Channel 4 Relocation

Alex Sobel Excerpts

Thursday 10th May 2018 Westminster Hall

[John Grogan (Keighley) (Lab)]

This is an exciting process, is it not? It is a great pleasure to follow the inspirational speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Batley and Spen (Tracy Brabin), and I congratulate the hon. Member for Glasgow South (Stewart Malcolm McDonald) on his paean of praise for the great city of Glasgow.

I will make a couple of opening remarks before concentrating on the Leeds city region. It is worthy of note that, for the first time since I was originally elected to the House in 1997, it is uncontested across all political parties that Channel 4 is best in the public sector. To paraphrase Sir Michael Grade when he was chief of Channel 4, Channel 4 can be in the public sector with a public broadcasting remit or it can be privatised, but it cannot be both. The fact that this process is taking place at all is testament to that; long may it remain so.

Another point worthy of note is that the new management of Channel 4 have embraced the process. A year ago, when I was re-elected to the House of Commons and had my first contacts with Channel 4, there were doubts about whether it could possibly come out of London and whether the talent would be available, and we heard about moving schools and all the same sorts of excuses that were made in the debate about the BBC 10 or 15 years ago. I am very pleased. I congratulate Ministers and shadow Ministers on keeping up the pressure; I think Channel 4 management are now behind the process.

Channel 4 is a great British institution. There are few that are similar in other nations in Europe, except perhaps ZDF and ARD in Germany. To have two great public service broadcasters, and Channel 4 with its particular remit, is something that makes me proud to be British.

Moving on to the Leeds city region’s bid, my hon. Friend the Member for Batley and Spen made the very good point that, although people say that their cities are like Channel 4, we have learned politically over the last few years that the United Kingdom is not just about cities. That is one of the strengths of the Leeds city region’s bid. Public investment in television in England and Wales over the last 30 or 40 years has all been in the west of the nation. There is a big gap in the east of the country where there has been no big investment in television and film.

There are obviously two bids here from Leeds and Sheffield, and both have strengths. As the new Mayor of the Sheffield city region, my hon. Friend the Member for Barnsley Central (Dan Jarvis), progresses in that role over the coming years, Sheffield will develop magnificently. At the moment, as an impartial judge from Keighley, I say that Leeds probably has the edge in terms of its creativity and of its being in the fastest growing area for television production throughout the country, and probably in terms of transport—until the new Mayor has had his full impact on improving Sheffield’s transport links. I would probably just about give it to Leeds.

However, I think we agree that it would be outrageous—I use that word advisedly, Sir Graham—if there was no representative from God’s own county on the shortlist that Channel 4 draw up. That is inconceivable, particularly given the investment record in the east of the country. I hope that, whether it is Leeds or Sheffield—unless both progress to the next stage—if only one Yorkshire city or region is on that shortlist, we will all unite behind it. This is a marvellous opportunity.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

To further make the case for the Leeds city region, we have the infrastructure, we have Sky, we have Perform and we have Yorkshire TV. We have Rockstar Leeds, the makers of Grand Theft Auto, which has sold more than 250 million copies around the world. We have Pace and ARRIS in Saltaire, which power internet and TV for hundreds of millions of people globally. We have the people and we have the infrastructure, does my hon. Friend not agree?

[John Grogan]

I do agree. One thing I admire about my hon. Friend is that he is much trendier than I am and is so much more in touch with the creative hub that is Leeds. He is right to say that Leeds has not only the history—Yorkshire Television and so on, which led to the spinning out of many production companies—but also this whole new phase and new generation of talent. I very much hope that Channel 4 recognises that.

UK Basketball

Alex Sobel Excerpts

Tuesday 20th February 2018 Westminster Hall

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the future of basketball in the UK.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Bailey. I am delighted that the Backbench Business Committee has given us an opportunity to debate the future of basketball at such an important juncture for the sport. It is five years since this place last had a chance to discuss this hugely popular sport.

