Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if she will bring forward legislative proposals to include betting shop workers within the scope of the offence of assault against a retail worker.

Answered by Sarah Jones - Minister of State (Home Office)

Through our Crime and Policing Bill, this Government has introduced a new specific standalone offence of assaulting a retail worker to help tackle the epidemic of shop theft and violence towards retail shop workers that we have seen in recent years.

For the purposes of this new offence, our definition of a ‘retail worker’ is intentionally narrow given the vital need to provide legal clarity and ensure there is no ambiguity for courts in identifying whether an individual is a retail worker, and the assault took place in the course of their work. The Government does not plan to include betting shop workers within the new offence.

However, Section 156 of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 created a statutory aggravating factor in sentencing cases of assault against public facing workers. It applies where an assault is committed against those providing a public service, performing a public duty or providing a service to the public, including public-facing roles in betting shops.

Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:

To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, whether her Department plans to introduce statutory safeguards to help prevent AI chatbots from being used to simulate sexual (a) activity and (b) scenarios involving children.

Answered by Kanishka Narayan - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)

The government is committed to tackling the atrocious harm of child sexual exploitation and abuse.

The strongest protections in the Online Safety Act are for children – regulated services must remove illegal content and prevent children from encountering harmful content, including where it is AI generated.

The government has introduced an offence in the Crime and Policing Bill which criminalises possessing, creating or distributing AI tools designed to generate child sexual abuse material. We are committed to ensuring the UK is prepared for the changes AI will bring. When it comes to keeping children safe online, we will not hesitate to act.

Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:

To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, what assessment she has made of the potential implications for her policies of the report from the Molly Rose Foundation entitled the Children’s exposure to (a) suicide, (b) self-harm, (c) depression and (d) eating disorder content online, published in October 2025.

Answered by Kanishka Narayan - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)

The government thanks the Molly Rose Foundation for its research.

Under the Online Safety Act, intentionally encouraging or assisting suicide is a priority offence for providers’ illegal content duties, and the government is taking action to give illegal self-harm content the same status, something the Molly Rose Foundation has long campaigned for.

Services likely to be accessed by children must use highly effective age assurance to prevent children encountering content that encourages, promotes or provides instructions for suicide, self-harm or eating disorders.

Ofcom has enforcement powers under the Act and has announced investigations into over 60 services suspected of failing to comply with their duties, including a pro-suicide forum.

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to her Department's policy paper entitled Statement of changes to the Immigration Rules: HC 997, published on 1 July 2025m what assessment she has made with Cabinet colleagues of the potential impact of removing (a) dental hygienists and (b) dental technicians from the Skilled Worker visa eligible occupation list on (i) sustainability of the dental workforce sustainability and (ii) patient access to care.

Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)

On 12 May, the Government published its Immigration White Paper, outlining our future approach to legal migration routes. A technical annex (www.gov.uk/government/publications/restoring-control-over-the-immigration-system-white-paper/restoring-control-over-the-immigration-system-technical-annex) was published alongside the Immigration White Paper setting out the impact of some of the key policy changes.

The Statement of Changes to Immigration Rules laid on 1 July represent the first step in delivering on the Governments White Paper and included raising the skills threshold for Skilled Worker, excepting an interim Temporary Shortage List of lower skilled occupations deemed critical to the UK’s Industrial Strategy, which was based on advice from the Department of Business and Trade and His Majesty’s Treasury.

Home Office and DHSC continue to work very closely to understand the impact of all Immigration Routes on sector workforce. It is our intention to publish an Impact Assessment (IA) at the earliest opportunity. NHS Employers has published www.nhsemployers.org/articles/immigration-rule-changes-july-2025 which explains the impact of the changes on health and social care occupations.

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what information his Department holds on (a) the number of people living with long COVID and (b) the (i) severity and (ii) duration of their symptoms: and what assessment he has made of research required to help improve (A) care and (B) support.

Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

The most recent data from the Winter COVID-19 Infection Study, a joint study carried out by the Office for National Statistics and the UK Health Security Agency, shows that, for the period 8 February 2024 to 6 March 2024, an estimated 1,140,000 people, or 1.9% of the population, in private households in England and Scotland reported experiencing long COVID-19 symptoms more than twelve weeks after a COVID-19 infection.

Of these, an estimated 839,000 people reported that day-to-day activity had been limited, of which an estimated 251,000 reported that day-to-day activity had been limited a lot.

Between 2019/20 and 2023/24, through the National Institute for Health and Care Research and the Medical Research Council, we have invested over £57 million on research into long COVID, with almost £40 million of this through two specific research calls on long COVID. The funded projects aim to improve our understanding of the diagnosis and underlying mechanisms of the disease and the effectiveness of both pharmacological and non-pharmacological therapies and interventions, as well as to evaluate the effectiveness of clinical care.

This includes funded clinical trials to test and compare different treatments such as antihistamines, anticoagulants, and anti-inflammatory medicines. We continue to fund new studies regularly. A list of trials currently recruiting participants is available via the NIHR Be Part of Research website, at the following link:

https://bepartofresearch.nihr.ac.uk/results/search-results?query=Long%20COVID&location=

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to work with the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology to prevent online eating disorder content from contributing to poor mental health outcomes among children and young people.

Answered by Zubir Ahmed - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

Under the Government’s Online Safety Act, all in-scope services are now required to protect their users from illegal content, and platforms likely to be accessed by children need to prevent their users from accessing eating disorder content.

We are working closely with the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, Ofcom, and others as the Online Safety Act takes effect. This includes exploring further opportunities to address harmful pro-eating disorder material and misinformation shared on social media and websites.

Further research examining the causal relationship between exposure to online content and children’s health outcomes, including mental health, and how it might be mediated is needed and welcomed. Departmental policies will remain agile to emerging and future research in this space.

Found: Leicestershire) Steve Darling (Liberal Democrat; Torbay) Damien Egan (Labour; Bristol North East) Gill German

Found: Leicestershire) Steve Darling (Liberal Democrat; Torbay) Damien Egan (Labour; Bristol North East) Gill German

Found: Watch the meeting Members present: Ruth Jones (Chair); David Chadwick; Ann Davies; Gill German; Claire