Oral Answers to Questions
Nick Smith Excerpts(1 month, 1 week ago)
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Mary Kelly Foy (City of Durham) (Lab)
Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent and Rhymney)
May I say how glad I am to give my hon. Friend the Member for Battersea (Marsha De Cordova) a break this morning? I also praise the former Chair of the Administration Committee, Sir Charles Walker; he has been a great friend and a great champion for this House.
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for City of Durham (Mary Kelly Foy) for asking this important question. The House of Commons Administration is committed to providing period products for emergency use; they are available free of charge in selected toilets across the parliamentary estate. No one should be put in an uncomfortable situation due to lack of access to emergency period products.
Mary Kelly Foy
May I say how glad I am to be asking this question today, so that my hon. Friend can also earn his pay? Free period products in the workplace are essential items, but in far too many places of work they are seen as optional. I know there are a few places around the parliamentary estate where free period products can be accessed, but more places are required and we cannot leave out our constituency offices. Will he ensure that more period products are made available both here and in constituency offices around the country?
Nick Smith
My hon. Friend makes a great point. The House service was asked a year ago to provide period products for emergency use, and it engages with groups, such as our workplace equality networks, to ensure accessible products throughout our House. On constituency offices, as Members of Parliament we are responsible for our staff, and away from this estate I would expect a Member, as an employer, to decide on what provision to arrange for their teams. However, I am happy to take that point back to the Administration Committee for further consideration of take-up and distribution, and I will contact my hon. Friend in good time on the matter.
Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)
Nick Smith
Earlier this year, the Restoration and Renewal Client Board published the strategic case for the R and R programme, which sets out how to deliver the R and R works that will be developed in detail over the next year. This detailed work, which will include robust cost, timescale and risk estimates for all three options, is expected to be presented to the House in 2025 to enable an evidence-based decision on how best to restore our lovely Palace.
Dame Meg Hillier
It feels a bit like groundhog day—we have been talking about restoration and renewal for 40 years. Bits are falling off the building, there are leaks in every office I have had in this building and in each part of the estate, and we all know the problems of asbestos and the issues in the basement. My hon. Friend has given me the timetable, but can he say that he will champion this issue, and that we will finally get to a resolution before a catastrophic event in this place destroys this world heritage site?
Nick Smith
I know that my hon. Friend has been an advocate for this programme for many years. Together, as members of the Public Accounts Committee, we sought safety for all of us here on the estate, the modernisation of our facilities and value for money. Detailed designs are being developed and surveys continue. The work of the R and R programme has been continuing at pace over the past six months, following the work of the client board and the programme board. We will work together on this.
Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)
I apologise for not being here earlier. Can the hon. Gentleman confirm that we are spending more than £1 million a month on just the maintenance of this Palace? The long delay—there is no reason for it—over making these decisions lengthens the process and leads to the taxpayer paying more money, and it is leading to more degradation of this Palace as we sit here.
Nick Smith
The hon. Member is right about the importance of moving faster and reducing costs on this important programme. I do not know the detailed answer to the question he asks, but I will get back to him.
Film Industry
Nick Smith Excerpts(1 month, 2 weeks ago)
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Lisa Nandy
I thank the hon. Member very much. I know from her previous role on the Select Committee that she is a formidable Chair, and I am very much not looking forward to appearing in front of her at the earliest opportunity.
The hon. Member is absolutely right about the visual effects tax credit. We understand how important these reliefs are to the industry and we plan to provide an update as soon as we can, although we have the spending review imminently, and there is work ongoing to ensure that we get right our offer to the creative industries as a whole. On the enterprise investment scheme for high-end TV, I am afraid that the answer is similar, but I would welcome the chance to keep talking to the hon. Member and to members of the Committee, once she has some. On the investment summit, I appreciate her calling me stardust—I do not think I have ever been called stardust before—or did she mean the people that we might bring along? She and I share the view that the creative industries are absolutely central to our economic growth agenda, and I am really pleased that that view is shared by the Prime Minister, the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Secretary of State for Business and Trade. She will see that at the investment summit next week and in the work that we will release over the next few weeks.
Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent and Rhymney) (Lab)
I welcome the statement. As a recent chair of the all-party parliamentary group for film and broader screen, I applaud the work of the British Film Institute, which does a great job as a champion of this fantastic sector. In Blaenau Gwent and Rhymney, we have the brilliant Cymru Creations, a local film company that helps young people to produce great films and learn a brilliant trade. What more can the Secretary of State do to support small and medium-sized enterprises in this sector? It is vital that we get behind them.
Lisa Nandy
I thank my hon. Friend for his role in helping to fly the flag for the British film industry. I also join him in paying tribute to the work of the BFI, and particularly to Ben Roberts and Harriet Finney, who have done extraordinary work for the film industry and for our country. I share my hon. Friend’s sentiment about SMEs. The measures announced will be a huge boost to SMEs, but this Government are aware that there is more that we can do. As we continue to build this exciting agenda with the British film industry, we will continue to talk to it and to make sure that we are meeting the needs of SMEs from the length and breadth of the country.