Asked by: Rebecca Smith (Conservative - South West Devon)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, whether she plans to set out a timetable for the implementation of the recommendations of Baroness Bertin's Independent Pornography Review by May 2026.
Answered by Kanishka Narayan - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
‘Freedom from Violence and Abuse: a cross-government strategy to build a safer society for women and girls’ commits to creating a joint team to address the issues in Baroness Bertin’s Review. The team will be formed by the Home Office, Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, Ministry of Justice and Department for Culture, Media and Sport. It will examine the evidence to inform the government’s approach to pornography policy.
Government has already taken action. Pornography showing strangulation or suffocation will be criminalised under the Crime and Policing Bill and will be a priority offence under the Online Safety Act.
Asked by: Rebecca Smith (Conservative - South West Devon)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many reports of non-consensual sexual deepfake images have been recorded by police forces in England and Wales in each of the last three years for which figures are available; and what steps her Department is taking to prevent the creation and distribution of synthetic sexual images.
Answered by Sarah Jones - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Office for National Statistics publishes information on the number of ‘threaten to share intimate photograph or film’ offences recorded by the police in England and Wales, but information on whether these offences involved non-consensual sexual deepfake images is not centrally held. Data for these offences can be found in Table 11 on the Office for National Statistic’s website (Sexual offences prevalence and victim characteristics, England and Wales - Office for National Statistics)
On 18 December 2025, the Government published ‘Freedom from Violence and Abuse: A Cross-Government Strategy to Build a Safer Society for Women and Girls’, which included an announcement to ban nudification apps and other tools designed to create synthetic non-consensual intimate images. This Strategy includes a commitment to explore routes to ensure that intimate images that are taken, created or shared without consent are removed online.
In January 2024, the Online Safety Act brought into force offences for the sharing, and threatening to share intimate images including ‘deepfakes’. These are ‘priority illegal offences’, the most serious category of online offence under the Act.
The Data (Use and Access) Act inserts new offences into the Sexual Offences Act 2003, criminalising the creation and requesting the creation of an intimate deepfake without consent or reasonable belief in consent.
In addition, the Home Office introduced world-leading measures making the UK the first country to outlaw possession, creation and distribution of AI tools for generating child sexual abuse material, as well as criminalising paedophile manuals that instruct others on developing such tools.
Asked by: Rebecca Smith (Conservative - South West Devon)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, which department has lead responsibility for policy on online pornography regulation; and with reference to Baroness Bertin's independent report entitled Creating a Safer World – the Challenge of Regulating Online Pornography, published in February 2025, what assessment she has made of that report's finding that fragmented Government responsibilities impede effective regulation of online pornography.
Answered by Nick Thomas-Symonds - Paymaster General and Minister for the Cabinet Office
Baroness Bertin’s independent report made 32 recommendations, including on governance and oversight of pornography policy. The ‘Freedom from Violence and Abuse: a cross-government strategy to build a safer society for women and girls’, published on 18 December 2025 commits to creating a joint team to address the issues detailed in the report. As this team is not yet set up, I am answering this question from the Cabinet Office, as there is currently no lead department for this work.
The team will be formed by the Home Office, Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, Ministry of Justice and Department for Culture, Media and Sport. It will examine the evidence to inform the government’s approach to pornography policy, including the question of departmental responsibility.
Asked by: Rebecca Smith (Conservative - South West Devon)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what funding her Department has allocated to tackling violence against women and girls since 5 July 2024.
Answered by Jess Phillips - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The Home Office allocated £74 million in FY2024/2025 and £122.3 million in FY2025/2026 to tackle Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG).
Our investment funds a range of vital frontline support services to victims of VAWG, improving police response to VAWG and tackling the root causes of VAWG.
The scale of violence against women and girls in our country is intolerable and this Government is treating it as the national emergency that it is. The cross-government VAWG Strategy,published on 18 December 2025, sets out the strategic direction and concrete actions to prevent violence and abuse, pursue perpetrators, and support victims, and to deliver our unprecedented commitment to halve VAWG in a decade. The Strategy is backed by at least £1 billion funding across government over the spending review period.
Asked by: Rebecca Smith (Conservative - South West Devon)
Question
To ask the Minister for Women and Equalities, when she plans to respond to the recommendations made by the Equality and Human Rights Commission on their updated code of practice following the For Women Scotland ruling.
Answered by Olivia Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities)
I refer the Hon Member to my written answer to PQ92379, dated 26 November 2025, which provides the information you requested.
The EHRC has revised its Code of Practice for Services, Public Functions and Associations following the consultation and submitted it to the Minister for Women and Equalities on 4 September 2025. This is a long and legally complex document which will have an impact on service providers up and down the country. Rightfully we are carefully considering it.
The process for laying the Code in Parliament is set out in the Equality Act 2006. The Government will follow this process. If the decision is taken to approve the Code, it will be laid before Parliament for a 40 day period.
Asked by: Rebecca Smith (Conservative - South West Devon)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent assessment she has made of the effectiveness of current criminal and civil remedies available to victims of intimate image abuse; and with reference to Baroness Bertin's independent report entitled Creating a Safer World – the Challenge of Regulating Online Pornography, published in February 2025, whether she has assessed the potential merits of that report's recommendations on an independent redress mechanism to support victims whose images have been shared without consent.
Answered by Jess Phillips - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
Work to address the circulation of non-consensual intimate image (NCII) content online is an important part of the government’s ambition to halve VAWG in a decade, and the recently published VAWG Strategy includes a commitment to explore routes to ensure that intimate images that are taken, created or shared without consent are removed online.
It is vital that victims and survivors have access to the support they need when they need it most. The Home Office provides funding to the Revenge Porn Helpline, which offers high-quality support and advice to victims of NCII abuse, engages with law enforcement and other stakeholders to improve the response to intimate image abuse, and raises awareness of the nature of NCII abuse and the harm that it can cause.
The Government committed in the VAWG Strategy to create a joint team, across the Home Office, Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, Ministry of Justice and Department for Culture, Media and Sport, to address the issues detailed in Baroness Bertin’s Independent Pornography Review and rigorously examine the evidence to inform the government’s approach to pornography policy. Further details on this will be shared in due course.
Asked by: Rebecca Smith (Conservative - South West Devon)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, when she plans to publish guidance to clarify the legal position of children aged 13 to 16 under section 75 of the Crime and Policing Bill.
Answered by Jess Phillips - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
Before commencing the new duty to report child sexual abuse, the Government will provide an appropriate period of time to prepare relevant sectors for implementation. This will include the development and publication of guidance for reporters.