Horseracing Industry

Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay Excerpts

Thursday 17th November 2022 Grand Committee

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay) (Con)]

I thank my noble friend Lord Risby for initiating this debate, and all noble Lords who have taken part in it. His support for the racing industry goes back a long way, including of course to another place, where he ably represented the people and businesses of West Suffolk, including Newmarket Racecourse and the many horseracing interests in that constituency. As he mentioned, he has been a member of the Horserace Betting Levy Board since 2016, and I am glad to have the opportunity shortly to say a bit more about his and their excellent work on behalf of racing. I also echo my noble friend Lady McIntosh’s tribute to the work of the late Rose Paterson, who is much missed in Parliament and the horseracing sector.

The Government acknowledge the significant contribution that racing makes to our economy: it supports jobs and livelihoods from Perth to Newton Abbot, and it is particularly important to rural economies, in the way that my noble friends set out. Over 20,000 people are directly employed across 59 licensed racecourses, hundreds of training yards and thousands of breeding operations. Tens of thousands more jobs are supported in the rural economy supply chain, including in the farriery and veterinary sectors, highlighted by the noble Lord, Lord Trees, as well as many jobs in the betting industry. Indeed, horseracing is the second-biggest sport in the United Kingdom in terms of attendance, employment and annual revenue. According to its governing body, the British Horseracing Authority, racing is worth over £4 billion to the economy in direct, indirect and associated expenditure every year.

How much it is valued by the public is shown by the numbers returning to our flagship meetings as Covid restrictions were lifted, with a record aggregate attendance at the Cheltenham Festival this year. I was on a very busy train to Gloucester on Friday, on my way to visit some of the new recipients of Arts Council funding, so I can attest to the liveliness of the November meeting there as well.

The Government introduced the horserace betting levy in the 1960s, when there were fears that no one would go to racecourses once betting shops were permitted to open. We have continued to ensure that the levy keeps pace as the betting industry evolves with the times. In 2017, we extended the levy to online bookmakers and fixed the rate at 10% of bookmakers’ gross profits on British racing so that it no longer has to be negotiated each year.

The 2017 reforms almost doubled the amount of levy collected, to £95 million in 2018, exceeding expectations, and it has continued to perform well. The levy returned £97 million to racing in 2019-20, against a forecast of £90 million. Even in 2020-21, when racing was suspended for two months and betting shops were closed for much longer, it returned £82 million. Last financial year, it returned £97 million. But we are not complacent. The British Horseracing Authority has presented its case that there is a significant gap in its funding, which means that it is unable to compete with jurisdictions such as the Republic of Ireland and France, as my noble friend outlined. We have considered that case very carefully as we prepare to conduct the next review of the levy, which is due in 2024. In particular, racing has asked for international races to be brought within the scope of the levy—noble Lords highlighted this in their remarks. Although funding systems vary between jurisdictions, it is fair to say that racing in those countries benefits from bets on overseas races in a way that racing in Britain does not, which is something that merits careful consideration.

The noble Lord, Lord Trees, asked about and highlighted the importance of funding equine health. The money that is raised is applied to the advancement of veterinary science and education, as set out in the legislation. Indeed, it is one of the three key areas funded.

A number of noble Lords touched on the Government’s review of the Gambling Act 2005. In addition to its case for additional funding, which I mentioned earlier, racing representatives have discussed with officials at DCMS their concerns about the impacts of proposals being explored through our review, including the potential for so-called affordability checks, the opposite case to which was made by the noble Lord, Lord Foster of Bath. We have heard his representations and their concerns, and I assure my noble friend Lady McIntosh that we have been gathering evidence to make sure that the review is evidence-based, and we will continue to engage with the sector when the White Paper is published in the coming weeks.

The noble Lord, Lord Foster of Bath, raised the use of drones to beat the broadcasting lag. We are aware of the industry’s concerns about this use of drones and will keep the issue under close scrutiny, working with it.

Any consideration of amendments to the rate of the levy needs to be in the context of all the proposals in the White Paper which affect bookmakers. However, the levy is not the only source of funding for racing. Indeed, it represented just 6% of racing’s total income in 2022, compared with 17% from racegoers, 11% from media rights deals and 4% from sponsorship. Owners and breeders contributed 40% and 22% respectively. So while we review whether the levy provides an adequate level of funding for the industry, it is only right that we expect racing and betting to explore jointly how they can maximise other sources of income. Both sectors have a clear interest in making racing as attractive as possible to customers, and I encourage racing to engage and work closely with betting partners in its thinking on the levy.

I pay tribute to my noble friend Lord Risby and his fellow members of the Horserace Betting Levy Board for their stewardship of levy funds. As the levy is a percentage of profits, it varies from year to year, depending, for example, on how bookmakers fare at key race meetings. The levy board has reserves to help mitigate this variation and it used these to great effect to support the industry during the Covid-19 pandemic, to mitigate the absence of, first, racing and, subsequently, spectators.

The levy board and the Racing Foundation put together a £28 million cash-flow and hardship support package. Some £20 million of levy funds were aimed at supporting racecourses, with £8 million from the foundation going to supporting individuals in the sector. Since then, the levy board has made additional contributions to prize money to mitigate lower amounts made available by racecourses because of Covid.

The Government too provided support, with racing benefiting from our economy-wide support for jobs and rates relief. Racecourses have also been able to access support through the sport survival package, through which a £21.5 million loan has been made to the levy board to enable it to provide extra support. The levy board distributed £15 million of this via prize money in 2021 and £6.5 million in 2022.

The Government remain committed to supporting British horseracing and related businesses, which are vital to the lifeblood of the rural economy, as well as a source of great pleasure to many people. I thank my noble friend for initiating this debate and giving us this opportunity, and for the work he does on behalf of all those who have the interests of racing at heart. I look forward to debating these issues further in future.

Committee adjourned at 4.51 pm.

Music Education

Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay Excerpts

Wednesday 9th November 2022 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay) (Con)]

My Lords, this has been an excellent debate, as I knew it would be. Although this is a plan that focuses on provision of music education in England, it has been a pleasure to hear two Front-Bench speeches from former arts teachers in Wales, who brought their particular passion and experience to it, along with all the valuable insights and excellent points raised by noble Lords today.

I pay particular tribute to my noble friend Lady Fleet, who is a committed and passionate champion of music. Twice now, I have had the pleasure of seeing with her the talented scholars of the London Music Fund, of which she should be extremely proud. She was absolutely right in her opening remarks about the potential for music to change lives. She has brought that commitment and passion to her chairing of the expert advisory panel for the national plan for music education, and brought it again to today’s debate in the excellent way she opened it. We are all very grateful to her for that. Her work, and the work of the other excellent members of the panel, led to the publication of the refreshed plan, with its powerful and well-chosen title, The Power of Music to Change Lives, in June. As was the case with the first music plan, this is a joint plan between my department and the Department for Education. I echo the tributes paid to my noble friend Lady Barran and would also like to pass my thanks on to Robin Walker, with whom I jointly wrote the foreword to the plan.

The panel members gave many hours of their time to provide valuable insight and challenge, without which the plan would not be as ambitious or as reflective as it is of the voices of educators, young people and musicians. I am extremely grateful to everyone who took part in the panel and informed its work. Studying and engaging with music is not a privilege: it is a vital part of a broad and ambitious curriculum. All pupils should have access to an excellent music education and all the joy it brings. That is why music is part of the national curriculum in all maintained schools for pupils from the age of five to 14, and why the Government also expect academies to teach music as part of their statutory requirement to develop pupils’ cultural development.

A number of noble Lords touched on the English baccalaureate, which was designed to be limited in size to allow for the study of other subjects. I stress that the Government believe that it should be studied as part of a broad and balanced curriculum, and that every child should experience a high-quality arts and cultural education throughout their time at school. The best schools in the country combine high-quality cultural education with excellence in core subjects and we are committed to ensuring that students have access to both. We therefore continue to direct funding towards ensuring that a rich diet of arts, sport and music remains available to all pupils.

The refreshed plan reflects the vision of the original, published in 2011, in wanting

“all children and young people to learn to sing, play an instrument and create music together, and have the opportunity to progress their musical interests and talents, including professionally.”

It sets out clear actions to improve music education between now and 2030, as part of the Government’s long-term vision for schools, as set out in the schools White Paper published in March.

My noble friend Lord Black of Brentwood and others asked why the plan is not statutory. It is important that schools have the autonomy to tailor their curriculum to meet the needs of their pupils. We have, however, clearly set out what effective practice looks like to inspire schools to ensure a focus on quality as well as quantity. An important aspect of the plan is the wide range of case studies it covers, showing examples of schools of all types and how they have developed a rich musical offering.

The model music curriculum published by the Department for Education in 2021, again with the assistance of my noble friend Lady Fleet, is designed to assist rather than prescribe, providing a benchmark to help teachers, school leaders and people designing curricula to make sure that every music lesson is of the highest quality. I can reassure the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley of Knighton, that composition is a key aspect of this. The noble Lord, Lord Aberdare, asked about the role of Ofsted: in July last year, Ofsted published a research review on music, summarising key lessons on effective music curriculum design and delivery. Ofsted also plans to publish a subject report on music next year, which will report on the quality of the music curriculum in schools.

Funding is a core aspect that was touched on in a number of noble Lords’ contributions. As part of the refreshed plan, the Government will continue to invest £79 million per annum in our national network of music hubs, which have a key role in supporting schools to provide high-quality music provision. We recognise the vital importance of every child being able to access the instruments and equipment that they need to advance, including technology and adaptive instruments, which is why the Government announced £25 million of new funding for musical instruments alongside the plan. I was asked about the timings of, and next steps for, that £25 million of new funding. Arts Council England is currently working with a range of relevant parties to help identify the needs of children and young people, including the extent to which schools are making use of music technology and instruments for pupils with special educational needs. We will set out more details once they have completed that work and brought the insights forward.

