Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment she has made of the effectiveness of the Foreign Influence Registration Scheme in regulating the activities of foreign actors seeking to advance political agendas in the UK.

The Foreign Influence Registration Scheme (FIRS) enhances transparency and early disruption by requiring individuals and organisations acting at the direction of specified foreign powers or foreign power controlled entities to register certain activities. It does not regulate the activity of foreign actors.

The Government will keep the effectiveness of the scheme under close review. We will be publishing an annual report setting out, among other things, the number of registrations across both tiers, number of information notices issued, the number of persons charged with an offence and the number of persons convicted of an offence. The first report will be published as soon as practicable after 30 June 2026.

A statutory review of the legislation will be undertaken after five years in the usual way, which will consider how the scheme has worked in practice and how far its objectives have been met.