Asked by: Daisy Cooper (Liberal Democrat - St Albans)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether she will make representations to NuvationBio to encourage access to the SIGMA Phase 3 trial of Safusideniv for eligible patients at UK hospitals.
Answered by James Frith - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department is supporting engagement with commercial sponsors of clinical trials through the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) Life Sciences Industry Hub. The NIHR Industry Hub provides a single, nationally coordinated pathway for research sponsors like Nuvation Bio to engage with, to set up and deliver commercial clinical trials.
Asked by: Daisy Cooper (Liberal Democrat - St Albans)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will make an assessment of the adequacy of Ofsted's ability to adjudicate independently on appeals submitted by school leaders in relation to Ofsted's own inspection judgments.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
Ofsted is currently reviewing its complaints arrangements for schools, with a view to strengthening independent oversight. The department is engaging with Ofsted on this matter. Further details of the plans will be made available in due course.
Asked by: Daisy Cooper (Liberal Democrat - St Albans)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, whether she has made an assessment of the combined impact of the (a) reduction in ticket office opening hours and (b) removal of ticket machines at railways stations on the accessibility of (i) railcard and (ii) discounted tickets.
Answered by Keir Mather - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The Department expects operators to consider the impact on passengers when proposing changes to retailing arrangements. These may include changes to ticket office opening hours, ticket machine provision, or the availability of products and services such as railcards and discounted tickets. Where operators propose changes to regulated ticket office hours, they must follow the relevant requirements set out in the Ticketing and Settlement Agreement and have regard to the Secretary of State's guidance when proposing changes.
In considering changes, operators are expected to ensure that passengers continue to have access to tickets, information and support, including railcards and discounted tickets, through alternative retail channels.
Asked by: Daisy Cooper (Liberal Democrat - St Albans)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of requiring (a) smart phone, (b) tablet (c) and other technology manufacturers to incorporate (i) HarmBlock and (ii) other similar CSAM classifiers into operating systems for the purpose of preventing transmission of child sexual abuse material.
Answered by Satvir Kaur - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
This Government is unequivocal in its commitment to protecting children from online sexual abuse. The previous Prime Minister announced on 8 June 2026 that the UK would become the first country in the world where it is impossible for children to take, share or view nude images on their devices. Government has engaged collaboratively with tech companies over the past three months, to explore how they can expand implement technical solutions on smartphones and tablets to detect and block nude images for children.
The Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport today (8 September) reiterated this commitment in an oral statement to the House. Since June, officials from the Home Office and DCMS have overseen an unprecedented work programme with Apple and Google, working with senior leaders and engineers to explore new ways of preventing child sexual abuse and strengthening protections for children online.
These proposals are a step in the right direction, but do not meet the scale of this government’s ambition. This government is therefore now preparing primary legislation to require companies to build in device operating system-level protections for children. In the meantime, we are also pursing secondary legislation to require any apps that children use to prevent them from accessing or sharing nudity.
This work will prevent predators from being able to exploit and abuse victims through their devices, as well as stopping children from being able to access pornography. Adults will still be able to take, share or view nude content through an age verification process. This will deliver on the commitment we made in the Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy – Freedom from violence and abuse: a cross-government strategy - GOV.UK.
The Government welcomes innovative technical solutions, which aim to keep children safer online and using smartphones and tablets. The Government’s policy is to focus on operating-system level detection of all nudity for child users, rather than attempting to identify and block only child sexual abuse material (CSAM).
Asked by: Daisy Cooper (Liberal Democrat - St Albans)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether she has considered the potential merits of establishing a steering group involving (a) material recovery facilities operators, (b) local authorities, (c) re-processors, (d) producers and (e) retailers to influence the implementation of the Deposit Return Scheme.
Answered by Emma Hardy - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Where in-scope containers are disposed of through household recycling, local authorities will continue managing these materials through existing waste arrangements. The Deposit Management Organisation will work with local authorities to consider ways they can maximise return of materials, and to ensure effective operation of the scheme.
Asked by: Daisy Cooper (Liberal Democrat - St Albans)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, with reference to the Deposit Return Scheme, whether (a) local authorities and (b) Material Recovery Facilities operators will receive producer funding for (i) collecting, (ii) sorting and (iii) recycling containers in scope of the scheme but placed in household recycling collections.
Answered by Emma Hardy - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Where in-scope containers are disposed of through household recycling, local authorities will continue managing these materials through existing waste arrangements. The Deposit Management Organisation will work with local authorities to consider ways they can maximise return of materials, and to ensure effective operation of the scheme.
Asked by: Daisy Cooper (Liberal Democrat - St Albans)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether she has made any assessment of the financial viability of existing materials recovery facility operators after the implementation of the Deposit Return Scheme.
Answered by Emma Hardy - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Where in-scope containers are disposed of through household recycling, local authorities will continue managing these materials through existing waste arrangements. The Deposit Management Organisation will work with local authorities to consider ways they can maximise return of materials, and to ensure effective operation of the scheme.
Asked by: Daisy Cooper (Liberal Democrat - St Albans)
Question
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, whether she has made an assessment of the potential impact of the inclusion of Channels and Updates functions on WhatsApp on the policy not to consider WhatsApp a social media platform.
Answered by Ian Murray - Minister of State (Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport)
Government announced in June that we would ban social media companies from offering their services to under 16s. The department is currently working through the details and the final scope criteria will be set out in the regulations that will be laid in Parliament.
Asked by: Daisy Cooper (Liberal Democrat - St Albans)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, notwithstanding the delay to local government reorganisation announced on 7 September, if she will meet with Hertfordshire local government leaders to discuss accelerating devolution.
Answered by Jim McMahon - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
Our ambition remains to ensure every area in England has, or is in the process of establishing, a strategic authority by the end of 2027, with strategic authorities in place everywhere by the end of 2028, and I want to work with Hertfordshire on how best to achieve that over the coming months.
Asked by: Daisy Cooper (Liberal Democrat - St Albans)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps she is taking to reduce medicine over prescribing.
Answered by James Frith - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department keeps overprescribing under careful review and works with NHS England and the wider health system to reduce inappropriate or unnecessary prescribing. This is done through a range of system-wide work, for example:
supporting personalised care and shared decision-making to help ensure medicines remain appropriate for a patient's clinical needs, circumstances and preferences;
encouraging regular medicines reviews to help identify and address inappropriate prescribing and problematic polypharmacy; and
promoting access to non-pharmacological interventions, including talking therapies and social prescribing, where these may be a more appropriate option than medicines.