Officials in both departments are also working with the sector on how instruments are maintained and supported, so I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, for his suggestion of an instrument amnesty. We will take that forward and look into what can be done, with or without the help which was offered today by my noble friend Lord Lingfield and other noble Lords.

The Government have invested over £714 million between 2016 and the last financial year in a diverse portfolio of music and arts education programmes to ensure that all children, whatever their background, have access to a high-quality music and arts education. This includes music hubs, which provide specialist music education services to around 90% of state-funded schools, and over £30 million a year through the Music and Dance Scheme, which my noble friend Lady Fleet mentioned and which provides means-tested bursaries to over 2,000 young people showing the greatest potential in these art forms.

I am afraid that I must tell my noble friend Lord Black of Brentwood that the DfE grant to hubs and the capital funding will not be index-linked. However, the grant makes up 40% of the total funding for music hubs nationally, with 60% coming from other income sources, including fundraising, and with many hubs raising more than this. This is why one of the pillars for hubs in future will be on sustainability.

The expectations set out in the plan, starting from early years, are unashamedly ambitious and informed by the excellent practice that we see demonstrated by many brilliant schools across the country, by music hubs and by music charities. We want to see all schools provide timetabled curriculum music of at least one hour a week of the school year for key stages 1 to 3, as well as co-curricular opportunities to learn instruments and singing and to play and sing together in ensembles and choirs. Music should be represented in every school’s leadership structure at primary and secondary phases, with a designated music lead or head of department at school and/or academy trust level.

In partnership with their music hub, every school, including academies, should have a music development plan setting out how it will be staffed and funded. The refreshed plan reaffirms the Government’s commitment to music hubs and sets out our approach for their next phase. In future, music hubs will develop plans for five functions, covering partnership, support for schools, progression and musical development, inclusion and sustainability. The music hub programme will also be opened up to competition. Specifically, Arts Council England will be inviting applications for the role of music hub lead organisation, with details to be published in due course. Together, these reforms should lead to concrete action, as has been urged by noble Lords, to ensure that every school and academy trust can take to improve their music education provision through partnership and collaboration with their hub partners.

On the questions about accountability raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Bull, and other noble Lords, schools are accountable for teaching a broad and balanced curriculum, and Ofsted will, as a matter of course, undertake deep dives on specific subjects when carrying out their inspections, including in relation to music teaching.

The noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, and my noble friend Lord Lingfield highlighted the importance of partnerships. Hubs will need to take a leading role in building a sustainable and local infrastructure for high-quality music education and music making. That would include the community-based organisations working with aspiring young musicians and other regional or national youth music organisations, as well as the music industry. It can certainly include independent schools or cadet organisations with high-quality music provision.

Being part of a strong multi-academy trust can benefit a school’s music provision, and we expect more academy trusts to take a leading role in arts education across their schools. The opportunity to share resources and expertise, under the strategic direction of trust-level leaders for music, can broaden opportunities for pupils and strengthen the quality of teaching. Ark Schools, for example, pools its resources to provide great music education across its schools. Ark includes 39 schools in London, Birmingham, Portsmouth and Hastings. There is a choir in each of them, and over 1,000 children a year aged between nine and 18 are currently in after-school clubs. At the time of the case study mentioned in the plan, the take-up of GCSE music at Ark had increased by 80%, and students who want to enter the music industry are provided with mentoring and advice from Ark’s network of 100 professional artists.

Underpinning the entire plan is our expectation that music education should be fully inclusive, including for pupils with special educational needs or disabilities, in both mainstream and special schools. To help make this a reality, we have set out some new initiatives, including that all music hubs will be expected to develop and publish an inclusion strategy and that all music hub lead organisations should have an inclusion lead by 2024.

I take a moment to highlight the fantastic work of another school featured in the plan’s case studies, the Barbara Priestman Academy, which is a specialist school on the outskirts of Sunderland for students aged 11 to 19 with autistic spectrum disorder or complex learning difficulties. At key stage 3, all pupils there receive weekly music lessons where they perform, compose and improvise. Students are given the opportunity to develop their musical skills and work towards qualifications at key stages 4 and 5, with performance at its heart.

We know that, while the potential of pupils is equally spread throughout the country, opportunity is not. The noble Baroness, Lady Wilcox, gave us the striking example of one of her former pupils. That is why, as part of the Government’s commitment to levelling up, we will pilot a music progression fund to support pupils, mainly in education investment areas, with significant musical potential, enthusiasm and commitment. On the timing of the progression fund, about which I was asked, we intend it to start from next autumn and run over four years, testing a range of interventions to support disadvantaged pupils.

The noble Lord, Lord German, highlighted the example of Coventry, as first mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Aberdare. I should also mention that, as part of our work to extend opportunity, the landmark City of Culture initiative that DCMS supports saw Coventry have a very successful year as City of Culture, which culminated just a few months ago. As part of that, I was pleased to hear a new composition by Nitin Sawhney at Coventry Cathedral, in the company of the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Coventry. Other initiatives included the CVX Festival, which trained schoolchildren and school leavers from across the city in event management—another key part of supporting them and encouraging them to forge careers in other parts of the creative industries.

The noble Lord, Lord Wallace, the noble Earl, Lord Clancarty, and others focused on support for disadvantaged young people. The music progression fund will involve testing a range of interventions to support disadvantaged pupils. Eligible pupils will receive small group or individual support over a sustained period to learn instruments or how to sing to a high standard. Our aim is to reach 1,000 disadvantaged pupils in four to six music hub areas, mainly from education investment areas, as I say. The lessons from that pilot will help hubs embed best practice across the country.

Professional development was raised by a number of noble Lords. The quality of teaching remains the single most important factor in improving outcomes for children, particularly those from disadvantaged backgrounds. That is why the Government will be providing additional funding for and placing a stronger emphasis on teacher development as part of the music hub programme in the future, including peer-to-peer support through new lead schools in every hub. We will also establish four national music hub centres of excellence for inclusion, continuing professional development, music technology and pathways to industry. We plan to appoint all the centres by autumn 2024.

My noble friend Lady Fleet asked what plans there were to scale up and train more specialist music teachers. I shall go into a little more detail there, as she pressed me on that particularly. The initial teacher training core content framework, published in 2019, defines in detail the minimum entitlement of all trainee teachers. Drawing on the best available evidence, it sets out the content that training providers and their partnerships should draw on. The core content framework aligns with the early career framework to establish an entitlement to a three-year or longer structured package of support for all new teachers at the start of their careers. It remains for individual providers to design curricula appropriate for the subject, phase and age range of the course. Once a teacher is qualified and working in schools, music hubs have a vital role to drive specialist music education continuing professional development, or CPD, as it is often called. In addition to a centre for excellence focused on CPD from autumn 2024, hubs will also work with lead schools to develop an effective CPD offer for all schools in the hub area, and a rich peer-to-peer support programme.

The noble Baroness, Lady Bull, was right to highlight the importance of careers advice. I am pleased to say that the DCMS has recently relaunched the creative careers programme, with nearly £1 million in funding. That follows the successful pilot in 2018-20, which saw seed funding from the Government, and £8.5 million of in-kind and cash contributions from the industry, which delivered over 92,000 student interactions with industry—an important way to ensure that pupils in school know about the opportunities available to them in our thriving and expanding creative industries.

The noble Lord, Lord Berkeley of Knighton, the noble Earl, Lord Clancarty, and others took the opportunity to extemporise a bit and ask about arts funding. I am happy to say a bit about that, although it is slightly off the topic of today’s debate, if connected to it—because this is an important issue following Arts Council England’s announcement of funding on Friday. It was in response to a request from the Government to ensure that taxpayer subsidy for arts and culture is spread fairly around the country. In the previous round, it amounted to £21 per capita in London and just £6 per capita outside London. London is our nation’s capital and includes many excellent world-class institutions, which we all want to see continuing to thrive, but that discrepancy is very striking.

Taxpayer subsidy comes from taxpayers across the country as part of inspiring people to seize opportunities everywhere in the country. We want to make sure that they have access to world-class arts and culture on their doorstep. As a result of that, and the larger pot of funding secured at the last spending review, Arts Council England has announced its largest ever national portfolio, with nearly 1,000 national portfolio organisations, including 276 new ones. I am pleased to see also an increase in the number of supported music organisations to the tune of 38, which includes support for music organisations such as the National Children’s Orchestras, based in Bristol, which delivers a national programme of orchestral training for young people. The music portfolio is now broader in its subdisciplines.

The noble Lord, Lord Aberdare, mentioned the Aurora Orchestra, whose funding has been increased by more than 50%. Opera still accounts for 40% of the overall investment in music, with uplifts for the English Touring Opera and the Birmingham Opera Company, as well as new joiners to the portfolio, OperaUpClose and the Pegasus Opera companies. The focus of Arts Council England, which has taken those decisions independently of government, as it rightly should, is on developing audiences around the country and developing new talent, including in these vital musical art forms.

Noble Lords also took the opportunity to ask about touring. When I was previously in this role, one of the last debates I responded to was the noble Earl’s debate on the importance of touring, where I acknowledged the remarks made by my noble friend Lord Frost about the negotiations. I do not want to foreshorten my time back in the role by extemporising too much about the Prime Minister’s views, but if the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley of Knighton, would be willing to share with the Prime Minister the correspondence that he mentioned, perhaps I can take that forward on his behalf. As noble Lords will have heard me say before, we are committed to supporting touring artists and musicians to adapt to the new requirements for touring. In many areas, the arrangements are much more workable than has at times been reported. I am happy to repeat my commitment to take that forward and ensure they are given the support they deserve.

