Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, whether she has had discussions with the Secretary of State for Education on the potential merits of supporting schools with transport costs to theatre productions.

The Secretary of State has regular conversations with the Secretary of State for Education on a number of issues, including on improving access to the arts for school pupils.

In March 2022, the Department for Education updated its pupil premium guidance and recovery premium guidance to make it clear that schools may use these funding streams to fund extracurricular activities, including school trips. Many theatres also offer subsidised travel in a bespoke or targeted manner through their work with community groups and targeted to specific groups. For example, the Lyric Hammersmith regularly offers to fund the cost of transport to enable local schools to visit, and its ‘free panto tickets’ for schools programme has been successfully running for many years.

The Department for Culture, Media and Sport is also working with the Department for Education to publish a Cultural Education Plan, as committed to in the Schools White Paper. This aims to improve access to cultural education for all children and young people in England. The development of the plan is supported by an expert advisory panel, chaired by Baroness Bull, which includes advising on routes to tackle disparities in opportunity and outcomes in cultural education.