Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment she has made of the effectiveness of measures to deter small boat crossings in the English Channel.
Answered by Alex Norris - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Government’s Plan for Change sets out our ambition to secure borders and control immigration. We are committed to tackling illegal migration and the criminal networks behind it.
The Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Act 2025 has now received Royal Assent and the overarching impact assessment for this can be found here:
The Government is continuously monitoring and evaluating the effectiveness of our measures in place to tackle small boats. As stated in the Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Act, the Border Security Command will be publishing an annual report, which must state the Commander’s views on the performance in the financial year of the border security system. This is set out in the Act here:
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2025/31/section/4/enacted
Border security is fundamental to both our national security and economic security and evaluating our approach is a critical part of that.
Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps her Department is taking to improve border security technology at ports of entry.
Answered by Alex Norris - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Immigration White Paper, published in May 2025, sets out a range of measures to transform the border, including using technology to maintain security at ports of entry.
The introduction of a ‘universal permission to travel’ requirement means that we know more about everyone wishing to travel to the UK including Electronic Travel Authorisation (ETA) and eVisa holders. This will allow for more interventions to take place upstream, with enhanced data and intelligent technologies also being used to target interventions on arrival, as well as using facial comparison technology to deliver consistent identity verification. We are currently reviewing the findings of a contactless eGate pilot and will announce further information on its implementation in due course.
Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent steps she has taken to disrupt organised criminal gangs involved in human trafficking.
Answered by Jess Phillips - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The Government is committed to tackling all forms of modern slavery, including human trafficking and ensuring that victims are identified and supported and offenders are brought to justice. The Modern Slavery Action Plan for 2025-2026 sets out the Government’s ambition to do this.
Under the Action Plan, we are working closely with law enforcement partners in the UK and internationally, to share intelligence to identify organised criminal gangs and tackle the enablers of human trafficking to disrupt offending. This includes implementing measures through the Online Safety Act; providing support through the Modern Slavery Fund to tackle modern slavery at source and reduce the threat both overseas and to the UK; and commissioning research to better under the nexus between organised immigration crime and modern slavery, to identify new ways to break criminals’ business models.
The National Police Chief Council Lead for Modern Slavery and Organised Immigration Crime is also developing a new national framework for investigating modern slavery, which is designed to support police officers at every stage of the investigative process to secure better outcomes.
Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what plans she has to increase support for victims of domestic abuse, including early intervention and safeguarding.
Answered by Jess Phillips - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
This government recognises the devastating impact of domestic abuse on victims, which is why we have set the ambitious target to halve VAWG in a decade. Prevention and early intervention will sit at the heart of the forthcoming Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy, with a focus on addressing the root causes of VAWG including supporting our education system to teach children about respectful and healthy relationships and consent.
In May 2025 we announced a £19.9m investment to provide vital support to victims of VAWG, increase awareness of VAWG and actively prevent these horrific crimes. This includes over £6 million for national helplines supporting victims of domestic abuse, 'honour'-based abuse, revenge porn and stalking and £2.5m on prevention and early intervention.
Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment she has made of the impact of the recent visa reforms on workforce shortages in key sectors.
Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The Government’s approach is to link migration policy and visa controls to skills and labour market policies, so that immigration is not used as an alternative to training or tackling workforce problems in the UK. This approach will be important to enabling delivery of the Government’s broader agenda.
Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps her Department is taking to help support police forces to tackle rising levels of online fraud and scams.
Answered by Dan Jarvis - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
The Government, working with City of London Police, has recently replaced Action Fraud with a new and improved national police reporting service for fraud and cybercrime. The new service (Report Fraud) went live on 4 December. Report Fraud will provide better intelligence to support police and other partners with responding to online fraud and scams.
In addition, the Government has completed recruitment of the National Fraud Squad (NFS) of specialist posts, led by the NCA and City of London Police. The NFS will take a proactive, intelligence-led approach to identifying and disrupting the most serious fraudsters operating in the online space and targeting the UK public.
The Home Office has also undertaken a comprehensive review of the fraud training and skills landscape - we will implement the recommendations from this to ensure officers have the right skillset to respond to online fraud and scams.
More broadly, under the Online Safety Act, companies in scope must now tackle fraudulent content at source, or face the possibility of significant fines from the regulator.
The Government will set out a comprehensive Fraud Strategy early in the New Year. It will include measures to both protect consumers and disrupt criminal networks and ensure that the UK remains the most difficult environment possible for fraudsters to operate in.
Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps she is taking to improve the timeliness and adequacy of information shared between her Department and local police forces.
Answered by Sarah Jones - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Home Office works closely with the National Police Chiefs’ Council’s to address any concerns about information sharing between the department and police forces.
Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what discussions the Department has had with the police on improving protection for retail workers experiencing abuse or violence.
Answered by Sarah Jones - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Home Office has regular discussions with the police and other partners on protecting retail workers and tackling shop theft.
The Home Office and Department for Business and Trade recently held a joint meeting of the Retail Crime Forum and Retail Sector Council, attended by representatives from policing and the retail sector, which included discussion on the ‘Tackling Retail Crime Together Strategy’. The strategy was jointly developed by the police and industry and aims to provide a collaborative and evidence-based approach to preventing retail crime, including abuse and violence against retail workers.
Through the Crime and Policing Bill, we are bringing in a new offence of assaulting a retail worker to protect the hardworking and dedicated staff that work in stores. We are also removing the legislation which makes shop theft of and below £200 a summary-only offence, sending a clear message that any level of shop theft is illegal and will be taken seriously.
Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether she plans to improve oversight of biometric data storage and retention across law enforcement agencies.
Answered by Sarah Jones - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Home Office launched a public consultation on 04/12/2025 on the use of biometrics, facial recognition and similar technologies.
The responses received will inform the creation of a bespoke legal framework and oversight for the use of biometric, facial recognition and similar technologies.
One aspect the consultation looks at is the oversight of biometric data storage and retention across law enforcement agencies.
Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment her Department has been made of the level of police recruitment and retention rates; and what steps she is taking to help constabularies maintain the number of frontline police officers.
Answered by Sarah Jones - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Government is clear that visible policing is essential to restoring public confidence in the police. To support this aim, for 2025/26, £376.8 million will be available to forces to support officer numbers. This funding will be distributed as follows:
The retention of police officers is a priority for the Home Office and the National Police Chiefs’ Council. Experienced officers are incredibly valuable which is why forces should be using effective evidence-based strategies to manage retention and progression of existing officers. Voluntary resignations rates for police officers remain low at 3.2% compared to other sectors.
As at 31 March 2025, 90.3% of police officers worked in frontline roles (including visible operational frontline and non-visible frontline roles; excluding National Policing, unknown, and ‘Other’ functions), the same proportion as the previous year.
Forces are operationally independent, and the deployment of officers remains an operational decision for Chief Constables.