Asked by: Julian Lewis (Conservative - New Forest East)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, if he will take steps to ensure (a) social media companies and (b) website providers that have been found to have hosted illegal content viewed by people that have subsequently committed serious crimes face financial sanctions.
Answered by Feryal Clark - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
The Online Safety Act 2023 places duties on social media companies and search services. These include duties to tackle illegal content on their services. These services will need to put systems and processes in place to reduce the risk that users post this illegal content. They will also need to take it down where it does appear. If companies fail to comply with any of these duties, Ofcom has a range of strong enforcement powers, including issuing fines and applying to the court to initiate business disruption measures.
Asked by: Julian Lewis (Conservative - New Forest East)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, when she plans to publish a substantive Answer to Question 20914 on Gender Dysphoria: Surgery, tabled on 18 December 2024.
Answered by Seema Malhotra - Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities)
A response to Parliamentary Question 20914 has now been provided; we apologise for the delay.
Asked by: Julian Lewis (Conservative - New Forest East)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what data her Department holds on the number of children travelling to (a) Poland, (b) Turkey, (c) Florida and (d) other countries for gender reassignment surgery in each of the last three years.
Answered by Seema Malhotra - Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities)
The requested data is not centrally held. However, Border Force has a duty under Section 55 of the Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Act 2009 to safeguard and promote the welfare of children.
We take this duty very seriously and are committed to protecting vulnerable children who cross the border.
All new Border Force entrants receive safeguarding training as part of their induction course. Once established, all Border Force Officers and managers have continuing training and knowledge refresh obligations.
Where concerns are raised, officers will take action to safeguard individuals who could be at risk.