Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lauren Edwards and Peter Kyle

Thursday 12th March 2026 Commons Chamber

[Peter Kyle]

The Government have a commitment to reduce the regulatory burden on business by 25%. My Department led on almost £1 billion of regulatory reform for company reporting in just the first weeks of our taking office. The small business plan and strategy will deliver for small businesses, on top of the industrial strategy, of course, which is getting our economy facing the future and into solid growth for now and the future.

[Lauren Edwards (Rochester and Strood) (Lab)]

I add my voice to that of my hon. Friend the Member for Bexleyheath and Crayford (Daniel Francis) in calling on the Government to publish the review of market access for small breweries as soon as possible. I was delighted that Moot Brew brewery from Halling in my constituency produced the guest ale for the Strangers’ Bar in the House of Commons before Christmas. Will the Secretary of State support a national guest beer agreement policy, so that more fantastic local brewers such as Moot are represented in my local pubs?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lauren Edwards and Peter Kyle

Wednesday 12th February 2025 Commons Chamber

[Peter Kyle]

Of course, I agree with my hon. Friend. Additional powers will be coming online via the Online Safety Act 2023. I wish that those powers had come into force earlier; that was a legacy of the previous Government. We have done everything we can to expedite those powers as quickly as we can. From March onwards, there will be powers that make extreme pornography illegal and that require sites to protect children from accessing pornography. Child sexual abuse and its related activity should not be called pornography—it is rape, and it should be called what it is—and we should do everything we can to keep it offline.

[Lauren Edwards (Rochester and Strood) (Lab)]

7. What progress he has made on setting up AI growth zones across the country.