Public Order Act 2023 (Interference With Use or Operation of Key National Infrastructure) Regulations 2025

Viscount Camrose Excerpts

Wednesday 4th February 2026 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Stansgate (Lab)]

My Lords, I am pleased to follow my noble friend Lord Trees. I support the regulations. I should also like to thank the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, for having tabled this amendment because it enables the House to consider matters we do not often have the chance to hear about or discuss, and they are important. It raises difficult and sensitive issues because, as the House knows only too well, it refers in great part to the use of animals in research.

I doubt whether there is a single Member in this House who positively wants to see animal testing and research if it can be avoided, and the Government are rightly committed to ending it. I was pleased to hear the noble Lord, Lord Willetts, commend the Government for their current commitment to phase out this research and I, in turn, commend the noble Lord for being on the same trajectory when he was in government and for the support he has given. Reference has been made to the document published last year, the three Rs and so on.

For the time being animal research remains an essential component of scientific and biomedical research, and it helps ensure that potential new drugs, vaccines and medicines are safe and effective. My noble friend Lord Winston referred to some of the benefits of this research. As I understand it, certain anaesthetics have been made possible only because of animal research, and who among us has not benefited from anaesthetics? The research is fundamental to advancing our understanding of complex biological systems and disease mechanisms and it plays an important role in safeguarding human, animal and environmental health. As has been said by several noble Lords, it is critical to responding to health emergencies, including a future pandemic, which none of us wants to see but which remains one of the most significant threats to our national security. Scientific advances are being made by the life sciences community, but we must recognise that alternatives are not yet mature enough in complexity and application to replace whole-animal models. The UK must support a balanced research ecosystem that enables both high-quality animal studies and the responsible development of animal methods.

This brings me to the amendment. I do not have time to talk about some of the constitutional points made by the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, and the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett. I have some sympathy when I hear references to Henry VIII clauses and so on, but I do not think this is the subject of today’s debate. The problem, as I see it, is that certain parts of the life sciences sector are facing unacceptable and unsustainable pressure from the non-peaceful actions of campaigners, however understandable, that threaten the integrity of the sector. I have visited some of these research establishments and spoken to scientific researchers who have been assaulted and suffered intimidation, so I understand the point made by my noble friend and others. The systematic targeting of key strategic points in secondary and tertiary supply chains is having a serious effect, and the knock-on effects of disrupted research, hostile working environments and escalating security costs are already raising concerns in the life sciences sector about the future viability of research and development in the UK.

If this research were to leave the UK, so would investment, talent and our research infrastructure, which would permanently damage the UK’s sovereign capability to develop medicines and to respond to future health emergencies. It is against this background that I put it to your Lordships that there is a case for designating life sciences establishments as part of critical national infrastructure. Incidentally, in the context of the changing geopolitical world in which we now live, this House heard references not that long ago to the vital importance of undersea cables and space infrastructure. As has been pointed out, this research is also economically important to the UK: over 300,000 people are employed in the life sciences sector.

The right to peaceful protest should be protected. In my view, it is essential in a democracy. It is the non-peaceful systematic disrupting of supply chains by campaigners that could lead to an erosion of our national research, and the damage would be permanent. It would undermine the Government’s plans for growth in the life sciences sector, lead to adverse health outcomes for UK civilians, and leave the UK reliant on foreign assistance in future pandemic scenarios.

Finally, is this proposed legislation at odds with the Government’s alternative strategy? I do not think it is. It is important to realise that it is the same scientific community who use animal models who are the most heavily invested in driving alternatives forward. If the UK infrastructure supporting animal research collapses, that will collapse the same infrastructure that supports the development of alternatives. Not only does this pose a significant threat to public health outcomes, but it could damage the UK’s ambitions to be a leader in non-animal alternatives. For these reasons, I hope the House will think carefully about voting for this fatal amendment, however well-intentioned it may appear to some noble Lords to be.

[Viscount Camrose (Con)]

I had planned to make a number of points in this debate, but I am pleased to see that they have all been made for me in far more elegant style than I could have attained myself. I will emphasise one point that has not had quite enough attention yet, and that is that this country is a world leader in animal welfare in the life sciences and in the development of products from the life sciences.

If protesters succeed in their aims, they will not stop animal research; they will export it overseas. The countries to which they will export it may indeed be able to match our research excellence, but they could not, I suspect, match our commitment to animal welfare. For this reason particularly, but for a great many other reasons noble Lords have raised, I oppose the amendment.

[Lord Sentamu (CB)]

My Lords, my contribution will be very brief. It is the job of His Majesty’s Government to introduce regulations and laws. The Minister is today presenting to us draft regulations which were laid before the House on 27 November 2025, some months ago, for approval.

