Asked by: Lord Smith of Finsbury (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to ensure that the Office for Product Safety and Standards is sufficiently staffed and skilled to enforce the new regulations on mandatory recycling labelling.
Answered by Lord Callanan - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
The Office for Product Safety and Standards (OPSS) has agreed, in principle, to act as a National Regulator for the new regulations on mandatory recycling labelling, which form part of proposed Producer Responsibility Obligations under the Environment Act 2021. No final decision has been made that OPSS shall adopt this enforcement role, but should OPSS become the regulator it will be funded to ensure the necessary resources, including suitably qualified staff, are available.
Asked by: Lord Smith of Finsbury (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask His Majesty's Government what discussions they have had, or plan to have, with Arts Council England to understand their decision to withdraw all national programme funding from English National Opera; and what plans they have to ask the Arts Council to reconsider this decision.
Answered by Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
The Secretary of State, other Ministers, and officials from DCMS all regularly meet Arts Council England – which is an arms-length body of the Department – to discuss all aspects of its work. This includes meetings to discuss Arts Council England’s 2023–26 Investment Programme.
All decisions on which organisations to fund through the 2023–26 Investment Programme, and by how much, have been taken by Arts Council England. In line with the long-standing principle that the Arts Council makes such decisions at arm’s length from Government, there are no plans to ask it to reconsider these decisions. The Department is keen that Arts Council England and English National Opera work together on the future of the organisation.
Asked by: Lord Smith of Finsbury (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the letter from the Deputy Director of the Department of Education’s Disadvantage and International Directorate dated 24 October, what consideration they have given to replacing “does not include” with “includes” in section 7 of the European University Institute (EU Exit) Regulations 2022.
Answered by Baroness Barran - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
While the UK’s membership of the European University Institute (EUI) convention ceased on exit of the EU, the department put in place an extension of its previous arrangements with the EUI beyond the end of the transition period, until 31 December 2022. This was to protect the status of UK-linked staff and students at the EUI, so that they could continue in their posts and with their studies while options for a future relationship with the EUI were considered.
Long standing government policy is to only grant privileges and immunities where there is a demonstrated and robust functional need for the running of the institution and never solely for personal benefit. In this case, in the absence of a negotiated international treaty compelling the government to do so, the department is unable to continue to grant privileges and immunities to EUI staff and students, including the UK linked ones.
The saving of the income tax privilege and the legal proceedings immunity for current staff is as considered appropriate and/or intended to give a reasonable period for those staff at the EUI to adjust, and they will be saved in relation to the current term of the staff member’s employment contract without extension.
Asked by: Lord Smith of Finsbury (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Department for International Trade:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether UK negotiators will seek to protect patent attorneys' rights of representation before the Unified Patent Court during accession negotiations to the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP).
Answered by Lord Grimstone of Boscobel
The Government cannot comment on the sensitive detail of live negotiations; however, accession will only take place on terms beneficial to the UK. The UK has a world leading intellectual property regime and will not sign trade deals that compromise it. The Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership sets clear and consistent rules for the intellectual property (IP) sector which will benefit UK businesses, attorneys, and consumers.
Asked by: Lord Smith of Finsbury (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Department for International Trade:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the implications of the UK's accession to the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) on the rights of representation of UK patent attorneys before the Unified Patent Court.
Answered by Lord Grimstone of Boscobel
The Government cannot comment on the sensitive detail of live negotiations; however, accession will only take place on terms beneficial to the UK. The UK has a world leading intellectual property regime and will not sign trade deals that compromise it. The Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership sets clear and consistent rules for the intellectual property (IP) sector which will benefit UK businesses, attorneys, and consumers.
Asked by: Lord Smith of Finsbury (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what is the current position in negotiations for the UK's associate membership of the Horizon Europe Programme; and what steps they are intending to take in order to protect the position of UK academics who have been awarded research grants by the European Research Council.
Answered by Lord Callanan - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
It has not proved possible to respond to this question in the time available before Prorogation. I will correspond directly with the noble Lord.