There are three main areas of the sport and different organisations leading and governing them, as befits a game played by so many in this country. To put it simply, we have the grassroots sport, which is overseen by Basketball England, Basketball Wales and Basketball Scotland, looking after all the amateur clubs, from juniors right up to the semi-professional national basketball league. We have the professional club game for adults, which is overseen by the British Basketball League and Women’s British Basketball League. In my constituency, we have Leeds Force, who are the newest team in the British Basketball League. I know that many other hon. Members are in attendance because they have WBBL or BBL teams locally; just like all sports fans, we are here to support our teams. Finally, we have the elite, international top of the sport, which is made up of the eight Great Britain teams, both male and female, playing in age groups and at adult level, and overseen by the British Basketball Federation. This is GB Basketball.

I pay particular tribute to the women’s team, who beat both Portugal and Israel last week on the road, to jointly top their EuroBasket qualifying group with Greece, one of the pre-eminent basketball nations, which finished fourth at the last EuroBasket event, in 2017. Some of those top players are here today, as I am sure people will not have failed to notice: Stef Collins, GB women’s captain, Eilidh Simpson and Bev Kettlety, the team manager. Those women’s futures are at stake, as are the futures of their male counterparts, of all the boys and girls playing in the national age groups, and of all the boys and girls in the clubs out there who dream of one day putting on a Team GB jersey—in other words, all those who think that they have a future in basketball and that our great country will sustain their dream of one day playing for their national team. The more immediate future concerns those women present here today and their dreams of finishing the qualifiers and competing at the 2019 EuroBasket championships, where they have a brilliant chance of taking GB to its highest ever placing in the competition.

Minister, let us not be remembered for throwing an air ball; let us do what is right for basketball and slam dunk the ball right into the hoop for our GB players. At the moment, the ball is in the hands of UK Sport, and I am concerned that it is double dribbling with its decision not to fund GB Basketball. I see an opportunity for the Minister to make an offensive turnover, and her assist could provide the opportunity for British basketball to score the winning three-pointer that sees those women through to EuroBasket in Serbia and Latvia in 2019 and all the other GB teams continuing to compete in their competitions, thereby maintaining the dreams of young people to play at the highest level.

[Paul Blomfield (Sheffield Central) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend for securing this hugely important debate. On the point about dreams, does he recognise the point made to me by Tyler Gayle, who wrote to me on behalf of Sheffield Hatters, our women’s basketball team, and said that the sport of basketball is one of the most effective at reaching out to deprived communities? Is that not a particularly important reason that it should continue to be supported?

[Alex Sobel]

My hon. Friend’s area has two great basketball teams: Sheffield Hatters and Sheffield Sharks. People in disadvantaged communities in Sheffield, Leeds, London and other urban centres, aspire to play for such teams and, one day, for our national team, so his point is spot on. My constituent Tricia McKinney, knowing that this debate was scheduled to take place, wrote to me on a similar point. Her son represented England and played for Sheffield Sharks, in my hon. Friend’s constituency, and her daughter and four grandchildren are involved with clubs in Leeds. She said:

“I see first hand the physical and social benefits ‘of being involved’. All the facts and figures show that basketball provides opportunities for adults and children from diverse ethnic backgrounds and both genders to participate in sport. It is a particularly important sport for those in deprived communities.”

That echoes my hon. Friend’s point.

[Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this very important debate. Does he agree that local basketball involving colleges, schools and other organisations, such as John Leggott College and Leggott Academy, is so important and, indeed, key to helping to grow the grassroots of this very important game?

[Alex Sobel]

My hon. Friend makes an absolutely apt point, which leads me to my next point. My constituent Baile Beyai wrote to me:

“I’m currently studying Politics at Leeds University and Basketball was a big, big reason that I had the self-esteem to even attempt to study at university, especially growing up as a problem child”—

those are his words—

“in a ‘disadvantaged’ area of London. So thank you; it’s an inspiration that you’re commandeering these efforts as I doubt even you know how much impact it has on kids, especially ethnic minorities in low income families. We face a much…bigger dropout than other sports and more funding would definitely improve the chances of young children playing the sport. Growing up I was jumping trains to go to England Basketball trials and sessions by myself, and remember at age 16 I was forced to skip the regional competition because I just didn’t have the £120 to pay for hotels. I doubt such constraints are put on children who’ve been selected to a high level of competition in other sports.”

