Asked by: Chi Onwurah (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, with reference to his Department's publication entitled Assuring a Responsible Future for AI, published on 6 November 2024, what assessment he has made of the role of legislation in driving the AI assurance market.
Answered by Feryal Clark - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
AI assurance supports organisations to demonstrate their compliance with existing – and future – standards and regulations. To complement the existing focus on proportionate, sector-specific regulation, the UK Government remains focused on its intention to introduce binding requirements on the handful of companies developing the most powerful AI systems, as announced in the King’s Speech. These proposals will build on the voluntary commitments already secured at the Seoul and Bletchley AI Safety Summits and build on the government’s ongoing commitment to ensure that the UK’s regulators have the expertise and resources to effectively regulate AI in each of their respective domains.
Asked by: Chi Onwurah (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of the Shared Rural Network.
Answered by Chris Bryant - Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
The Shared Rural Network (SRN) has already delivered substantial improvements to outdoor 4G mobile coverage across the UK. 4G coverage from at least one mobile network operator has increased from 91% when the programme was agreed in March 2020 to 94.9% according to Ofcom coverage reporting. This progress includes upgrading and activating Emergency Services Network (ESN) masts which are delivering new 4G coverage in the harder to reach areas across Britain and building new masts in areas that currently have no signal at all to having coverage from all four mobile network operators.
Ofcom recently assessed that all four mobile network operators had met their 88% coverage obligation for completion of the partial not-spot programme. This part of the SRN targets areas where there is currently coverage from at least one but not all four mobile network operators.
Asked by: Chi Onwurah (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, with reference to paragraph 4.94 of the Autumn Budget 2024, published on 30 October 2024, HC 295, how much he plans to spend over what time period on an extension of the Innovation Accelerators programme to continue to bolster high-potential innovation clusters in the Glasgow City Region, Greater Manchester and the West Midlands; and whether the programme will be extended to other places.
Answered by Feryal Clark - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
The Government will extend the Innovation Accelerators pilot for a year to continue to bolster high-potential innovation clusters in the Glasgow City Region, Greater Manchester and the West Midlands. We will announce further details on the allocation of the R&D budget in due course.
Any future extension of the programme to other places will be subject to decisions taken through the second phase of the Spending Review.
Asked by: Chi Onwurah (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, with reference to paragraph 4.99 of the Autumn Budget 2024, published on 30 October 2024, HC 295, over what period will £80 million be invested in corporate services across Government; and whether this investment will be in (a) IT, (b) human resources and (c) training.
Answered by Feryal Clark - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
The multi-year investment relates to the Matrix Shared Services Transformation programme, which plays an important part in driving a modern digital government, giving people a more satisfying experience and their time back in nine government departments. The £80m investment will take place in the year from April 25 to March 26 inclusive with the programme running through to FY27/28. The scope of the investment covers the implementation of a new system, the associated service transformation and the staff costs to prepare for and enact the changes for the first tranche of departments. With this investment we'll move closer to reaching our overall ambition - to transform shared services and technology to enable civil servants to focus on what they value most, serving the public.
Asked by: Chi Onwurah (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, with reference to paragraph 4.94 of the Autumn Budget 2024, published on 30 October 2024, HC 295, by what process the figure of £37 million for the Made Smarter programme was arrived at; how many firms that figure is planned to cover; and what the expected return is.
Answered by Feryal Clark - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
We will announce further details on the allocation of the R&D budget in 2025/26 in due course. We will ensure we continue to build on the success of the Made Smarter Innovation Challenge, which has supported more than 400 organisations, of which over half are SMEs.
Asked by: Chi Onwurah (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, with reference to paragraph 4.94 of the Autumn Budget 2024, published on 30 October 2024, HC 295, by what process the support for the commercialisation of university research will be allocated; and what the expected return is.
Answered by Feryal Clark - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
DSIT and UK Research and Innovation are designing a new process to allocate this funding. This will build on engagement earlier in the year with the university sector on how to design proof-of-concept funding. While the benefits realised will depend on the precise design, evaluations of existing UKRI programmes show strong benefits. For example, the Medical Research Council’s evaluation of their developmental pathway funding scheme found that spin-outs from those awarded funding raised on average £4 million, whereas most spin-outs from projects marginally rejected for funding raised very little, or nothing.
Asked by: Chi Onwurah (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, whether he plans to increase the amount spent on research outside the Greater South East by 40%.
Answered by Feryal Clark - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
This public R&D regional investment target is set out in the statement of missions laid in relation to the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act 2023.
Increasing productivity right across the UK is fundamental to our mission to kickstart economic growth. Through our Industrial Strategy and the development of Local Growth Plans, we will build on local strengths to ensure that public and private R&D investment right across the UK helps local places to reach their potential.
Asked by: Chi Onwurah (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, with reference to his Department's publication entitled Assuring a Responsible Future for AI, published on 6 November 2024, what assessment he has made of the role that Government procurement can have in driving demand for AI assurance.
Answered by Feryal Clark - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
We know that Government procurement is a powerful lever to drive innovation, giving businesses confidence to invest in and shape markets by signalling Government needs and intent, and this is no different with AI assurance. By embedding them in public sector procurement, Government can likely drive demand for proven AI assurance practices and support improvements in the quality of the AI supply chain. We are continuing to assess this potential, and last week we launched a public consultation on our AI Management Essentials tool, with questions as to the potential market effects of including these practices in Government procurement processes.
Asked by: Chi Onwurah (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, what the (a) annual and (b) consolidated take up is of cyber essentials by small and medium sized businesses.
Answered by Feryal Clark - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
a) Cyber Essentials certificates awarded to small and medium sized businesses:
i. November 2023 to October 2024: 41,162, including 9,680 Cyber Essentials Plus certificates.
ii. November 2022 to October 2023: 26,674, including 7,966 Cyber Essentials Plus certificates.
iii. November 2021 to October 2022: 20,773, including 4,938 Cyber Essentials Plus certificates.
iv. November 2020 to October 2021: 18,136, including 3,694 Cyber Essentials Plus certificates.
b) From 1 May 2020 to 31 October 2024 (the period for which IASME Consortium have been government’s sole delivery partner for Cyber Essentials), 131,339 Cyber Essentials certificates have been awarded to small and medium businesses. This includes 27,217 Cyber Essentials Plus certificates.
Asked by: Chi Onwurah (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, with reference to paragraph 4.94 of the Autumn Budget 2024, published on 30 August 2024, HC 295, whether this applies to all UK universities; and what metric she will use to assess whether a university is world leading.
Answered by Feryal Clark - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
The Autumn Budget 2024 announces at least £6.1 billion of funding for core research, growing this allocation at least in line with inflation. Core research funding directly and indirectly supports universities through a range of programmes, including competitive research grants through UKRI’s research councils, investment in PhDs and fellowships, and Quality-Related research funding provided through Research England, informed by the outcomes of the Research Excellence Framework (REF). DSIT will work closely with the sector to effectively prioritise our R&D settlement, and will announce further details on funding allocations in due course.