Complacent reply from Government after being challenged over why they have deleted the requirement for a timetable to be set for the removal of Chinese-made security cameras with potential links to slave labour and with implications for national security.

Mar 9, 2023 | News

Baroness Neville-Rolfe, the Cabinet Office, has provided the following answer to your written parliamentary question (HL5881):

Question by Lord ALTON of Liverpool
To ask His Majesty’s Government why they proposed an amendment to the Procurement Bill to delete the requirement for a timetable to be set for the removal of Chinese-made security cameras with potential links to slave labour and with implications for national security. (HL5881) 

Tabled on: 27 February 2023

Answer:
Baroness Neville-Rolfe

The Procurement Bill contains a robust and comprehensive framework of exclusion grounds, including new grounds on both modern slavery and national security, together with groundbreaking provisions for a centralised debarment list. This is sufficient to ensure that suppliers and subcontractors which are involved in forced labour, or which pose an unacceptable security risk, are prevented from competing for public contracts.

Separately, following a review of security risks, the Government has instructed departments to cease deployment of surveillance equipment on sensitive sites, where it is produced by companies that are subject to the National Intelligence Law of the People’s Republic of China. Implementation of this instruction is already underway.

We will continue to keep the situation under review, and are ready to take further steps if necessary.

Date and time of answer: 09 Mar 2023 at 12:32.

Lord David Alton

For 18 years David Alton was a Member of the House of Commons and today he is an Independent Crossbench Life Peer in the UK House of Lords.

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