Minister, do we really want our inner-city kids driven to petty criminality in order to follow their dreams, or to abandon their dreams, as they cannot pay for hotels?

UK Sport recently announced £226 million for Olympic eligible sports until 2021. That includes £14.5 million for equestrian sports, £25.5 million for sailing and more than £6 million for modern pentathlon—a sport that requires a horse, a sword and a gun. None of those sports is within reach of the young people we see playing basketball. We are funding elite sports for elites.

Temi Fagbenle, who top scored for GB in last week’s win against Israel, started playing in Haringey. That ultimately led her to a scholarship at Harvard University and a contract in the Women’s National Basketball Association, where she plays for Minnesota.

Last week, Temi said:

“I feel…they are literally trying to rip the GB shirts off my and my team-mates’ backs. Just look at the athletes on the basketball teams—a lot of us are from ethnic minorities and/or grew up in working-class households. The youth from these groups, and young people in general, aren’t inspired by obscure sports that are completely alien to them, they are inspired by athletes they can relate with.”

This is the sad reality of where we are. The next game for Temi and the other women players will be in November, but will they be able to play that game and qualify for EuroBasket, as we have heard they are on course to do?

I think it is important, Mr Bailey, that you know the background to how we got here. In 2006, British Basketball was formed, as required by the International Basketball Federation—FIBA—in conjunction with the British Olympic Association, to guide our teams through to London 2012, where we qualified as hosts. Since then, basketball has continued to grow in popularity, with more and more players giving us our best ever base for the future, but funding has eroded and is almost entirely at risk, although our elite teams have continued to improve, especially the women, who finished a best ever ninth at the 2013 EuroBasket tournament. The two main funding bodies in this country are Sport England and UK Sport, but at present our GB teams do not receive funding from UK Sport because basketball does not meet the current performance policy. Sport England provides £4.7 million for the grassroots game in England and allocates £1.4 million for talent, with £150,000 of Sport England’s talent grant in 2018, plus a further indicative investment of up to £150,000 from that talent grant, to ensure that the men’s and women’s under-16, under-18 and under-20 age group teams can compete this summer, but there is nothing for the senior teams.

This temporary reallocation of funds is subject to final approval by Sport England, and I understand that it will be confirmed shortly. Grateful as I am to Sport England, that is not enough to sustain our GB teams, and if no more funding comes forward, we will have to withdraw all our teams. The sum of £1 million a year is enough to sustain all of elite basketball in the UK. The funding that basketball received was equivalent to just £10,000 per player, while so-called—but not guaranteed—podium team sports received £40,000 per player in the old funding regime.

[Julia Lopez (Hornchurch and Upminster) (Con)]

I appreciate the hon. Gentleman’s securing this debate, not least because I wake up every day to the NBA highlights on YouTube as my husband is such a fan. One reason for the great appeal of basketball is that it is a game of the street. That is particularly the case in London, where outdoor courts such as Clapham Common, Turnpike Lane and Bethnal Green can act as a social lubricant for people from all backgrounds. Does the hon. Gentleman therefore agree that we need not just to focus on funding costly leagues and indoor basketball courts, but to get local authorities to fund outdoor courts properly and get proper facilities for people?

[Alex Sobel]

Absolutely. I am very grateful for the hon. Lady’s point, because I am not going into great depth about facilities, but we absolutely do need facilities, and I will come to the outdoor game later in my speech.

I am sure that most hon. Members think of basketball as a five-player game indoors, but they will also remember the classic movie “White Men Can’t Jump”, starring Woody Harrelson and Wesley Snipes, in which Woody and Wesley play outdoors on a half-court, two on two. That will not quite become an Olympic sport, but if we add a player on each side, it will: 3 on 3 basketball will debut at the Tokyo 2020 games, in just two years’ time, as a full Olympic sport—an Olympic sport eligible for UK Sport funding. No one knows who the medal challengers will be or what our Olympic potential is.

