Universities: Sensitive Research

Viscount Stansgate Excerpts

Tuesday 30th April 2024 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Camrose (Con)]

The noble Baroness raises a very important point; it is not about naming one or more countries and targeting them. The non-legislative and legislative elements of the entire approach to this are about being actor agnostic, and simply looking at the cases as they arise.

[Viscount Stansgate (Lab)]

My Lords, further to the points made by my noble friend, the Government said they are taking a range of measures, but if you take an area like biosecurity, which I am sure the Minister will agree is a very significant potential future threat, with people perhaps developing pathogens, aided possibly by using AI technology to do them more easily and quickly, is there not a case for mandatory surveillance over, for example, access to materials, which would indicate where somebody might be trying to do something that has that dual purpose—in other words, something bad rather than something good? Does the Minister agree that a voluntary scheme, such as I understand exists at the moment, may not be enough?

[Viscount Camrose (Con)]

Indeed, and we must recognise that there are limits to a voluntary scheme, particularly where actors are genuinely malign. I reassure the noble Viscount that any research contracted for purposes of defence, or indeed for purposes that might be used for defence, would be subject to vetting in the usual way. Depending on the nature of the research, the greater the vetting.