In conclusion, children across the country should be grateful to my noble friend Lady Fleet not just for her work in shaping this plan, and its original version a decade ago, but for her vigilance and commitment to ensuring that it is actually put into practice. There is a lot to do to make sure that our refreshed vision for music education becomes a reality, which is why we will be setting up a monitoring board to help us continue to drive forward those commitments. I know that my noble friend will continue to hold our feet to the fire, as well she should, but we are very proud of the way that the plan brings together the voices of all the individuals and organisations who helped to shape it: the teachers, head teachers, young people, parents and guardians, peripatetic teachers, hub leaders, youth music organisations, musicians and representatives of our thriving music industry. I am grateful for the contributions from noble Lords today, which have added to it, and look forward to their continued scrutiny on putting this plan into practice.

Online Safety Bill

Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay Excerpts

Monday 7th November 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Kidron (CB)]

My Lords, in begging leave to ask the Question of which I have given private notice, I declare my interests, particularly as founder and chair of 5Rights Foundation.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay) (Con)]

My Lords, the arrangement of parliamentary business is, as the noble Baroness will appreciate, a matter for business managers through the usual channels. However, the Bill remains a priority. The Secretary of State committed on 20 October to bringing it back to Parliament shortly. We will continue to work with noble Lords, Members in another place and others on the passage of this important legislation.

[Baroness Kidron (CB)]

I thank the Minister for that reply and am happy to see him back in his place. However, after four years of waiting, I am afraid his Answer was not quite good enough.

Coroner Walker’s landmark judgment that Molly Russell died after suffering negative effects of online content, and his Prevention of Future Deaths Report, deserve to be met with action. That action should be finally bringing forward the Online Safety Bill. Molly Russell died five years ago, the same five years in which we have been working on the Online Safety Bill, in the absence of which children suffer an aggressive bombardment of material that valorises self-harm, body dysmorphia, violent porn and, of course, suicide— real harms to real children. Does the Minister agree that it is time to stop this suffering and commit to bringing the Bill to this House before the end of this month, which is the date by which we have been told we need it to ensure correct scrutiny and its passage in this Session?

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My Lords, this important legislation has indeed been a long time coming. I was a special adviser in the Home Office when it was first proposed and was in Downing Street when it was first put in the Conservative manifesto in 2017. Like the noble Baroness, I am very keen to see it in your Lordships’ House so that it can be properly scrutinised, so that we can deliver the protections that we all want to see for children and vulnerable people. The noble Baroness is tireless in her defence of these people. She served excellently on the Joint Committee, which has already looked at the Bill. Like her, I am very keen to get it before your Lordships’ House so that we can continue.

[Lord Vaizey of Didcot (Con)]

My Lords, I register an interest as an adviser to Common Sense Media. I am delighted to see my noble friend the Minister in his place, although I am sad to see that his predecessor has lost his place. Anyway, he is in and he is out.

I regard the Online Safety Bill as the end of the beginning, not the beginning of the end. Mindful that the excellent chair of Ofcom is in the Chamber, I say this: is it not time to get on, expedite the Bill and allow Ofcom, finally, to start to regulate these platforms and social media sites? We have seen Elon Musk taking over Twitter—we need some action now. The Bill is effectively being scrutinised in the other place, and it is ready to come here. Let us get on with it.

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My noble friend is right to point to the noble Lord, Lord Grade of Yarmouth, as one of many voices in your Lordships’ House who will help us in the important scrutiny of this Bill. We are very keen for that to take place. Of course, the other place has to finish its scrutiny before this happens. Once it has done that, we can debate it here.

[Lord Knight of Weymouth (Lab)]

My Lords, business managers will be listening. I hope they will make sure that we are given sufficient time in this House to give proper scrutiny to a highly complex Bill.

If part of the compromises that may have been made in the department are to remove aspects of the Bill, particularly around “legal but harmful”, could the Minister also consider—and have conversations across government—about finding time in a subsequent legislative Session for us to finish the job if the Bill that he brings to this House does not do a proper job?

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

Regarding future legislative Sessions, I will restrict myself to the debate on the current one. The noble Lord is right: the business managers will have heard how anxious your Lordships’ House is to see the Bill and begin its scrutiny. The decision will be communicated in the usual way.

[Baroness Boycott (CB)]

My Lords, can the Minister assure the House that he, the Minister here and the Minister in the other place, will take advice from all the NGOs and other expert groups that have been working on this crucial issue for so long?

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

I absolutely can. Ministers have had meetings with such groups and officials have continued to have those meetings, even with the change of Ministers in recent weeks. These have informed the scrutiny and improvement of the Bill to date.

[Lord McNally (LD)]

My Lords, when I sat on the Puttnam commission 20 years ago, there was some excuse for not taking action for the real harms being caused on the internet. There is no such excuse now, as has been indicated. This House and the other place have been working on this for five years. The regulators are very well tooled up and ready to move. It is inexcusable, and there will be no excuse for leaving things undone due to backroom deals at the last minute. I do not doubt the Minister’s integrity on this but there must be no deals by No. 10 to weaken the Bill at this point; there is too much at stake. I do not think the Government will be forgiven if they renege on past promises to deliver a Bill worthy of the challenges that we are facing.

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

The noble Lord is quite right. Members of your Lordships’ House and another place will be vigilant. The Bill is being laid before Parliament so that noble Lords and Members in another place can see what is being proposed and inform the debate on it.

[Lord Cormack (Con)]

My Lords, does my noble friend agree that the tragic inquest on Molly Russell illustrated that the greatest crime of the 21st century has been the progressive destruction of childhood innocence? Will he therefore talk to business managers to ensure that a carry-over into the next Session happens if it is necessary? As the noble Lord, Lord Knight, said, we must get the Bill on to the statute book after thorough scrutiny in your Lordships’ House.

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

The inquest into the heartbreaking death of Molly Russell highlights the importance of holding technology companies to account to keep their users, particularly children, safe online. That is why we are bringing forward the Online Safety Bill, why the strongest protections in the Bill are for children and why I look forward to debating it in your Lordships’ House.

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

My Lords, I welcome the Minister back to the Front Bench. His former boss, Theresa May, launched the online harms agenda, which we on these Benches supported. Yet, three Prime Ministers later, we are still waiting for this crucial legislation to reach your Lordships’ House. Other noble Lords have noted that the Bill must be completed in this Session, as it has already been carried over. If repeated delays mean that the Bill’s passage conflicts with plans for winding up this Session, will the Government extend the Session to get the protections on to the statute book or simply drop the Bill?

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

I thank the noble Baroness for her words of welcome. She will appreciate that her final point is one for business managers rather than for me but I reiterate, having been there at the genesis of the discussions that led to the Bill, that I am very keen to see it in your Lordships’ House and to give it that thorough scrutiny. It has already been well improved because of the work of the Joint Committee of both Houses, but it needs to come to your Lordships’ House so that we can scrutinise it properly.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, the original aim of the Bill was to tackle harm to children, which we can all agree on, but it has expanded enormously and some say represents a real threat to freedom of speech for adults. Will the Minister ensure that he not only sees stakeholders working with those interested in online safety for children but meets free speech organisations and civil liberty campaigners to ensure the Bill does not become a legislative piece of censorship?

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

The Bill contains strong safeguards for freedom of expression. No platforms will be required to remove legal content and all services will need to have regard to freedom of expression when implementing their safety duties. Of course, although Ministers have met such groups throughout the passage of the Bill so far, I would be very happy to continue to do so to ensure that aspect of the Bill gets proper scrutiny too.

[Lord Davies of Brixton (Lab)]

My Lords, as the noble Baroness mentioned, the Bill has been extended. One of the extensions was to financial harm caused online. Will the Government assure us that they remain committed to including strong measures on financial harm? This can hurt people as much as the other forms of harm that we find online.

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

The context shows the importance of preventing financial harm to people, particularly in the current economic climate. When the Bill comes forward from another place, it will be open to scrutiny by noble Lords on this aspect and many others.

[Lord Harris of Haringey (Lab)]

My Lords, the Minister obviously has a very difficult brief to bring before your Lordships’ House. He has barely opened his folder of notes during the course of this Question because all he is able to say is that it is a matter for the business managers, but is it not the case that this is a Bill about which there has been extensive consultation? There is very broad consensus. The only thing now holding it up is an internal row within the Conservative Party. It is not a question of waiting for the business managers. Could he tell his colleagues in the Conservative Party to stop arguing and enable the Bill to be brought forward?

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

The Bill is being scrutinised in another place by Members of Parliament from all parties. It is important that they complete that work before it comes to your Lordships’ House, but it has benefited from pre-legislative scrutiny by the Joint Committee, which again drew on people from all parties and none. I am keen to see that scrutiny continue in your Lordships’ House.

[Lord Pannick (CB)]

Could the noble Lord suggest to business managers that if further time is required for the Bill and is not otherwise available, it would be available if the Government were to abandon the ridiculous plans to bring back the Bill of Rights Bill, which the Lord Chancellor appears keen on?

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

I will pass the noble Lord’s message on to business managers, but he will understand that it is not for me to respond.

[The Lord Bishop of Durham]

My Lords, this seems a classic example of the people we want to protect not getting a voice. Five years’ worth of children have been damaged because of the lack of this. Please can we and the business managers put the children first?

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

Your Lordships’ House gives voice to those voiceless victims through the right reverend Prelate and, not least, the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, who has rightly asked this Question today. I am keen for all those voices to be joined in the debate on the Bill as soon as possible.

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston (Con)]

To go back to one of the earlier questions about financial harms, does my noble friend agree that one of the problems facing the Bill is the way in which things keep getting added to it? Once the Bill arrives in your Lordships’ House—the sooner we can get on with scrutinising it, the better—it is important that we all remain self-disciplined, try not to add things to it and just focus on child safety.

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My noble friend makes the sort of wise point that one would expect from a former Leader of your Lordships’ House. I think that is the case with any Bill that comes before Parliament. With this one, which has benefited from pre-legislative scrutiny, Members of both Houses have been able to look at it and wider issues. I look forward to thorough but targeted debates when the Bill comes forward.