The game 3 on 3 is played in every urban constituency, as the hon. Member for Hornchurch and Upminster (Julia Lopez) has pointed out. In fact, 3 on 3 basketball is the largest urban team sport in the world, according to a study commissioned by the International Olympic Committee. The Netherlands base their youth basketball development programme on the 3 on 3 style of play, and as a result the country is ranked second across all genders and ages. Ball Out 3x3 is pioneering 3 on 3 basketball in the UK and is endorsed by FIBA 3x3. It will deliver the nation’s biggest 3 on 3 tournament this summer. We will become one of the leaders of 3 on 3 if this continues.

In the United States, rapper Ice Cube has teamed up with former NBA stars to launch a 3 on 3 league. Cube said:

“It was to bring a style of basketball that I grew up playing, watching, and loving, which is 3-on-3 basketball.”

That is the same urban sport that our young people play outdoors. As this is the first debate I have led in Westminster Hall, I hope you will indulge me, Mr Bailey, and let me quote from the Ice Cube song, “It Was a Good Day”, which is about a day in south-central Los Angeles, a very urban and difficult area. It was a day without any gang violence, air pollution or police harassment. He raps:

“Which park, are y’all playin’ basketball?

Get me on the court and I’m trouble”.

The game 3 on 3 is global, urban and an Olympic sport. It has a bright future, but we are not even considering its potential for our own programme. UK Sport revealed in its annual review that athletes in para taekwondo, para badminton, sport climbing, karate and BMX freestyle will receive national lottery support, as they enter the Olympic and Paralympic programme for the first time, but not 3 on 3.

GB Basketball wrote to UK Sport in June last year seeking a meeting about a 3 on 3 programme, but a meeting did not take place until January this year. GB Basketball has asked for help, as it needs expertise to research the position of the 3 on 3 game and strategic support for 3 on 3. I am sure that UK Sport will say that GB Basketball did not apply, which is true, but it took six months for UK Sport to engage with GB Basketball, and support was not forthcoming to put in a comprehensive application for Olympic funding. GB Basketball is waiting for UK Sport to confirm that it will support it in the process. We are missing an opportunity with 3 on 3. However, if we do fund it, we still need to keep our elite basketball teams on the court.

[Stephen Doughty (Cardiff South and Penarth) (Lab/Co-op)]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. I wholeheartedly agree with many of his points. I have been contacted by many constituents representing Vale Vipers and Cardiff Met Archers, and by Sheridan Ward, whose son Jed has been selected to play for Wales. They are all passionate about this game. I know how much difference it made to kids in the vale when I was growing up. Some of them went off to play in the United States and at the top levels in the UK sport. Without this funding and support, kids will not have that chance in the future, so I wholeheartedly endorse what my hon. Friend is saying.

[Alex Sobel]

My hon. Friend hits the nail right on the head. I am grateful for his contribution. Basketball Wales provides valuable support to UK basketball.

On broadcasting, the British Basketball League is not currently able to secure domestic and international broadcast revenues, whereas other European leagues have monetised broadcasting both domestically and internationally. Attendance figures vary throughout Europe, but basketball is clearly a popular spectator sport. BBL’s average stadium capacity is only 2,362—Leeds Force have the smallest arena in the UK—compared with 4,424 in Germany and 6,447 in Spain. The value of France’s domestic broadcasting rights for basketball stands at £8.5 million. The domestic league in Spain is valued at £5.3 million and Germany’s at £0.9 million.

The Perform Media Group—one the world’s largest sports media companies, which holds the BBL media rights—estimates that the level of interest in basketball in the UK stands at 20% of the population. That is one in five people. Similarly, 22% of the population in Germany takes an interest in the game. The figures for France and Spain are 33% and 61% respectively. Much smaller nations, such as Israel, still manage to monetise their league rights to the tune of £1.8 million. The potential audience of 20% in the UK is sizeable. If we can grow the brand appeal of both the national team and the BBL, that will help create a sustainable commercial model for both.

