Asked by: Samantha Niblett (Labour - South Derbyshire)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, what steps her Department is taking to protect children from harm caused by AI chatbots.
Answered by Kanishka Narayan - Minister of State (Cabinet Office) (Jointly with the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Technology)
We have taken a power in the Crime and Policing Act to close loopholes in the Online Safety Act regarding AI chatbots. This means unregulated chatbots will have to comply with duties under the Online Safety Act to protect their users from illegal content once the relevant legislation is passed.
Alongside this we are considering the evidence from the ‘Growing up in the online world’ consultation. Some responses felt that chatbots could support children’s wellbeing. However, we also heard concerns about how these services can provide children with harmful, misleading, or inaccurate advice.
Following the publication of the progress statement in June, we plan to provide a further update on the consultation in the coming weeks.
Asked by: Samantha Niblett (Labour - South Derbyshire)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, whether, following the Government's announcement on measures to address AI chatbots producing romantic and sexual content for children, it plans to take further steps to close gaps relating to chatbots providing safeguarding advice and misleading information to child users.
Answered by Kanishka Narayan - Minister of State (Cabinet Office) (Jointly with the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Technology)
We have taken a power in the Crime and Policing Act to close loopholes in the Online Safety Act regarding AI chatbots. This means unregulated chatbots will have to comply with duties under the Online Safety Act to protect their users from illegal content once the relevant legislation is passed.
Alongside this we are considering the evidence from the ‘Growing up in the online world’ consultation. Some responses felt that chatbots could support children’s wellbeing. However, we also heard concerns about how these services can provide children with harmful, misleading, or inaccurate advice.
Following the publication of the progress statement in June, we plan to provide a further update on the consultation in the coming weeks.
Asked by: Samantha Niblett (Labour - South Derbyshire)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, what steps she plans to take with Cabinet colleagues to protect and support transgender individuals following the implementation of the proposed under 16s social media ban.
Answered by Kanishka Narayan - Minister of State (Cabinet Office) (Jointly with the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Technology)
The government wants to support those who use the online world to find solace and support or who depend on technology to connect with others. Transgender individuals will still have access to the internet and safe spaces online. The government wants to see more online services designed safely for children. We are also investing in safe spaces offline: youth clubs, schools funding, community spaces and parks – rebuilding a sense of community for young people that has eroded.
Asked by: Samantha Niblett (Labour - South Derbyshire)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, what assessment her Department has made of the level of availability of accessible third spaces for people under the age of 16 following the introduction of the proposed social media ban; and what steps she is taking to ensure that sufficient safe, affordable and age appropriate third spaces remain available for young people in local communities.
Answered by Kanishka Narayan - Minister of State (Cabinet Office) (Jointly with the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Technology)
Giving every child the best possible start in life is this government's driving force.
This Government is investing £500 million through our Youth Matters national youth strategy, so young people from all walks of life can access fun things to do outside of school, support when and where young people need it, more safe spaces and access to trusted adults.
This includes over £60 million to improve access to enriching activities and youth work, £350 million to refurbish or build up to 250 youth facilities and £10m for a new youth opportunity programme with the King's Trust. In addition, £132.5m of dormant assets funding for Every Child Can will increase disadvantaged young people’s access to enrichment opportunities.
Asked by: Samantha Niblett (Labour - South Derbyshire)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, whether she has received representations from the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Digital Creators on the subject of children's access to video-sharing platforms.
Answered by Kanishka Narayan - Minister of State (Cabinet Office) (Jointly with the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Technology)
The government recently published a consultation and began a national conversation which sought views and evidence from across the UK on measures that could further protect children online and enhance their wellbeing.
This closed on 26 May and we are analysing the responses. We received over 116,000 responses to the consultation and we are considering the insights parents, children and other stakeholders have shared. We will publish a full list of organisations that responded to the consultation alongside a summary of responses.
Asked by: Samantha Niblett (Labour - South Derbyshire)
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 extent of similarities between YouTube Shorts, Instagram Reels and TikTok.