[Lord Kamall (Con)]

My Lords, a number of noble Lords and I were fortunate to attend a round table organised by the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, with some of the children’s charities. What we heard there, even from my noble friend Lord Gilbert, who believes strongly in free speech, is that when it comes to child protection there really is no debate; there is consensus across the House. The real challenges are some of the harms that may conflict with free speech, for example, but also the issue of harms themselves. Clearly, some definitions of harm suggest that some harms may well be subjective rather than objective. How do my noble friend the Minister and his colleagues intend to deal with some of these subjective arguments over harms?

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

I pay tribute to my noble friend for his work on this Bill while in office. I saw him at this Dispatch Box answering questions that reflected your Lordships’ eagerness to receive it and begin that scrutiny work. He is tempting me to stray into debates on the Bill itself, which we will have plenty of time for when it comes forward. As I say, the strongest protections in the Bill are for children and nothing in the Bill is designed to harm freedom of expression. The Bill holds those in balance, but I know that is one area that noble Lords will want to scrutinise during the Bill’s passage.

[Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall (Lab)]

My Lords, has the noble Lord, Lord Kamall, not precisely made the point by pointing out that what we need to do now is talk about the Bill? We are prevented from talking about the Bill for reasons that may be clear to a number of your Lordships but are certainly not clear to me. Is it not time that we get a chance to have the discussions implied in the question from the noble Lord, Lord Kamall? Although Molly Russell was the most—how can one say it? The noble Lord used the word “heartbreaking”—example put before us recently, there have been many others and there will be many more before the Bill gets on to the statute book.

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

The noble Baroness is right. There have been too many such cases, and we want to get this legislation on to the statute book to prevent as many of those preventable harms as we are able to. I too want to have that debate to continue the scrutiny in your Lordships’ House, but it is important that the other place concludes that before we are able to do so. I hope that it will be engaged in that very swiftly and that the Bill will soon be before your Lordships.

Electronic Trade Documents Bill [HL]

Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay Excerpts

Second reading committee
Monday 7th November 2022 Grand Committee

Moved by

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay]

That the Committee do consider the Bill.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay) (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful for the Committee’s understanding. I have just finished answering a Private Notice Question in the Chamber.

The Bill allows for the use in electronic form of certain trade documents, such as bills of lading and bills of exchange, which currently have to be on paper and physically possessed. It implements the recommendations made by the Law Commission of England and Wales in its report on electronic trade documents, which was published earlier this year. The Bill is not mandatory: it is a permissive and facilitative piece of legislation. Though it is only a small Bill, of seven clauses in length, its impact will be huge. It will help to boost the UK’s international trade, already worth more than £1.4 trillion, by providing benefits to UK businesses over the next 10 years of £1.1 billion.

In short, the Bill will allow businesses to use electronic trade documents when buying and selling internationally, making it easier, cheaper, faster and more secure for them to trade. It is fully supported by the businesses and industries that it is designed to help. The Government’s role here is simply to remove an obstacle to progress and to pave the way for international trade and trade law to be brought up to date.

The Law Commission published its recommendations and draft legislation in March this year. In its report, it made recommendations for legislative reform to allow trade documents in electronic form which can satisfy certain criteria to have the same legal effect and functionality as their paper counterparts. The Law Commission undertook significant consultation on the aim and contents of the Bill throughout the development of its recommendations. It spoke to a wide range of interested parties, including academics, lawyers, trade experts and industry representatives.

No previous attempts have been made to legislate in this area, which is one of the factors that makes this Bill unique and novel. While the Law Commission’s recommendations are for the law of England and Wales, we have worked with the territorial offices and devolved Administrations to ensure that the Bill can be extended to Scotland and Northern Ireland to ensure that businesses across the UK can benefit from this important development.

Business-to-business documents such as bills of lading, which are contracts between parties involved in shipping goods, and bills of exchange, which are used to help importers and exporters complete transactions, currently have to be paper-based. Existing laws, such as the Bills of Exchange Act 1882 and the Carriage of Goods by Sea Act 1992, did not envisage the digitisation of these documents. This Bill seeks to modernise the law, enabling this move to digital trade documents. Under the Bill, digital trade documents will be put on the same legal footing as their paper-based equivalents, giving UK businesses more choice and flexibility in how they trade.

The impact of the Bill cannot be overstated. Whether it is lowering transaction costs associated with trade by reducing resourcing and operational costs and increasing productivity; whether it is increasing efficiency and encouraging business growth by facilitating the development of digital products and services; whether it is delivering environmental benefits through a reduction in paper documents and emissions from couriering the paper documents; or, critically, whether it is increasing the security, transparency, traceability and transactional data of the flows of goods and finance—the Bill has the potential to revolutionise UK businesses’ ability to trade across borders.

To illustrate this, the process of moving goods across borders involves a range of actors, including those involved in transportation, insurance, finance and logistics. One trade finance transaction typically involves 20 different parties using between 10 and 20 paper documents, totalling over 100 pages. Research carried out by industry and academia has produced the following illuminating statistics and figures.

The use of electronic trade documents will reduce trade contract processing times from between seven and 10 days to as little as 20 seconds, according to the industry publication Trade Finance Global. The Digital Container Shipping Association estimates that, if 50% of the container shipping industry adopted electronic bills of lading, the collective global savings would be around £3.6 billion per annum. The International Chamber of Commerce estimates that small and medium businesses could see a 13% increase in international business if trade is digitised, and the World Economic Forum has found that digitising trade documents could reduce global carbon dioxide emissions from logistics by as much as 12%. Electronic trade documents also increase security and compliance by making it easier to trace records.

The Bill will lay the foundations for the future digitisation of our global trade approach and ambitions. I hope it receives strong support from your Lordships and I look forward to noble Lords’ contributions to this debate. I beg to move.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My Lords, I am very grateful to all noble Lords who have contributed to today’s debate, including my noble friend Lord Lindsay, who spoke in the gap. As the noble Lord, Lord Fox, rightly said, it is quality not quantity that counts. I am glad that noble Lords who took part were unanimous that although the Bill may be small its potential impact is significant.

In my opening remarks I touched on that transformative impact, and I am keen to emphasise the elegant way that the Bill achieves its goal. It is a simple Bill, although I hesitate to use that word because a great deal of consideration and work has gone into making it so. My noble friend Lord Holmes of Richmond is right to pay tribute by name to some of the people who have been involved in that important work. The Bill achieves what it sets out to do in a minimalistic way. As the noble Viscount, Lord Waverley, said, it is also an enabling Bill which leaves people free to sign up to use it if they wish. The opportunity it presents to bring trade law up to date is immense.

English law underpins the laws of global trade, and all eyes will be on us in the UK as we take this legislation forward. As the noble Viscount, Lord Waverley, said, the benefits will be there for others to accrue beyond these shores. The objective of the Bill is for the UK to take the lead in setting an international standard for how electronic trade documents can be defined and recognised under domestic law with the intention that other jurisdictions will adopt similar laws. The more that other countries harmonise their domestic laws to recognise electronic trade documents, the less it will matter whether UK law and this Bill in particular apply, and that is the case with paper trade documents today.

I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Lansley for highlighting some of the areas that he intends to probe in the Special Public Bill Committee. He is right that the Bill requires that scrutiny there.

I will deal with some of the questions that were raised. I hope it will be useful. I will, of course, look to see whether it is worth writing on further points ahead of the Special Public Bill Committee, although I would be grateful to noble Lords for recognising that that is the place to go into some of the deeper detail. I am always happy to speak to noble Lords ahead of that committee if it would be useful.

I agree with my noble friend Lord Holmes that there are many opportunities for technological solutions. One of the underlying principles of the Bill is that it is technology neutral. It would run counter to the objectives of the Bill if it were to prescribe or mandate a particular electronic trade document system. That would be likely to stifle innovation and risk excluding participants on the basis that their system does not satisfy the Bill’s requirements. The Bill does not specify what constitutes a reliable system or mandate a particular type of system. Rather it sets out various factors that a court may take into account when determining reliability. The Bill therefore offers some guidance on how to assess the reliability of electronic systems. We have been working closely with industry, which is developing standards to ensure reliability and verifiable authentication of electronic trade documents.

[Lord Fox (LD)]

One issue that is worth investigating further is who is the arbiter of reliability when it comes down to a system. Is it the buyer, the seller, a third party or some accreditation body that says it is reliable?

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

If I may, I will accept the noble Lord’s invitation to look at this in Committee because it is worthy of the deeper scrutiny that that affords.

A number of noble Lords understandably referred to the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law, or UNCITRAL, and its Model Law on Electronic Transferable Records, or MLETR, which is the international attempt to provide a legal framework for electronic trade documentation that can be adapted and adopted by individual jurisdictions. In developing its recommendations for reform, the Law Commission was particularly cognisant of this model law. The recommendations have been developed with a keen awareness of it, aligning with it where possible and integrating its spirit and objectives into the particularities of the law of the UK. As such, the provisions of the Bill are broadly compatible with the MLETR, but are drafted to cater for the nuances and specificities of UK law.

For example, the Bill expressly and clearly provides that electronic trade documents are capable of possession, while the MLETR provides that control is a functional equivalent to the fact of possession. It is clearer and more direct to extend the application of the concept of possession itself, rather than to use control as a functional equivalent to the fact of possession. That is something that the noble Lord, Lord Fox, touched on in his remarks about restrictions on control.

