Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lord Austin of Dudley and Lord Vaizey of Didcot

Thursday 20th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Vaizey]

As I said earlier, we hope to set up a second round of pilots for broadband roll-out, for which we have set aside £50 million, but obviously that process is being run by Broadband Delivery UK, and it would be wrong for Ministers to favour one area above another.

[Ian Austin (Dudley North) (Lab)]

We would obviously like to associate ourselves with the Minister’s congratulations earlier to the England cricket team. However, he also claimed that funding for grass-roots sport will be higher at the end of the Parliament than it was at the beginning. How can that be the case, when local teams and clubs up and down the country are on the front line of cuts and facing higher fees and charges to hire pitches, sports halls and pools, and when local sports co-ordinators and county sports partnerships are sacking staff, all as a result of the cuts to local government spending imposed by his Government? What assessment has he made of the impact that local government finance will have on grass-roots sport, and what discussions has he had with his colleagues at the Department for Communities and Local Government?