The point for me is that this is the 45th report from the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee. It has scrutinised and gone through it all. What has it decided in the end? That it is expedient. It has no negative comment about it. Either we trust our Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee, or we do not. As a House, we make that committee. That is the battle.

In the end, I have to support the approval of these regulations because I trust our Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee. Where it has not found an SI expedient—I remember my history of your Lordships’ House from 2005—it has sent it back, but it has not done this now. We should follow our processes and procedures and go ahead and approve it.

Product Regulation and Metrology Bill [HL]

Viscount Camrose Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 26th February 2025 Lords Chamber

I will give one quick example. For years, card payment machines were accessible and able to be used independently by all members of the community; then, flat screen card payment machines came out, which are inaccessible and unusable for me and for huge swathes of our community. What redress has there been? Nothing. It would be on us to bring a case under equalities legislation. Why should it be the person on the wrong end of exclusion who has to suffer that and then to bring the case themselves? What a great thing this Government could do—through consultation and a national conversation—by bringing about an “inclusive by design” standard. I look forward to the Minister’s response. I beg to move.

[Viscount Camrose (Con)]

My Lords, I will speak to Amendments 34, 35, 36 and 37, in the name of my noble friend Lord Holmes, and Amendment 43, in the name of my noble friend Lord Sharpe. I draw noble Lords’ attention to the fact that I am not doing so from the Front Bench on this occasion.

On my noble friend Lord Holmes’s amendments, I will address two key issues: first, the labelling of AI-generated content, including music; and, secondly, the promotion of inclusive design in AI products.

On labelling AI-generated content, the Government’s Explanatory Notes rightly highlight the need to adapt to new technologies such as AI. This amendment supports that goal in, I think, a sustainable and sensible way. During the passage of the Data (Use and Access) Bill, I spoke about the importance of digital watermarking, and particularly the development of internationally accepted technical standards to support this. These labelling amendments are an excellent illustrative pair of use cases where such watermarks can and should be applied. The noble Lord, Lord Vallance, at the time expressed his positive views towards such standards. I hope that, on the back of the Government’s consultation, they will pursue this energetically.

Consumers have to be able to distinguish between human-generated and AI-generated content—for their own sanity, among other reasons. This is particularly important in sectors such as music, where the line between human creativity and AI involvement may not always be clear. My noble friend has proposed a characteristically sensible way to bring this about, but if the Government have an even better idea then I look forward to hearing it.

Next, I will address my noble friend’s amendment on inclusive by design. This principle is vital in ensuring that the products developed and marketed in the UK, especially those leveraging advanced technologies such as AI, are accessible to all, regardless of disability or other factors. This improves designs not just for those who would otherwise be excluded but for everyone. My noble friend rightly emphasised the importance of acknowledging accessibility and inclusivity at the design stage, and this amendment will create a framework for that.

There is a story—I do not know whether it is true—that the first seat belt design teams had no women in them, to the enormous detriment of all their eventual users. In fact, early seat belts did not work at all not only for women but for men. By making inclusive design a key part of the development of AI technologies in particular, we have the opportunity to ensure that the benefits of AI are shared more widely.

Before I turn to my noble friend Lord Sharpe’s excellent amendment, I will make a broader point about AI in the Bill. The Minister said earlier that this is not an AI Bill. That is fine, but where is the AI Bill? The party opposite, both in opposition and in government, have told us we will have an AI Bill, but I am sad to say that we still know next to nothing about it. We do not know its scope, its timing or its purpose, let alone any of its contents. This uncertainty is a real problem for everyone involved in AI in this country. If the plan is to distribute AI laws across different Bills, that is fine, but we need to know. Either way, I urge the Government to share their thinking on AI regulation, because we urgently need to understand at least the direction of travel.

I strongly support my noble friend Lord Sharpe’s Amendment 43. We need to address the gaps that he rightly identifies, to ensure that we are setting clear expectations for the development and regulation of AI technologies. Without such clarity, we risk stifling innovation rather than promoting it, and creating unnecessary regulatory burdens for businesses, especially SMEs, working in this sector.

Finally, as we look to develop the technical standards and regulations for AI, we must consider the risks posed by foreign actors who may seek to manipulate AI systems or to exploit them for their own malicious purposes, whether for economic advantage or geopolitical leverage. The security and sovereignty of our AI systems must be paramount. The establishment of the robust regulatory framework set out in these amendments should include safeguards to prevent undue foreign influence, ensuring that UK businesses and consumers are protected.