greater participation by UK-based and European providers, as well as promoting innovation through our digital infrastructure and cybersecurity programmes. At the same time, the NCSC offers advice and guidance on how businesses and organisations can make themselves more cyber resilient, and this advice is also broadly applicable to digital resilience issues.

As I mentioned in Oral Questions last week, businesses should also take it upon themselves to ensure that they have sufficient cyber resilience systems in place by ensuring that their software and hardware are up to date and, if they can, seeking certification so that their systems are Cyber Essentials certified. Businesses should also be encouraged to have a business continuity plan so that, if anything happens, they have a plan in place.

[Viscount Stansgate (Lab)]

My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend on his Question; I submitted exactly the same Question yesterday. Is it possible that some of the sites affected in the UK, including the GOV.UK portal, were not aware that the data was held in America rather than in the UK and that, therefore, when a problem arises as it did in East-1, or whatever it is called, on the east coast of America, they were not aware that we would be in this vulnerable position?

Mathematical Sciences

Debate between Lord Leong and Viscount Stansgate

Wednesday 2nd April 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Leong (Lab)]

I thank the noble Duke for the question. Maths is now the second most popular subject at A-level; something close to 32% of those taking A-levels are doing maths. We have to encourage young people to take up maths. I was lucky to have a good maths teacher, so I really enjoyed algebra, calculus and so on. It is important that maths graduates go to teach in universities and become good teachers. The Government are investing money to recruit and retain these good teachers, so that maths can be liked by most children across the country.

[Viscount Stansgate (Lab)]

My Lords, I am very glad that my noble friend the Minister mentioned teachers. We all agree that maths underpins so much of the scientific work and growth on which our country depends, but is he aware that cuts in post-1992 universities are particularly worrying in the maths department, because over three times as many teachers come from post-1992 universities as from the Russell group? Will my noble friend the Minister take time to meet the president of the Academy for the Mathematical Sciences, Dame Alison Etheridge? It is very important for the Government to keep in close contact with the scientific bodies that represent mathematics.

[Lord Leong (Lab)]

My noble friend is absolutely right. Most of the graduates at Russell group universities will probably spend more time doing research than those going to the new universities, where teaching is the main curriculum. Only some 5% of those who go to Russell group universities end up as teachers. We have funding for recruiting teachers but we also need to retain them, which is very important, so the Government have initiatives to retain these teachers.