Samantha Niblett

It is an honour to serve under your chairship, Ms Vaz. I am grateful to be able to contribute to this important debate on tech sovereignty in the UK. There is something rather poignant about having this debate on the very day the Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister has announced a consultation on plans to give people access to their Government data through a bespoke digital wallet built in-house. In many ways, that is the ultimate expression of tech sovereignty, but there is much more to do and we must do it now. For me, growing instability, geopolitically and globally, has shone a light on just how reliant we are on digital infrastructure—the systems that enable our communication, support our health service and help to keep our country safe. The Financial Times recently reported concerns about Iran targeting United States AI data centres, which is a way to undermine neighbouring economies and damage US interests. As AI becomes embedded across both the public and private sectors, we must recognise the risks posed by concentrated powers in the hands of a small number of overseas tech companies. At its most basic, sovereignty means the ability to make deliberate choices in our own interests, according to our shared values, so it is concerning that so many public sector contracts continue to go to overseas tech giants. In November ’22, Palantir was awarded a three-year Ministry of Defence contract worth £75.2 million, followed by, in December ’25, a further three-year contract worth £240.6 million, both without a formal competitive tender. I would love to see more of those major contracts going to home-grown innovators—companies based in the UK paying taxes here and helping to grow our economy. That is why I am really pleased to hear about the commitment to have a sovereign AI venture fund of £500 million to foster AI development. I would welcome seeing how much of that goes to female founders. The UK is by no means the little guy in this fight. Our start-up ecosystem is the third largest in the world. We have a real opportunity to grow. If we get this right, tech sovereignty can mean high-quality jobs across our regions, and it can ensure that we become the most trusted and safest country in the world for technology.