Within this Bill, control is a question of fact, as reflected by Clause 2(3)(a), which did not feature in the Law Commission’s draft Bill. The Bill does not define possession; it is a common law concept, which is highly flexible. Again, noble Lords will want to discuss this area in Committee, but the Law Commission’s advice, based on extensive research and consultation, is that it would be difficult, if not impossible, to set out in legislation what constitutes possession of an electronic trade document because possession is a fact-specific concept that has always been notoriously difficult to define in abstract terms. Furthermore, it would be impractical to frame legislation to cover the full range of possible solutions that could arise in relation to possessing electronic trade documents, particularly given the potential for technology to develop and give rise to different forms of control and therefore possession. I look forward to discussing this in greater detail in Committee.

The noble Lord, Lord Fox, asked about the territorial extent of the Bill, particularly in relation to Northern Ireland. The Bill is intended to apply UK-wide, as the issues concerning the legal blocker to possessing electronic documents are broadly the same. Apart from the provision in Clause 3(4), which extends only to Scotland and relates to the interaction between the Bill and the Moveable Transactions (Scotland) Bill, the Bill extends UK-wide. It is reserved in relation to Northern Ireland on the basis that the Bill deals with the reserved matter of trade with any place outside the United Kingdom. We have agreed with officials in the Northern Ireland Executive that the legislative consent Motion process is not therefore engaged.

[Lord Fox (LD)]

Is this Bill compatible with the Northern Ireland protocol? Is it compatible with the unique position that Northern Ireland has within the United Kingdom in having an open border with the EU?

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

We do not expect the Bill to have any impact on the operation of the Northern Ireland protocol. It is a measure to digitise business-to-business trade documents. It will allow businesses to use electronic trade documents when buying and selling internationally, and the benefits will be realised irrespective of whether trade is internal to the UK market or is global.

The noble Lord, Lord Fox, also asked some further questions about other jurisdictions. DCMS and the Department for International Trade agreed the digital economy agreement with Singapore, which includes a memorandum of understanding that put in place a pilot project to explore and text the interoperability of electronic trade documents.

The noble Viscount, Lord Waverley, asked about digital ID and e-signatures. I certainly agree that digital signatures and digital ID are areas that would benefit from harmonisation. As noble Lords stated, this Bill is merely the first foundational step towards digitisation and interoperability. The Bill is very specific in removing the legal blocker to possession of electronic trade documents; that really is its core purpose. We want to remove an obstacle for UK businesses that trade internationally. In giving electronic trade documents legal effect, we can unlock their current and future potential.

I will of course consult the Official Report of the debate to see whether there are any further points on which it might be useful to follow up before Committee. I look forward to the further scrutiny that this modest but important Bill will receive then. I am very grateful to noble Lords for their remarks and the questions that they have raised today.

Motion agreed.

Football Governance

Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay Excerpts

Thursday 3rd November 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bassam of Brighton]

To ask His Majesty’s Government when they expect to bring forward legislation to implement the recommendations of the Fan-Led Review of Football Governance, published on 24 November 2021; and in particular, the proposal for an independent regulator.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay) (Con)]

My Lords, the Government published their response to the recommendations made by the independent fan-led review of football governance in April 2022. The Government recognise the need for football to be reformed to ensure the game’s long-term sustainability. We continue to consider the policy and consult interested parties, but the Government remain committed to publishing a White Paper setting out our detailed response to the fan-led review.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

My Lords, I warmly welcome the noble Lord back to his place on the Front Bench and commiserate with the noble Lord, Lord Kamall, his predecessor, but this is part of the problem. The Conservative Party made a strong manifesto commitment, as did our party, to hold a fan-led review of football’s governance. I appreciate that we have had a year of on-off, merry-go-round government, but a year has passed since the review was published and nearly six months since the Queen’s Speech announced a White Paper. When can we expect some legislative protection for our football clubs? When can we start to see the interests of the fans who give their support week in, week out to football clubs properly represented? This has been going on for far too long, and I think we are all beginning to run out of patience.

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

I join the noble Lord in paying tribute to my noble friend Lord Kamall, with whom I swapped places on the substitutes’ bench; I hope that his stay there will be as brief as mine. However, for all the changes in ministerial positions, the work to continue examining the recommendations made by Tracey Crouch, in commitment to and fulfilment of our manifesto pledge, as the noble Lord said, has continued at official level. The Secretary of State and my right honourable friend the Sports Minister, who have stayed in place, have been engaging with organisations. The Sports Minister made sure that his first meeting was with the Football Supporters’ Association. They are taking the time to continue that engagement and to look at the policy, and they will bring forward a White Paper with the answers to these complex issues soon.

[Lord Addington (LD)]

My Lords, will the Minister assure us that the Government are still in absolute agreement that there needs to be change and that it will happen soon? If that is so, can they assure us that we will not be talking about this in another year’s time, because there needs to be action now? Those assurances are required, and other sports have similar problems. I put my hand up as a rugby union player.

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

Yes, we still agree that football needs to be reformed to secure its long-term sustainability. Some of the action can be taken now; it does not require legislation or government action. The clubs can do it—for instance, on the financial flows throughout the football pyramid. We continue to encourage clubs to do that, and we are discussing the challenges facing rugby football clubs as well.

[Lord Faulkner of Worcester (Lab)]

My Lords, on 25 April, the noble Lord, Lord Parkinson, answered a Question from the noble Lord, Lord Ravensdale, about the fan-led review. His first words were:

“My Lords, the Government have endorsed the principle that football requires a strong independent regulator to secure the future of our national game.”—[Official Report, 25/4/22; col. 4.]


He has not referred to a regulator in his answers so far today. Can he confirm that it remains the Government’s policy? In an interview with the Sun newspaper on 19 July, his right honourable friend the Prime Minister was reported as having made the following promise:

“In a bid to pitch himself as a footie-mad man of the people, Tory frontrunner Mr Sunak promised to hand fans power over dodgy owners in a radical shake-up. The diehard Southampton fan said he would implement all ten of the recommendations from former sports minister Tracey Crouch’s fan-led football review in time for the World Cup.”


I do not think he can do it in time for the World Cup, but can the Minister say whether it will be before the end of the Parliament?

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My Lords, much has changed even since the Prime Minister made those commitments. My right honourable friends the Secretary of State and the Sports Minister are taking the time to consider the recommendations of Tracey Crouch’s review. We remain grateful to her and the thousands of fans who took part in it and informed it. The noble Lord should not read any more into that than that they are taking the time to look at this complex area of policy and to discuss it with the FA, the EFL and supporters’ organisations among others. We will bring forward our response in the White Paper.

[Lord Woodley (Lab)]

My Lords, I declare an interest in so far as I am the president of a football club with 47 children’s teams, and as a struggling Evertonian. I spoke in April about the need for fans to have real input and real say in the day-to-day running of their clubs in their communities. Nothing has changed since then apart from the fact that, particularly in the Premier League, more owners than ever are foreign investors, particularly from the USA, or even people from the Middle East who murder innocent journalists. Can the Minister explain why these takeovers are being allowed to happen in our national game, without the fans being given any real say or influence?

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

We want to give fans a strong voice in the governance of the national game. That is why we had the fan-led review, and we are grateful to everyone who took part in it. The response in April stated that

“new owners’ and directors’ tests will help to ensure the future sustainability of our … clubs”,

which play such an important role in their communities, and that ensuring that football has suitable owners and directors is crucial to securing the long-term future of the game.

[Baroness Taylor of Bolton (Lab)]

The Minister has given some rather vague assurances today, which cause some concern as to whether the Government will row back on what has previously been said about the regulator in particular. Can he be firmer about the commitment the Government will make? These problems have been around for a long time. He has said that we “will” get a White Paper and that they “will” consider the problems. When will we get a White Paper?

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

The White Paper will set out the detail that I am unable to give at the Dispatch Box today. My right honourable friends the Secretary of State and the Sports Minister have engaged directly with football organisations and football supporters to discuss the complex issues and to take forward the recommendations made by Tracey Crouch and the fan-led review. The White Paper will be coming soon, but I am afraid that I cannot give the noble Baroness a date today.

[Lord Kamall (Con)]

I thank my noble friend for the kind message regarding my being put on the subs’ bench. I want to ask about the thinking in the department. Can we still set the same objectives in a fan-led review, but without a regulator, and are there alternatives that may be considered just as effective?

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

Officials and Ministers in the department are discussing the recommendations of the fan-led review with all the interested parties, taking into account all those views, and the White Paper will provide the answers which my noble friend and others seek.

[Lord Fox (LD)]

My Lords, words such as “discussing” and “reviewing” indicate that the department seems to be kicking this ball into touch. Does the Minister recognise that, with every month and every year that passes, clubs that have been part of communities are being lost, and that more delay will mean that more clubs are lost?

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

As I said to the noble Lord’s noble friend earlier, football itself can take forward some of the recommendations in the fan-led review which we endorsed in April, such as financial redistribution throughout the leagues. We urge them strongly to do that, and my right honourable friends have done so directly.

[Lord Polak (Con)]

My Lords, we need to be a little careful that we do not throw the baby out with the bath water. The Premier League is the envy of the world; it attracts the world’s best players. As a Liverpool fan, I could not let this debate go by, being led just by an Evertonian. I urge us to be very careful to ensure that the Premier League stays the premier league.

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My noble friend raises some of the complex issues with which my right honourable friends are grappling in their discussions with everybody interested in this matter, including supporters’ groups and the fans themselves, and they will bring forward our answers in the White Paper.

[Lord Grocott (Lab)]

My Lords, we have had two attempts on this side, first from my noble friend Lord Faulkner and then from my noble friend Lady Taylor, to get an answer to a specific question, which is whether the Government stand by their commitment earlier this year and endorse the principle that football requires a strong, independent regulator. If I ask the Minister a third time, might it be third time lucky?

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

I may disappoint the noble Lord by repeating that we are looking at that and all the recommendations that Tracey Crouch and the fan-led review made. He should not read anything more into it than that we are taking the time to give those complex recommendations the thought and attention they deserve, and the White Paper will provide the answers to his question.

