Westminster Hall Presses Ministers on Homelessness, Tech and Inclusion

High-Level Summary

Westminster Hall held four debates covering: preventing rough sleeping among families with children; support for UK-based tech companies; how public bodies record Sikh and Jewish ethnicity; and provision of disability equipment. MPs pressed Ministers on enforcing councils’ legal duties and cross-government prevention, while the Minister restated that families must be accommodated and set targets to eliminate bed-and-breakfast use for families and to halve rough sleeping. Members urged tougher digital competition enforcement and stronger scale-up support for tech, while the Government highlighted existing CMA powers, an industrial strategy and targeted investments. On ethnicity data, MPs called for Sikh and Jewish categories in public datasets; Ministers pointed to an ongoing Office for National Statistics (ONS) review. On disability equipment, MPs cited long waits and a postcode lottery; Ministers set out frameworks, funding and agreed to examine better reuse and possible stronger oversight.

Detailed Summary

Rough sleeping: families with children

Paula Barker opened by citing an ITV report and Crisis data on 134 cases in six months of families with children or pregnant women seeking help after being turned away by councils, sometimes leading to rough sleeping. She noted the Minister had “already written to all the councils in the country to remind them of their clear duties”, welcomed the national plan, and pressed for accountability, cross‑department prevention (including the Home Office), higher social housebuilding and timelines for new toolkits and duties. Contributors highlighted drivers such as unaffordable rents, private rent‑benefit gaps and rural invisibility; one asked, “How can the Government achieve their plan to halve long-term rough sleeping”.

The Minister clarified statutory duties: households with children must be accommodated, and “There should never be any reason for families to be refused accommodation while there is a dispute about which authority owes that household a duty.” She set targets: “By the end of this Parliament, we want to eliminate the use of B&B accommodation for families, except in absolute, dire emergencies, and halve rough sleeping.” She cited funding “more than £3.6 billion… from 2026-27 to 2028-29”, reported improvements (secured accommodation for 6+ months up to 46%, and long‑stay B&B cases down 55% year on year), and said the interministerial group “will meet regularly.” She said the Government will expand pilots into “a programme backed by £30 million of funding” to tackle poor emergency accommodation practice and move quickly on toolkits. The motion was agreed to without division.

Government support for UK-based tech companies

Peter Fortune argued that Apple and Google “control 95% of all mobile operating systems in the UK… all the while taking up to 30% of every transaction”, restricting developers and raising consumer prices. He cited a UK tribunal ruling that Apple’s payment restrictions were “neither necessary nor proportionate”, and warned of cloud concentration, with Amazon Web Services and Microsoft holding 70%–90% market share. Backbenchers raised the scale‑up “valley of death”, slow public procurement, pension fund investment, regional clusters and climate‑tech opportunities.

The Minister emphasised the Competition and Markets Authority’s independence but said it “continues to monitor firm compliance. If Apple and Google fail to meet their commitments, the CMA will consider the use of statutory powers”. He set out a plan to make the UK a “top three” place to scale tech by 2035, including raising public R&D to £22.6 billion by 2029‑30, expanding the British Business Bank and skills/talent schemes, and a £100 million advance market commitment for novel semiconductors. The motion was agreed to without division.

Public body data collection: Sikh and Jewish ethnicity

Preet Kaur Gill argued that although “Sikhs and Jews have been recognised in law as both ethnic and religious groups”, many public bodies still do not collect ethnicity data on them, undermining service design, targeted health interventions and hate‑crime monitoring. She noted that “Home Office data shows a 20% increase in crimes specifically targeting Sikhs” and that in the 2021 Census “nearly 100,000 Sikhs and 65,000 Jews ticked ‘other’ and wrote in their ethnicity”. She urged inclusion of Sikh and Jewish tick‑boxes in the Government Statistical Service (GSS) harmonised ethnicity standard used by public bodies.

The Minister said the GSS review is ongoing and impartial, confirming “the option to add tick boxes for Sikhs and Jews as ethnic groups is an open question”. She explained that while the Equality Act recognises Sikh and Jewish identities as ethnic as well as religious, it “does not legally mandate the inclusion of a tick-box option for data collection purposes” and that “Tick-box response options… simply cannot include all the ethnic groups”. She undertook to look into hate‑crime recording issues with the Home Office. Consultation submissions will be published in April and findings in the autumn. The motion was agreed to.

Provision of disability equipment

Seamus Logan presented evidence of long waits, inconsistency and discharge delays, calling for a national strategy. He reported that “64% of respondents revealed that waiting times for disability equipment were longer than expected” and that “74% of equipment providers were aware of patients experiencing delayed hospital discharge due to unavailable community equipment”. Members described a “postcode lottery”, significant wheelchair waits—“70% of wheelchair users wait more than three months”—problems reusing equipment when providers collapse, and Access to Work case backlogs.

The Minister acknowledged unacceptable waits and outlined measures within current responsibilities: a planning framework requiring ICBs and community services “to actively manage and reduce waits above 18 weeks and to develop a plan to eliminate all 52-week waits”; NHS England’s wheelchair quality framework and personal wheelchair budgets; £723 million for the Disabled Facilities Grant in 2026‑27; and Better Care Fund plans under which “ICBs and local authorities plan to spend £440 million on assistive technology and equipment” this year. He agreed to examine better reuse—seeking “to marry the demand and the supply together”—and said that, through NHS reforms and a new national quality board, he would consider “how we define ‘quality’ for disabled people” and write to MPs with specifics. The motion was agreed to.