Answered by Kanishka Narayan - Minister of State (Cabinet Office) (Jointly with the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Technology)
The Online Safety Act imposes a range of consistent duties on user-to-user service providers requiring them to proactively identify, mitigate and manage risks to users, and to be accountable for the safety of their platforms.
Service providers must proactively mitigate risk of use for illegal activity and must address illegal content when it appears. They must also prevent children from encountering the most harmful content and must implement age-appropriate measures to protect children from other kinds of harmful content.
Ofcom, the independent regulator, has powers to take robust enforcement action where service providers do not comply with Act duties.
Asked by: Samantha Niblett (Labour - South Derbyshire)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, whether her Department reviewed the Crown Commercial Service's approximately £9 billion Memorandum of Understanding with Microsoft, signed in November 2024, in light of the CMA's findings that Microsoft's software licensing practices reduce competition in UK cloud markets and impose additional costs on public sector organisations.
Answered by Ian Murray - Minister of State (Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport)
DSIT has not formally reviewed the SPA24 Memorandum of Understanding with Microsoft. This agreement does not represent a commitment to spend, but instead provides eligible public sector organisations with access to discounted pricing. Decisions on whether to purchase goods and services are made by individual organisations in line with procurement regulations.
The Government Commercial Agency (GCA), formerly Crown Commercial Service (CCS), manages SPA24 with Microsoft to ensure that it continues to deliver against its objectives.
Asked by: Samantha Niblett (Labour - South Derbyshire)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, what assessment her Department has made of the potential implications for its policies of the Competition and Markets Authority's decision of 31 March 2026 to launch a Strategic Market Status investigation into Microsoft's business software ecosystem; and what steps her Department is taking to help ensure that the investigation proceeds without delay from its scheduled commencement in May 2026.
Answered by Kanishka Narayan - Minister of State (Cabinet Office) (Jointly with the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Technology)
This Government is committed to promoting a competitive and innovative digital economy, which is why we prioritised the commencement of the CMA’s new powers in digital markets last year.
The CMA launched its Strategic Market Status designation investigation into Microsoft’s business software ecosystem on the 14 May 2026, this investigation must be completed within 9 months. An indicative timetable of this investigation is published on the CMA’s website. The CMA operates independently of Government, and decisions on which firms to investigate, and how these investigations are conducted rest solely with the CMA.
Asked by: Samantha Niblett (Labour - South Derbyshire)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, what assessment her Department has made of the potential implications for its policies of the CMA's finding, published 31 March 2026, that the rapid integration of artificial intelligence into Microsoft's business software ecosystem creates risks of distorting competition in a critical layer of UK digital infrastructure.
Answered by Kanishka Narayan - Minister of State (Cabinet Office) (Jointly with the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Technology)
The Government is committed to promoting a competitive and innovative digital economy, which is why we prioritised the commencement of the CMA’s new powers in digital markets last year.
The CMA operates independently of Government, and decisions on the scope of its investigations rest solely with the CMA.
The CMA launched its investigation into Microsoft’s business software ecosystem on 14 May 2026. The CMA has invited views on the details of this investigation until 4 June 2026. The proposed scope includes the integrated use of AI tools in business software to help ensure that UK businesses and public sector organisations can choose the tools that deliver the greatest productivity gains. The CMA will consider responses to its consultation and confirm its position in due course.
Asked by: Samantha Niblett (Labour - South Derbyshire)
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 concentration of ownership of UK mobile towers among wireless infrastructure providers; and what assessment she has made of the implications of this market structure for competition and mobile coverage.
Answered by Kanishka Narayan - Minister of State (Cabinet Office) (Jointly with the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Technology)
The Government continually monitors developments across the mobile market to understand how they may shape investment in comprehensive, high-quality mobile connectivity that is secure and affordable for consumers and business.
On 10 February, the Government published the Mobile Market Review call for evidence, inviting stakeholders to provide detailed evidence on the technological, structural and financial developments across the mobile ecosystem and how they impact investment, competition and consumer outcomes, and on what further actions the Government could take to support these objectives.
The call for evidence closes on 5 May. The Government encourages all relevant stakeholders to engage with the process and provide robust evidence to help inform future policy development.