The UK’s domestic fan base is young—we can see that from those present in the Public Gallery—which is extremely important to advertisers. The monetisation of German and Israeli basketball gives us a benchmark for where the UK could realistically be in the future with the right funding and investment. However, due to the rise of internet protocol television there is general commercial uncertainty over the future of TV licensing revenues. As a result, the right to broadcast tier 1 sports, such as the premier league, the National Football League and the champions league, attract an even larger share of broadcasting budgets. Tier 2 sports, such as ruby league, ruby sevens and hockey, are struggling to grow and maintain revenues from broadcasting rights. Currently, the only way to watch the BBL is online, apart from the finals games that are broadcast—but poorly promoted—on the BBC. However, 10 times as many people watch the BBL on the Unilad Facebook page than on the BBC. There are huge opportunities to grow the audience for basketball here, and get more young people playing through clubs and rising to the highest level. These audiences will also attract commercial opportunities, but this takes time—time that the game is currently not being given.

Our GB games are also not being broadcast, with limited live-streaming opportunities to watch GB games, so how can the British fan base watch our national team and how can our national team move on to monetise their potential? In the medium term, if we can get those broadcasting rights for those games, we can monetise it, but in the short term, that just is not possible.

I hope that the Minister will take on board three recommendations, with which she can score a triple double—a basketball term for scoring 10 or more in three different areas. First, I recommend that sports funds provide a short-term solution for the next three seasons so that GB players can stay on the court. Secondly, post-Tokyo, I recommend that the review of elite funding looks at a wider set of criteria than immediate podium potential and a wider range of socioeconomic factors, including the barriers to elite sport faced by our black, Asian and minority ethnic and disadvantaged communities, linking it to the sports they play. Finally, I would like the Minister to intervene and recommend that UK Sport undertakes an urgent review of the potential of 3 on 3 and that funding is made available for a development programme for a 3 on 3 squad for Tokyo.

[Mr Adrian Bailey (in the Chair)]

I have something like eight Members down to speak. I intend to call the Front-Bench spokespersons at 10.30 am at the latest. That works out at approximately five minutes per speaker. I will not impose a time limit at this point, but I will start to get agitated and interrupt after five minutes. Back Benchers should bear that in mind.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alex Sobel]

Because I have little time, I will concentrate on the Minister’s remarks. I thank her for taking on board two of my recommendations, but I want to refer to the conversations I had yesterday with UK Sport. It admitted that basketball had medal potential, but that it would take 12 years. UK Sport initially funded basketball in 2006, but that ceased in 2014. UK Sport did not see through those 12 years that it identified to me on the phone yesterday. As my hon. Friend the Member for Washington and Sunderland West (Mrs Hodgson) said, funding is £102 per adult participant, which is the lowest of any team sport, even though it has the second highest participation rates. With those participation rates, it surely has Olympic potential, and UK Sport admitted as much.

A number of Members, including the hon. Members for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss) and for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Gavin Newlands) and my hon. Friends the Members for Keighley (John Grogan) and for Tooting (Dr Allin-Khan), mentioned the Commonwealth games. I want to highlight the letter that FIBA sent to the Minister yesterday. I received a copy. It said:

“I revert to the FIBA October letter, sent to British Basketball, that England and Scotland’s Commonwealth Games participation could still be under threat if Great Britain Basketball cannot fulfil its senior fixtures in the next windows.”

Yesterday, UK Sport said to me that GB Basketball should perhaps relook at its strategy and concentrate on the Commonwealth games. FIBA said that is not possible. I am concerned that UK Sport is luxuriating in complacency about UK basketball and does not understand the implications of its actions across the piece. An urgent discussion is needed among the Minister, possibly me, GB Basketball, Sport England, UK Sport and others, and I am glad that the Minister is committed to that. As a matter of urgency, we need to move things on so that we can save UK basketball, which is a unique sport in this country.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered the future of basketball in the UK.

Erasmus Plus Programme: Youth and Sport

Alex Sobel Excerpts

Tuesday 30th January 2018 Westminster Hall

[Lloyd Russell-Moyle (Brighton, Kemptown) (Lab/Co-op)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered youth activities and sport within the Erasmus Plus programme.