Public Service Broadcasting: BBC Centenary

Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay Excerpts

Thursday 3rd November 2022 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay) (Con)]

My Lords, this has been a very spirited and thought-provoking debate, and a very enjoyable one for my first time back at the Dispatch Box. I warmly congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Foster of Bath, on securing it. He encouraged me to sign up to speak from the Back Benches and I had done so, but it is a delight to be responding with a bit more time from this position.

The noble Lord’s Motion encourages us to look to both the future and the past, but perhaps I should start with an observation about the present. It seems to me that we in the UK today are very lucky to benefit from a vibrant and diverse broadcasting sector. We have access to hundreds of television and radio channels, each of them unique. These are in turn supplied by a wealth of creative talent and distributed in innumerable ways, some cutting-edge and others which would be familiar even to the late Lord Reith himself—although I wonder whether he might have mellowed in his opinions on jazz.

Moreover, it strikes me, taking the long view, as today’s Motion invites us to do, that that success is due in no small part to the work of the BBC, first as the pioneer of radio, and later television, broadcasting, and then, over time, providing a different role, an important foundation on which so much else of our broadcasting heritage is built.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell said, 1922 was a very special year. It marked the publication of TS Eliot’s “The Waste Land” and James Joyce’s Ulysses, one of which I have read repeatedly and the other of which I am still struggling through, but both of which I have learned a great deal about in this centenary year thanks to the BBC’s programming about them.

However, as we heard, a lot has changed since 1922. The BBC is no longer our only broadcaster; indeed, it is not our only public service broadcaster. Strictly speaking, it is one of six but, taking a more rounded measure of public service, we might also include our eight local television providers and hundreds of local and national radio stations in that list. That does not even include all the programmes created and shown by commercial broadcasters that are nevertheless public service in nature.

The need for public service broadcasting in this country is as strong as ever it was. Whether that is breaking news footage of Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine, or lessons for children stuck at home during the pandemic, it is vital that our broadcasters understand the positive impact that they can and do have on our life in the United Kingdom: on our culture and values, on our economy and on the very cornerstones of democracy. They play a key role in bringing the nation together at our moments of greatest celebration and our moments of deepest sadness.

In particular, I echo the tributes paid by other noble Lords to our public service broadcasters, especially the BBC, for their thoughtful and respectful coverage following the recent death of Her late Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. As the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, said, more than half the country, 32.5 million people, watched the BBC’s coverage of the state funeral, and millions more watched it on ITV: a powerful example of what public service broadcasting can and should be about.

I agree with my noble friend Lady Harding that, in Parliament, it is our job as parliamentarians to hold public service broadcasting to account but also to provide a legal and regulatory framework which encourages and supports the contribution that the BBC and others make. Part of that framework, of course, includes the media Bill, which noble Lords in great number have asked about, understandably, today. Let me highlight what my right honourable friend the Secretary of State said last night in your Lordships’ House—not in the Chamber but in a reception held here. She said she is fully committed to introducing legislation to make sure that we are regulating in a way that is fit for the modern era, and that we will be coming forward with the media Bill shortly. I am afraid I cannot be more precise than that, but I am happy to echo her words that we will do that soon.

I will start with the legal and regulatory framework for the BBC. In January, the Government announced that the licence fee will be frozen for the next two years and will rise in line with inflation for the following four years. That means that the cost of the licence fee will remain fixed at £159 until April 2024, before rising in line with inflation until April 2028.

Concerns about the cost of living have been echoed in your Lordships’ House today and were central to the Government’s decision. The settlement aims to support households at a time when they need that support most, while also giving the BBC what it needs to deliver on its important remit. Under the settlement, the BBC will continue to receive around £3.8 billion in annual public funding, allowing it to deliver its mission in public purposes and to continue doing what it does best.

We believe that this is a fair settlement which strikes the right balance between protecting households and allowing the BBC to deliver its vital public responsibilities, while encouraging it to make further savings, efficiencies and innovations. The Government’s longer-term road map for reform of the BBC sees two forthcoming milestones as we prepare for the next review of the BBC’s royal charter: the ongoing mid-term review and the planned BBC funding model review. I will address each of those in turn.

At this point, half way through the charter period, work has already begun on the mid-term review. That will function as a health check, conducted by the Government and examining how effectively the governance and regulatory arrangements introduced by the current charter, such as the move to the new unitary board, are performing, and whether further reforms are required. The Government are interested in the success of the BBC’s governance and regulatory arrangements in enabling progress against our ambitions for greater impartiality, an effective complaints system and a BBC that represents the breadth of the audience it was established to serve.

That is not just about how well the BBC is doing. We also want to look at the effectiveness of the framework by which Ofcom holds it to account. The Government are seeking to conclude the review swiftly and to report on its findings next year. At the same time, the BBC’s funding model faces major challenges, due to how people consume media, as we have heard in this debate. Technology has revolutionised how, when and where audiences can access and watch content. An increasing number of households are choosing not to hold a TV licence as fewer people choose to watch live television or other activities which require a TV licence. If this trend continues as expected, that presents clear and looming challenges to the sustainability of the licence fee.

It is not just the Government who have these concerns. They have been echoed in today’s debate. Licence to Change: BBC Future Funding, the report of your Lordships’ Communications and Digital Committee under the chairmanship of my noble friend Lady Stowell of Beeston, whom I had the pleasure of sitting alongside, albeit briefly, in the last few weeks, found that the drawbacks to the current licence fee model are becoming more salient. We must consider how best to fund the BBC over the long term so that it can continue to succeed. It is therefore right that we examine the future of the licence fee. The Government will set out further detail on their plans in due course.

The BBC forms just one part of the UK’s vibrant public service broadcasting system. Our six public service broadcasters provide a wealth of important content—news and current affairs programmes which help us understand the world around us, original, distinctively British programming which shapes our culture and reflects our values, and programmes made in all corners of our nation and broadcast around the world.

The noble Baroness, Lady D’Souza, the noble Lord, Lord Bilimoria, and others, were right to praise the important work of the BBC World Service. The Government strongly support the BBC’s mission to bring high-quality and impartial news to global audiences in some of the most remote places in the world, particularly those parts of our globe where free speech is limited. The BBC is operationally and editorially independent from the Government, so decisions over its spending and services are a matter for the BBC, but the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office is providing the BBC World Service with over £94 million annually for the next three years, supporting services in 12 languages and improving key services, and that is in addition to the nearly £470 million which the Government have already provided through the BBC World2020 programme since 2016.

The noble Lord, Lord Dubs, was right to highlight the bravery of BBC journalists who report for the World Service, particularly in Iran. We regularly raise the harassment of BBC Persian staff directly with the Iranian Government as well as in multilateral fora, but I wholeheartedly agree with his tribute to them. Moreover, our public service broadcasters complement their commercial competitors by raising standards across the industry by investing in skills, boosting growth and taking creative risks. They drive growth in our booming production sector by commissioning distinctive public service content and supporting the hundreds of independent production companies that are the lifeblood of that sector.

This contribution is not limited to television. As the noble Baroness, Lady Bonham-Carter, noted, in celebrating 100 years of the BBC, we are celebrating 100 years of BBC radio. Since listeners first tuned in to daily news bulletins on its 2LO service, BBC radio has been a pioneer of public service content, from great drama to ground-breaking comedy, the newest music and the greatest of old, not least through its orchestras and choirs. Radio is also changing, as more and more people consume audio content online. With its unique position in the radio market, I hope we can have confidence that the BBC will continue to evolve to deliver high-quality and engaging audio services to the country and the globe over the years to come.

The noble Baroness, Lady Bonham-Carter, and others raised the announcements this week about changes to BBC local radio stations. Again, the BBC is rightly operationally and editorially independent of government, but the Government are disappointed that it is reportedly planning to make such extensive cuts to its local radio output. In an Answer to an Urgent Question in another place earlier this week, my honourable friend Julia Lopez set out that she is meeting the BBC next week and will be conveying to it the views raised in that Urgent Question. We wait to hear more from the BBC on how it expects these changes to affect local communities, including the provision of local news and media plurality.

As noble Lords have noted, it is not just the BBC celebrating an important birthday this year. On Tuesday, Sianel Pedwar Cymru, or S4C, the UK’s Welsh language television broadcaster, celebrated its 40th birthday. S4C is a great example of how our public service broadcasting provides for every part of the UK, not only providing an opportunity for Welsh speakers to access content in a language familiar to them but supporting the Welsh economy, culture, and society.

Channel 4 also celebrated its 40th birthday yesterday. It is an integral part of our public service broadcasting system and a great UK success story. Over the past four decades, Channel 4 has done an excellent job in delivering on its founding purposes, providing greater choice for audiences and supporting the British production sector, including in the diocese of the right reverend Prelate following its move to Leeds. The Government want Channel 4 to continue to deliver for audiences for the next 40 years and long beyond. My right honourable friend the Secretary of State is carefully examining the business case for the sale of Channel 4 and will set out further detail on our plans for the future of the channel in due course. As the right reverend Prelate and others said, there is much to be considered. The principal conclusions of the Government’s review of public service broadcasting were set out in our White Paper earlier this year and my right honourable friend will be able to draw on those conclusions when considering her decision.

I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, for giving me the opportunity to correct the record. He is right to pick up on an answer that I gave when last in this post, stemming from a confusion between salaries and total remuneration packages. One of the last things that I did before leaving was to write a letter to the Library of your Lordships’ House setting that out for the record; if it was not sent, I will make sure that it is. I am grateful for the opportunity to do that from the Dispatch Box.

Continuing with birthdays, as the noble Lord, Lord Inglewood, will remember particularly well as a former Broadcasting Minister, in March this year Channel 5 turned 25. It continues to make a vital contribution to the UK PSB system through its provision of news and its unique focus on children’s television.

