Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent steps her Department has taken to help reduce online fraud.
Answered by Tom Tugendhat - Minister of State (Home Office) (Security)
In May, the government published a new strategy to address the threat of fraud. One of the three pillars included in the strategy focuses on blocking fraud at source, which includes actions to prevent online fraud.
The Online Safety Bill will tackle online harms, including fraud and fraudulent advertising. This means that social media and search engine companies will have to take robust, proactive action to ensure that their users are not exposed to these crimes in the first place.
We are also working with the large tech companies to agree an online fraud charter, which will include actions to help tackle online fraud.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether their Department has a Chief Risk Officer for national security risks.
Answered by Tom Tugendhat - Minister of State (Home Office) (Security)
The Home Office takes national security risks extremely seriously. Our approach ensures named individuals are accountable for specific risks, with cross cutting items owned at board level by the Home Office Executive Committee. For example, the aim of the UK’s counter-terrorism strategy (CONTEST) is to reduce the risk from terrorism to the UK.
The Director General for Homeland Security is senior responsible officer for CONTEST. In addition, all Home Office risks are identified and managed using principles set by the Director General for Corporate and Delivery.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many people in the UK are reported as missing as of September 2023.
Answered by Sarah Dines
The Home Office does not hold this data centrally. Information about current missing persons incidents is held by individual police forces. The National Crime Agency’s UK Missing Persons Unit holds the national database for all missing incidents that are unresolved after 72hours, allowing the police to have access to missing persons information across force boundaries. In addition, annual missing persons statistics, broken down to police force level, are published by the National Crime Agency’s Missing Person’s Unit in its annual data report which can be found here: Downloads | UK Missing Persons Unit
We are working with the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) to deliver a National Register of Missing Persons (NRMP) which will enable us to have a snapshot of live missing incidents across police forces in England and Wales. This will assist officers when they encounter a missing person particularly if that missing person is outside their home force area.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps she plans to take to tackle illegal online advertisement of knives intended to encourage (a) combat and (b) violent behaviour.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
Under measures in the Knives Act 1997 it is an offence to market a knife in a way which indicates, or suggests, that it is suitable for combat, or is otherwise likely to encourage violent behaviour involving the use of the knife as a weapon. A person found guilty of this offence on indictment can face up to 2 years imprisonment or a fine or both.
We are also introducing the Online Safety Bill which is currently in its final stages in Parliament. The legislation will achieve Royal Assent this Autumn and Ofcom’s powers will commence shortly after.
For the first time in the UK, tech companies are going to be accountable to an independent regulator to keep their users, particularly children, safe. They will need to remove and limit the spread of illegal content. This means less illegal content online and when it does appear it will be removed quicker.
Schedule 7 of the Bill sets out a series of priority offences which includes the sale of weapons online, including sales from online marketplaces. Companies will need to take particularly robust action to prevent the proliferation of this content online and ensure that their services are not used for offending. This means companies will need to proactively mitigate the risk that their services are used for illegal activity including removing any content that does appear as soon as they are made aware of it.
In addition, as part of DCMS' Online Advertising Programme, the government will introduce a new and targeted regulatory framework for paid-for online advertising, which will focus on tackling illegal advertising and increasing the protection of children and young people from adverts for products and services that are illegal to sell.
DCMS will be issuing a consultation on the details of the proposed regulation in due course and have convened a ministerially-led industry taskforce to drive forward non-legislative action meanwhile.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether she plans to take steps to prevent the appearance of pop-up knife advertisements on social media.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
Under measures in the Knives Act 1997 it is an offence to market a knife in a way which indicates, or suggests, that it is suitable for combat, or is otherwise likely to encourage violent behaviour involving the use of the knife as a weapon. A person found guilty of this offence on indictment can face up to 2 years imprisonment or a fine or both.
We are also introducing the Online Safety Bill which is currently in its final stages in Parliament. The legislation will achieve Royal Assent this Autumn and Ofcom’s powers will commence shortly after.
For the first time in the UK, tech companies are going to be accountable to an independent regulator to keep their users, particularly children, safe. They will need to remove and limit the spread of illegal content. This means less illegal content online and when it does appear it will be removed quicker.
Schedule 7 of the Bill sets out a series of priority offences which includes the sale of weapons online, including sales from online marketplaces. Companies will need to take particularly robust action to prevent the proliferation of this content online and ensure that their services are not used for offending. This means companies will need to proactively mitigate the risk that their services are used for illegal activity including removing any content that does appear as soon as they are made aware of it.
In addition, as part of DCMS' Online Advertising Programme, the government will introduce a new and targeted regulatory framework for paid-for online advertising, which will focus on tackling illegal advertising and increasing the protection of children and young people from adverts for products and services that are illegal to sell.
DCMS will be issuing a consultation on the details of the proposed regulation in due course and have convened a ministerially-led industry taskforce to drive forward non-legislative action meanwhile.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to the Answer of 10 July 2023 to Question 193669 on Offenders: Deportation, what information her Department holds on the number of applications for the Facilitated Return Scheme (a) that were considered and (b) for which a decision was taken by her Department within 20 days of submission of that application in each of the last five years.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
Information on the number of applications for the Facilitated Return Scheme that are (a) considered and (b) decided within 20 days is not available from published statistics.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to the Answer of 17 July 2023 to Question 193678, what advice her Department provides to students living in the UK on a student visa and who need to apply for a new student visa without departing the UK because the award for their current course has been deferred as a result of the University and College Union marking and assessment boycott.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
Students and sponsors should refer to paragraph 5.32 onwards of the sponsorship duties guidance. Where a formal award has not yet been issued, a student on a course at degree level or above at a sponsor which is a Higher Education Provider with a track record of compliance, can request formal written confirmation from their sponsor stating that they are highly likely to complete their course successfully.
The Department for Education will continue to engage with the HE sector over the coming weeks to help better understand the boycott’s impact on students and the mitigating actions HE institutions are taking to protect their students’ interests.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to the Intelligence and Security Committee Report on China, HC 1605, published 13 July 2023, what information her Department holds on (a) the number of coerced repatriations made by foreign states of their nationals from the UK in each of the last three years and (b) which states are known to have conducted repatriations of UK residents through coerced means.
Answered by Tom Tugendhat - Minister of State (Home Office) (Security)
We continually assess potential threats in the UK, and take protection of individuals’ rights, freedoms, and safety in the UK very seriously.
Whilst it is our long-standing policy not to provide detailed information on security and intelligence matters, where we identify individuals at heightened risk, we are front footed in deploying protective security guidance and other measures as appropriate.
Any threats made by a foreign state against individuals in the UK will be thoroughly investigated.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to the Answer of 10 July 2023 to Question 191940 on Offenders: Deportation, what proportion of applications for the Facilitated Return Scheme are (a) considered and (b) decided within 20 days.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
Information on the proportion of applications for the Facilitated Return Scheme that are (a) considered and (b) decided within 20 days is not available from published statistics.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether their Department has purchased products manufactured by (a) Hikvision and (b) Dahua in the last three years.
Answered by Tom Tugendhat - Minister of State (Home Office) (Security)
As has been the case under successive administrations, it is not government policy to comment on the government’s security arrangements. This includes any specific details regarding the make and model of security systems, which are withheld on national security grounds.
Each Department is responsible for their own procurement decisions.
However, I would refer the Hon. member to the Written Ministerial Statement made by the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster on 24 November 2022, which set out that Departments had been instructed to disconnect surveillance equipment from core departmental networks where it is subject to the National Intelligence Law of China.