I applied for the debate, as chair of the all-party parliamentary group on youth affairs and former vice-president of the European youth forum, for two main reasons. The first is the big issue hanging over us in almost every decision we make in this place at the moment: Brexit. How will we continue to co-operate with EU programmes after departure day? The Minister for Universities has stated that the Government intend to negotiate some sort of continued access with Erasmus Plus and its successor. However, the Government’s intentions remain unclear on the youth elements of the programme that are part of Erasmus now but may be separated post-2020 in the next EU multiannual financial framework, which is being negotiated.

I note that it will be much easier to continue co-operation in higher education—most exchanges there are bilateral in nature—than it will be in youth and sport, where exchange and co-operation are primarily based on multilateral partnerships, making the arrangements all the more complicated. I remain concerned that when people talk about Erasmus, they are generally speaking about the university sector. When I tried to secure this debate, I was asked multiple times whether the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport was the correct Department to respond. The Universities Minister has given assurances about the Erasmus programme but not wider assurances about its youth and sport sections, and particularly how our policy on youth and sport will feed into an Erasmus successor programme. That is why I am here.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

As my hon. Friend said, the Erasmus sport programme is not just for universities. One of the Barking Abbey sports academy programmes is a basketball programme. As chair of the all-party parliamentary group on basketball, I am proud that 35 basketball apprentices undertook an exchange with the Basketball Federation of Madrid. Sixty-five per cent of Barking Abbey students are from black and minority ethnic communities. Does he agree that the loss of such a programme would be detrimental not just to sport, but to BME communities in the UK?

[Lloyd Russell-Moyle]

Totally. I will talk later about how the youth and sport programmes are far more diverse than some of the university parts of the Erasmus Plus programme. The continued participation of black, Asian and minority ethnic communities and other harder-to-reach or economically deprived communities in parts of those programmes is really important. We need to think about not just our continued participation in the Erasmus programme but, generally, how we will continue to co-operate with our European partners on youth policy and sport policy.

Erasmus has secured a place in people’s minds as a university programme—600,000 people from the UK have gone abroad to study in the past 30 years—but there are similar numbers in the youth programme. It is vital to highlight the importance of youth and sport in Erasmus Plus. What are the policy views of DCMS about how that programme should look? Additionally, how will our current domestic programmes intertwine and co-operate with a future Erasmus programme? How will the International Citizen Service and National Citizen Service work in harmony with any future European programmes? How will UK Sport’s international development through excellence and leadership in sport programme continue to work with the sport section of Erasmus Plus?

The sport part of the programme is a good example. More than 10,000 people have taken part in the youth and sport section alone in the past year, while the IDEALS programme has an average uptake of 46 young people. Those are different programmes, but the scale of Erasmus’s youth and sport section outweighs any of our domestic programmes. That is why it is so important that our involvement continues. The current programme runs from 2014 to 2020, so it is in its final half. We await the independent mid-term evaluation report, which was completed in August 2017 and is sitting on desks in the Commission in Brussels. We all want to see what the official report—rather than the drafts—will say.

I have spoken at length to several national agencies and to the evaluation team who wrote the report on EU youth and sport policy. What role is the UK playing to ensure that we lead those discussions? If we are to buy into Erasmus Plus and its successor programmes, we want to ensure that they meet our needs, so we need to roll our sleeves up and get involved in the nitty-gritty of the debate and discussions. If we are to remain in Erasmus, we must ensure that it is in line with our youth policy. That would be much easier to do if we had had the youth strategy that the Government promised before the election. I understand that there will now be a youth chapter in the civil society policy. It is important that we are clear about our policies so that we can influence our European colleagues.

From conversations with colleagues in Ukraine last night, I understand that the Ukrainian authorities tried to opt into only part of the Erasmus programme—interestingly, the youth and sport part, not the university part—but they were rebuffed by the Commission, who said that it is all or nothing; they could not start to take programmes apart. That makes it clear that if we took part, we would be in not just the university section, but the youth and sport section. It is, therefore, even more important that we inform the design of the youth section based on our policies.