Our two other public service broadcasters, ITV and STV, continue to play an important role both on and off the screen. Last year, STV was the most watched peak-time television channel in Scotland for the fourth year in succession, and in 2019, the most recent year for which detailed data are available, ITV spent more than £250 million outside London, directly employing more than 2,000 staff and indirectly supporting many more. That is not to mention its 3,000 hours of national and regional news, with “STV News at Six” having held Scotland’s number one news programme slot since 2019.

However, despite these ongoing successes, there are also challenges ahead for our public service broadcasters. I have referred already to some of the specific challenges facing the BBC, but in many ways, they are symptomatic of broader changes in the sector, which create both opportunities and risks. One of those is advances in technology. Just as the advent of cable and satellite services revolutionised broadcasting in previous decades so internet-delivered services are revolutionising it now, creating new distribution methods and potential business models. It is notable, for instance, that 79% of households with a television set now choose to connect it to the internet.

Changing consumer habits are also a factor. Today’s viewers now have huge choice in what they watch and how they watch it, and are taking advantage of that choice. Two-thirds of households subscribe to video-on-demand services like Netflix and Disney+, and in September 2021 YouTube reached 92% of online adults in the United Kingdom. Viewers are shifting to different platforms, types of content and modes of viewing: telephones, laptops, short-form, long-form, on-the-go and around the house. To be a successful modern broadcaster, it is important that broadcasters make their content available in a multitude of formats across a wide range of devices and platforms.

Increased competition is also changing the sector. New global players, particularly US-based streamers, as noble Lords have noted, are using their greater financial resources to compete with both our public service broadcasters and our commercial ones. That is not just a question of competition for viewers but for the programmes they show. In 2019, the public service broadcasters in the UK were collectively able to spend just under £2.8 billion on new content. At the same time, Netflix alone spent an estimated £11.5 billion on production globally.

In April this year, the Government set out their proposals for supporting our public service broadcasters, using our new legislative freedoms to deliver a regulatory framework which works in the best interests of the UK. We were able to draw upon much previous work, including the report of the Communications and Digital Committee of your Lordships’ House, at that time chaired by my noble friend Lord Gilbert of Panteg. As a result, the White Paper contained a number of proposals to support British broadcasters to prosper in this new media environment.

The first of these relates to prominence. An important part of our public service broadcasting system is ensuring that public service content is readily available to as wide an audience as possible and easy to find. But as audiences increasingly watch content online, our broadcasters, including the BBC, are finding it increasingly difficult to secure and maintain their presence on global platforms. We announced in our White Paper plans to legislate for a new online prominence regime, so that PSB content is made available and given protected prominence across designated TV platforms. Building on Ofcom’s recommendations, we believe that legislating for prominence will not only support the future sustainability of public service broadcasters; it will also mean that viewers can continue to find the content they value. We understand, and share, the concerns of our public service broadcasters that action to address this issue is needed as soon as possible. I am glad to hear that echoed in today’s debate.

I also want to touch briefly on the listed events regime, which helps to ensure the free and universal availability of key moments from some of our most loved sports. In recognition of the key role that our public service broadcasters play in distributing content which is distinctively British and of interest to audiences in the UK, the Government have announced their intention to make qualification for the listed events regime a benefit specific to our public service broadcasters. This will ensure that they have the opportunity to show national sporting events such as the Paralympic Games and the Women’s EUROs, both rightly praised by the noble Lord, Lord Addington, for years to come. We are considering whether digital rights should be brought in scope of the regime to reflect the rapidly changing viewing habits of UK audiences and the growth in on-demand streaming services.

Video-on-demand services such as Netflix and Amazon Prime provide huge value to UK audiences and in many cases significant, and growing, contributions to the UK economy. But these on-demand services, apart from BBC’s iPlayer, are not subject to Ofcom’s Broadcasting Code, which sets out appropriate standards for content, including for harmful or offensive material, accuracy, fairness and privacy. This means that the television-like content which people watch is regulated differently depending on how they choose to watch it. Some services available in the UK are not regulated in the UK at all. That is why we intend to bring larger TV-like on-demand providers, which are not regulated in the UK but which target and profit from UK audiences, under Ofcom jurisdiction. We will also give Ofcom powers to draft and enforce a new video-on-demand code, similar to the existing Broadcasting Code. These changes will mean that UK audiences will be better protected from harmful material and better able to complain to Ofcom if they see something about which they are concerned.

My noble friend Lady Harding of Winscombe was right that the people who are moving to these new methods of watching television the quickest are the young, and the noble Baroness, Lady Benjamin, was right to raise our important responsibility to children. UK-wide television tax reliefs aimed specifically at children’s television programming have since 2015 directly supported more than 500 projects and over £600 million of investment in children’s content. We are grateful to have worked closely with the noble Baroness, Lady Benjamin, on introducing powers for Ofcom to monitor the commercial public service broadcasters and enable them to set criteria for the provision of children’s television programming; and of course, we chose children’s television, alongside radio, to pilot contestable funding, as she mentioned in her contribution. An evaluation of the three-year pilot of the young audiences’ content fund is taking place to determine its impact. The potential for further investment will be assessed against that evaluation and future public service broadcasting needs.

The noble Viscount, Lord Colville of Culross, mentioned smart speakers. Today the whole sector faces perhaps its greatest challenge yet with the emergence of online audio services and smart speakers. I share the noble Viscount’s concerns about the potential impact of these devices on the radio sector. Officials in DCMS are actively exploring potential options for bringing forward legislation to protect the position of radio on smart speakers in a way consistent with the proposals to develop a new pro-competition regime for digital markets.

The noble Lord, Lord McNally, said that it was a Conservative Government who established the BBC. As this is a Liberal Democrat debate, I should say that a Conservative and Liberal coalition presided over its birth. The BBC was founded on 18 October 1922. The following day, Tory Back-Benchers met at the Carlton Club and pulled the plug on that coalition, giving the BBC its first big story to cover. Those were the days when Tory Back-Benchers brought down Prime Ministers from other parties. It was thus a Liberal politician, the Postmaster-General FG Kellaway, who noted:

“If the best use is to be made of this new form of communication, it must touch life at many aspects”.—[Official Report, Commons, 4/8/1922; col. 1955.]


I think we would all agree that our public service broadcasters have delivered on that vision. Now is the time, as we have done today, to look ahead to the next century and provide the foundations for future success. I am very grateful to the noble Lords who have given us the opportunity to do so.

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston (Con)]

Before my noble friend sits down, may I seek a couple of points of clarification on legislation? My noble friend echoed the Secretary of State in saying that the media Bill will be with us shortly. Yet a decision on the privatisation of Channel 4 has yet to be taken. Could he confirm that, if the Government decide not to go ahead with the privatisation of Channel 4, the media Bill will still come forward shortly because it is the non-Channel 4 aspects that are deemed incredibly urgent?

The Minister also made some comment in response to the noble Viscount, Lord Colville, on digital competition. However, I am not entirely clear on what he is saying about the prospect of a digital competition Bill. He may remember that I was very keen, if possible, that we should combine the two things, particularly if Channel 4 is no longer on the agenda.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

I am grateful to my noble friend for the opportunity to say a bit more. There is not much that I can add, other than to repeat the Secretary of State’s words from last night. We will bring the media Bill forward shortly and that does not pre-empt the decision she is considering vis-à-vis Channel 4. The Queen’s Speech set out the Government’s commitment to publishing a draft digital markets competition and consumer Bill in this parliamentary Session. We will do so as soon as parliamentary time allows.

Electronic Trade Documents Bill [HL]

Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay Excerpts

Thursday 3rd November 2022 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay]

That the Bill be referred to a Second Reading Committee.

Motion agreed.

Arts: Energy Cost Support

Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay Excerpts

Thursday 20th October 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kamall (Con)]

The noble Baroness makes a very important point about the importance of our cultural sector to our economy, but also to the social life and well-being of so many people across the country. Sometimes that cannot be measured in simple econometric terms. I remember, from my time as Health Minister, how much social prescribing was helpful. Cultural organisations and individuals play a role in well-being, and help people get through difficult situations. I assure her that I am so excited to have this job because I am now the Minister for Civil Society—my dream job. I want to work right across the sector, with the heritage sector, the museum sector and others, to champion them, not only to the outside world but also within government.

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My Lords, rising energy bills are affecting businesses across the economy, but I am glad to hear my noble friend recognise the particular role that cultural organisations play in community life. We saw that recently, after the death of Her late Majesty the Queen, when all the major cultural organisations along the South Bank opened their doors—and their loos—to the many people who wished to queue to pay their respects. Some larger organisations have formed consortia to buy their energy up front and in bulk. Have the Government given any thought to encouraging smaller organisations to see how to do this? Might there be a role for the Arts Council or other umbrella organisations to negotiate better deals on their behalf?

[Lord Kamall (Con)]

I take great pleasure in thanking my noble friend, my predecessor, for his question. I pay tribute, once again, to him for the work he did during the Queen’s funeral, working together across the sector and with the cultural organisations in the examples he gave. This scheme is led by BEIS. We have to work very hard to make sure that BEIS understands any specific needs of the cultural sector, and those of community organisations and civil society. I do not know about the specific example he gives, but it seems very sensible and I will take it back to the department.

National Heritage Act 1983

Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay Excerpts

Thursday 13th October 2022 Grand Committee

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to welcome my noble friend Lord Kamall to his new role. I am in the happy position of being able to say that I know he will both enjoy and excel at it. I congratulate my noble friend Lord Vaizey of Didcot on securing this debate and so successfully trailing it in today’s Times, in the weekend’s Sunday Times, at the Cheltenham Literature Festival, on his Twitter feed, on the BBC and in our Spectator panel at the Conservative Party conference earlier this month—possibly also on his new Times Radio show, but I have not yet had the pleasure of listening to that.