Asked by: Lord Smith of Finsbury (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the impact of the privatisation of Channel 4 on the independent production sector.
Answered by Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
Her Majesty’s Government consulted extensively on the future ownership model of Channel 4, and the views and evidence from a wide range of interested parties – including from the independent production sector – has informed the Government’s assessment and wider policy decisions.
The Government recognises that Channel 4 has consistently delivered on its remit in the decades since being established, including supporting the UK’s independent production sector. Forty years on, this sector is now flourishing. Independent production is increasingly less reliant on income from UK public service broadcasters, and will continue to be in demand for the high-quality, differentiated, distinctively British content it produces. In the 10 years between 2008 and 2018, the contribution of public service broadcaster commissions to sector revenue fell from 64% to 42%, due in large part to the growth of international revenue.
Her Majesty’s Government will publish its response to the consultation shortly.
Asked by: Lord Smith of Finsbury (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the fundamental differences between Channel 4 and international streaming services, such as Netflix.
Answered by Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
The increasing popularity in the UK of international media and streaming groups means that Channel 4, in common with other public service broadcasters, faces growing competition for audiences, programmes, and talent from new, global groups with greater spending power.
Channel 4 and these global streamers are certainly fundamentally different. But no one can deny that the markets within Channel 4 operates have been radically changed by the arrival of such competitors, and Channel 4 will need different tools to succeed in the future.
Audiences are increasingly likely to consume content on non-linear platforms such as video-on-demand services. Whilst overall daily audio-video viewing is increasing, broadcast TV’s share of total viewing fell from 74% in 2017 to 61% in 2020. At the same time, subscription video-on-demand services’ share of total video more than trebled, increasing from 6% in 2017 to 19% in 2020.
Global players such as Netflix have significant financial and operational resources compared to UK public service broadcasters, and they are driving up content costs and viewer acquisition costs across the sector. This is reflected across a number of genres, including high-end dramas. Channel 4’s commissioning spending is dwarfed by Netflix, and small in the context of broadcasters. Netflix invested £9.2 billion in 2020, which included spending £779 million on original UK productions, over twice as much as Channel 4, which spent £329 million on original programming on its main channel in 2020.
Asked by: Lord Smith of Finsbury (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what steps they will take to safeguard the specific public service duties of Channel 4 in the event of privatisation.
Answered by Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
Her Majesty’s Government believes that the need for public service broadcasting remains as strong as ever, and wants to ensure that the UK’s broadcasting system is dynamic and relevant, and that it can continue to meet the needs of audiences in the future.
The Government has been very clear that it wants Channel 4 to remain a public service broadcaster, with obligations and benefits similar to those which all public service broadcasters have – both public and privately-owned – so that it continues to make an important social, economic, and cultural contribution to the UK.
Asked by: Lord Smith of Finsbury (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what discussions, if any, they have had with (1) the BBC, and (2) the Scottish government, about provisions for the (a) protection and (b) enhancement, of Gaelic broadcasting in any broadcasting White Paper.
Answered by Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
The UK Government has a strong record of demonstrating its commitment to minority language broadcasting, including broadcasting in Scottish Gaelic, to ensure that our broadcasting sector serves all audiences of the UK. This includes the requirement in the Government’s Framework Agreement with the BBC for it to support the provision of output in Gaelic in Scotland and to operate a television channel (BBC Alba) in partnership with MG ALBA.
Such broadcasting has an important role to play in the UK’s broadcasting ecology, providing not only an opportunity for people to access content in a language familiar to them, but as a means of cultural expression for communities across the UK.
The Government is undertaking a strategic review of public service broadcasting in order to ensure that viewers across the whole UK continue to benefit from a system capable of meeting their needs, now and in the future. In undertaking this work the Government is engaging with a wide range of interested parties including the devolved administrations and the BBC, as well as other broadcasters, industry bodies, and viewer interest groups. We will set out the review's conclusions in due course.