What vision do the Minister and the Government have for the content? Erasmus Plus has policy themes based particularly around economic policy, because the current programme was designed in the wake of the economic crash to get young people back into economic activity. Issues of social inclusion and radicalisation have now come to the fore. How will those issues, which I assume the Government will want to tackle, be reflected in a new programme? What are the Government’s priorities?

Additionally, in the latest Commission proposal, it looks as though the European Voluntary Service for Europe and neighbouring countries—in a crude way, I guess it is our equivalent of ICS—will be taken out of Erasmus. The EVS has existed for 20 years, so it is not a new programme, and we have participated in it for all that time. It will be merged into a new European solidarity corps—or, as most of my European colleagues rather unfortunately pronounce it, “corpse”—and how that corps complements NCS and ICS will be really important. Do the Government intend to opt into the new European solidary corps? We have had reassurances about opting into the Erasmus programme, and the European solidarity corps will be a successor, but it will not be part of Erasmus. Do the Government intend to commit to continuing in all successor components of Erasmus Plus, or will we continue only with the core of Erasmus, with everything else still up for question?

Erasmus is the name of the programme we have at the moment, but it was not always thus. Before 2014, there was a separate youth programme, Youth in Action, and before that the EU Youth Programme. There were Comenius, Grundtvig and Leonardo—I could go on with the other European philosophers. Erasmus was chosen in conversations we had with the Commission. I was not in favour of it at the time; in fact, I argued heavily against it when I was in Brussels.

The idea was that everyone knew Erasmus, so we might as well try to make everything Erasmus. In my view, doing so just waters down the other bits of the programme that are not really known about, but that is the direction that the Commission went in. Now it looks as though the Commission is moving towards separating parts of those programmes back out into a solidarity corps, and it would be interesting to know the position of the UK Government and the Minister. Are we supportive of those plans to split out again? How are we having those discussions in Europe?

The higher education sector has a high success rate in achieving Erasmus funding; 90% plus of Erasmus funding is successful in that sector. In the youth sector, it is around the 30%-plus mark. I sat on the European programming committee in a previous life, and the evaluators often state that the youth programmes are just as well written, but they are written by volunteers. It is the same with the sports programme; we are often talking about voluntary sports clubs rather than big, professional HE institutions. How will our influence be brought to bear on the Commission and the discussions in the Council to ensure that the future programmes, and particularly the solidarity corps, are flexible, light-touch programmes to which voluntary groups and small organisations can apply?

One of the outcomes, as I understand it, of the mid-term evaluation is that smaller organisations have been pushed out by the bigger merger. There are other advantages to merging everything into one, and I do not particularly want to get into them all, but it is important to recognise that smaller organisations, which we want to encourage and foster, are at a disadvantage in an integrated programme. I hope that we will welcome the European Commission’s direction.

The only reasons we managed to secure a separate section for youth in the Erasmus programme were the heavy lobbying work from youth organisations, which I helped to co-ordinate, and detailed discussions with Commissioner Vassiliou, who was the commissioner at the time. I wonder whether the Minister has considered, in her discussions with youth organisations, the importance of including the voices of youth and youth organisations in the programme.

Equally, it would be interesting to include the voices of stakeholders such as Scottish, Welsh and Northern Ireland colleagues. The matter is generally devolved, but we represent the whole UK in the discussions. I am aware that the Belgian authorities take their counterparts with them to Council meetings. The Belgian authorities have no problem with having all their regional Ministers sitting behind them. Are we considering something similar, particularly on these important devolved matters—on sports and youth—to ensure that those voices are included?

I will give some numbers quickly before I finish. I have asked several questions that I hope to hear back on. Erasmus, of course, is a good programme. Some 16,000 higher education students took part last year, and 10,000 youth and sports groups, but only 11% of the money is distributed to youth and sport programmes—1% for sport and 10% for youth. That surely shows the efficiency of the youth and sports programme. The cost per head of a participant in the youth part of the Erasmus programme is €900 or thereabouts. The cost of participating in the Erasmus higher education programme is €2,500 within Europe; if participants take the Erasmus option of going to a neighbouring non-EU country such as Norway or the Russian Federation, it is €5,000 per participant.