It is a debate well worth having, and an issue I have particularly enjoyed discussing over the last 12 months with the excellent professionals who work in our museums and galleries, including those involved in informing the practical guide on restitution and repatriation published by Arts Council England this summer, the first for 20 years. As I have said in your Lordships’ House before, both the National Heritage Act and I turn 40 next year. It is a good rule of thumb that Acts of Parliament should be reviewed when the Ministers responsible for them are the same age, but I am not convinced, from the discussions I had when I and the Act were both 39, that there is presently a case for change.

Some perspective is needed. There are more than 2,000 museums in England alone, and the Act we are debating today covers just three—albeit they are now groups of museums—not including the British Museum. With a handful of other exceptions, such as through the 1963 Act, all other museums in the country are free to take decisions about their collections within the confines of their own statutes and charity law. I know from my discussions with museums’ directors and trustees how carefully and thoughtfully they approach questions of repatriation and restitution. These questions are a vital part of the unending process of historical inquiry. How did this object come to be here? How have it and the people who made it been treated down the generations? Whose voice is missing from the conversation we are having about it? There are often complicated or uncomfortable truths to confront in all directions through this historical inquiry. Ensuring that people have the opportunity to do that, and to reach their own conclusions, is in many ways more important than where they get to do it.

Just as it is bad history to sweep under the carpet past actions that make us feel uncomfortable, it is bad history to create new myths of wickedness or virtue. We have to seek to understand the past in all its complexity. At their best, our museums help us to do that—but there are constant pressures on them to boil down that complexity and let present morals intrude on the past. But morals, just like politics and fashion, have changed over time and will continue to change in generations to come. That is why I believe there is still a strong case to be made for universal collections that bring together items that give us a range of insights into our shared human experience across the globe and across the generations, and for sheltering them from short-term political pressures.

Our national museums take their responsibilities very seriously, sharing and exchanging not just the items in their collections but perspectives and scholarship on them, supporting the development of museums around the world and using digital technology to share their collections with global audiences. We saw just last week the advantage of having dispersed collections of our shared human heritage: a wildfire on Easter Island caused terrible damage to the Moai sculptures at that UNESCO world heritage site. It is possible that the fire was started deliberately—an unthinkable thing—but, whatever its cause, it is a reminder of the vulnerability of our universal heritage and, to me at least, it is a cause for relief that two are at the British Museum, as are some 20 in other museums around the world.

I have a question in closing. My noble friend Lord Vaizey asked about the Charities Act loophole. Has my noble friend the Minister seen the opinion by the Institute of Art and Law about recent changes to the Charities Act, specifically to Section 106 on ex gratia payments? The institute suggests that this could make it easier for museums, including national ones, to dispose of items in their collections without seeking permission from the Charity Commission. The recent Charities Act was a Law Commission Bill that was not designed to make significant policy changes in contentious areas. It was carefully scrutinised by a special Public Bill Committee chaired by a former Master of the Rolls in your Lordships’ House. Has the Minister seen the opinion and do the Government have a view on it?

Repatriation of Cultural Objects

Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay Excerpts

Tuesday 6th September 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

My Lords, in begging leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper, I declare my interest on the register as a trustee of the People’s History Museum and the Royal Pavilion and Museums Trust.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay) (Con)]

My Lords, museums and galleries in England operate independently of government. Some national museums are prevented by law from deaccessioning items in their collection, with some narrow exceptions. The Horniman Museum is not subject to such legislation so this was a decision for its trustees, but I know that they went about their decision with appropriate care and consideration. Arts Council England has published a practical guide for museums in England to help them in approaching this issue more generally.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)]

My Lords, I congratulate the Horniman Museum on being made the Art Fund’s museum of the year back in July. The unanimous decision of the museum’s board to return ownership of 72 artefacts to Nigeria has been hailed as “immensely significant”—a view that I share. Given that the organisation receives DCMS funding, what discussions, if any, did the Horniman have with DCMS prior to making this decision, and should we take this as evidence of a shift in government policy on the future of cultural objects acquired through force? I note that George Osborne, chair of the British Museum, said recently in relation to the Parthenon sculptures that there was a “deal to be done”.

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My Lords, I echo the noble Lord’s congratulations to the Horniman on its accolade as museum of the year and, indeed, to the People’s History Museum, which was shortlisted and narrowly lost out. As I said, the Horniman Museum is not prohibited in law from taking the decision. The trustees let us know that they had been approached with a request for restitution; I am satisfied that they went about it in a thoughtful manner, in accordance with their guidance. Separate guidance has been published by Arts Council England to inform deliberations by other museums but this does not have any implications for wider positions, particularly in relation to the barrier in law to deaccessioning.

[Lord Kirkhope of Harrogate (Con)]

My Lords, I do not wish to be churlish but I really must bring my noble friend’s attention to when this Question was raised previously and my own contribution. I asked at that time what negotiations or discussions were to take place between the Government represented by my noble friend and the Government of Denmark about the large amount of silver and other valuables that were looted, particularly from the east coast of this country, in history. Can he guarantee that, if discussions are to take place in this area, he will also be looking to bring back to this country that which is ours?

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

Again, my noble friend makes an important point. The reason that we have a legal bar on deaccessioning is to protect our national collection so that people—both those from the UK and the many visitors from around the world who come to our excellent museums—are able to see items from across human civilisation and see them in the great sweep of that wide context. Often, the debate about where things are physically located obstructs the more important purpose of museums, which is to continue to educate and inform people about items; that matters wherever they are. In the case of the Horniman Museum, the items that it has transferred legal title of will remain at the Horniman Museum for the foreseeable future.

[The Earl of Clancarty (CB)]

My Lords, public opinion has changed considerably on this issue in the past few years. With regard to the national museums, should the Government not now consider it a duty to change the appropriate legislation—the British Museum Act and the National Heritage Act—to allow the British Museum in particular to come to a decision on these matters? Otherwise, its hands will remain tied, and that is surely unacceptable.

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My Lords, I am mindful that I am as old as the National Heritage Act so I am always happy to discuss, as I do, with people in the sector their views on it. I do not think there is a case for further changes to the law. There are already exceptions to do with the spoliation of items acquired during the Third Reich and to deal with human remains that are less than 1,000 years old. I think the position that we have is the right one at the moment but I am always happy to hear representations.

[Lord McNally (LD)]

My Lords, the Minister has twice cited those Acts in defence. Surely there is a case for looking at them and how restrictive they are in modern times. Of course, not all artefacts can be returned to their place of origin, but can your Lordships imagine the queues at the British Museum to look at a 3D replica of the Parthenon marbles, along with a history of where they came from and how they were looked after by the British Museum and then returned to their rightful place in Athens?

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

The British Museum has worked with the Acropolis Museum to allow for replicas to be made there and for the Acropolis Museum to show the sculptures. Of the half that remain in existence, half are in the Acropolis Museum, but there are also items in the Louvre, the Vatican and other museums around the world. The British Museum and many other museums work in partnership with museums around the world to lend items in order to extend our knowledge about them, and that is the purpose of our great museums.

[Lord Dubs (Lab)]

My Lords, I cannot resist commenting on the Minister saying that old legislation prevents the Government doing anything. Surely we can change the legislation. Where there are important historical reasons and an artefact is particularly valuable to a country such as Greece, surely that is so exceptional that we should consider its return. Of course, we cannot return most artefacts but, where they are so significant and where they are part of an entity, surely we should think again.

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

The legislation does not prohibit museums such as the British Museum working in partnership with museums around the world. I note that it has talked about a Parthenon partnership with the Acropolis Museum, and we welcome the discussions that the British Museum wants to have there. It has always said that if the ownership of the sculptures was acknowledged. it would be willing to discuss loans, as it has loaned those items to other museums around the world in the past and does so with many other items to organisations around the world on a regular basis.

[Lord Cormack (Con)]

My Lords, does my noble friend accept that many of us feel it would be wrong for the Government to usurp the function of trustees? In view of what Mr George Osborne has said recently, it seems that sensible discussions are taking place, but we should also not forget that the British Museum and all our great national museums regularly lend their objects and artefacts not only around the world but particularly within this country. We in Lincoln have been the beneficiary of many wonderful loans in recent years.

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My noble friend makes an important point. I believe that before the pandemic the British Museum was loaning some 4,000 objects per year to museums around the world. They were also shared with people across the UK, which is exactly what we like to see.

[Lord Singh of Wimbledon (CB)]

My Lords, as an interim measure until we have some consensus on this issue, does the Minister agree that we should have a little plaque at the bottom of each article emphasising or explaining from where and how the item was looted?

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My Lords, many museums do that; it is the job of museums to explain the context of items. In my experience, museums are very keen to continue filling in that, in all its complexity. In the case of the Benin bronzes, which were taken in a raid in February 1897, it points out the role of the British Empire at the time. I should also point out that that raid brought about the end of slavery in Benin, showing the full complexity of matters in the past.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, as an ex-archaeologist, I would like to point out that we do not own the Elgin marbles. I thought that Lord Elgin paid for them, but apparently there is no proof of that, so they are looted. It is a national embarrassment. I was in Greece this summer and saw the Parthenon and there is a vast gap where the marbles should be. It is time to send them back.

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My Lords, as I have said in response to previous questions on the matter, the Acropolis Museum is a marvellous museum where you are able to see the Parthenon in the background. However, more people see the Parthenon sculptures in the British Museum annually within a great sweep of human civilisation. They were legally acquired by the museum in 1801 and the trustees are right in their assertion of that fact.

[Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall (Lab)]

My Lords, the Minister has rightly said that it is the job of museums to look after whatever is currently in their care, and to make sure that items are displayed appropriately and looked after for the future. Is he confident, given the parlous state of the finances of many of those museums, that they will in future be in a position to do what they are there to do?

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My Lords, through things such as the museum estate and development fund and DCMS Wolfson grants, the Government provide grants to museums to ensure that they continue to be able to house, look after and share the items in their care with audiences not just in the UK but around the world.