There is nothing wrong with investing in students who go into higher education, but the majority of students who take part in the Erasmus higher education programme are from more privileged backgrounds, by the nature of the fact that they have gone to university and then chosen to opt out. As I have mentioned, more than 50% of those on the youth programme come from the most disadvantaged backgrounds. It is important that we continue to opt in and have a voice. A stack of case studies is available on the websites of the British Council and the UK national agency about how the programme—particularly EVS—has turned young people’s lives around, and I implore hon. Members to look at them.

When I was chair of Woodcraft Folk, a national voluntary youth organisation, I applied for those grants and saw this at first hand. I remember a young person from County Durham who came to the programme with very anti-immigrant views. By the end of it, after doing exchanges and working with other young people from across Europe, his views were totally transformed because he was able to see the value of humanity in all of us. That is what I hope this Government will do, by continuing to engage in the programme and by giving a strong commitment that we will continue not only in Erasmus, but in the solidarity corps and the European Voluntary Service substitute.

Leaving the EU: Data Protection

Alex Sobel Excerpts

Thursday 12th October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington (Matt Western) on his maiden speech, which reminded me of a happy childhood visit to Warwick castle. I am sure that he will make fantastic contributions to the House in the future.

The transfer of data is critical for the functioning of our economy. The proper management and control of data is increasingly a matter of civil liberties. Roughly 70% of the UK’s trade in services is reliant on the free flow of personal data. The EU’s data economy is expected to be worth £643 billion by 2020 and millions of UK citizens share their lives online. To be able to operate, UK businesses require clarity on the legal basis for data transfer post Brexit.

As the Minister asserted, the Government’s future partnership paper presents the adequacy model as the basis for a future UK-EU agreement on exchanging and protecting personal data. As my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge (Daniel Zeichner) said, the alternatives—making use of binding corporate rules or standard contractual clauses—would be burdensome, costly and create considerable uncertainty for individuals and businesses. Given that a post-Brexit UK will find itself in a position of unprecedented alignment with existing EU laws and norms, it does appear that an adequacy agreement is the most sensible way forward. The UK—it is hoped—will be designated by the European Commission as providing adequate protection for personal data, and it will be business as usual.

As the House of Lords European Union Committee has made clear, however, even if the UK positioned itself in perfect alignment with EU rules as it exits, it is very likely that the EU will amend or reform its data law in the near future, thus threatening the UK’s adequacy status. Divergence between the EU and a post-Brexit UK may come sooner rather than later.

In 2009, the EU’s charter of fundamental rights became legally binding. The charter codified existing EU rights and principles and is now the source document for EU fundamental rights. Article 8 of the CFR covers the protections of personal data—the right to privacy and the right to data protection that serve as the foundation for the EU’s data protection law. The European Union’s general data protection regulation, which will apply in the UK from May 2018, creates and enhances data protections and rights for EU citizens in continuity with the principles of article 8 and the CFR more generally.

Much is made of the EU’s novel right to be forgotten, but the GDPR also speaks to the issue of algorithmic decision making and processes that significantly affect users every moment of the day for most of our citizens—the Minister is probably being affected right now, as he is on his phone. It also creates a right to explanation whereby individuals can ask for details on how decisions about them were made—for example, on access to credit. As such, the GDPR creates a requirement on those designing algorithms and evaluation frameworks to avoid prejudicial decision making and to enable easy explanations for users.

Those rights and norms are at the cutting edge of global data protections law and are essential for our tech industry in the UK. They are possible because the EU is developing its data protection laws in accordance with the principles expressed in the charter of fundamental rights. However, the Government have made it clear that the charter will not form part of domestic law on or after exit day. As such, significant divergence from EU data protection norms may begin sooner than expected, putting our tech industry in incredible jeopardy.

Once the UK has surrendered its place at the EU’s decision-making table, as is the Government’s intention, our ability to exert influence on the future of EU data law will be greatly diminished. Not only are we presented with yet another possibility of the UK being demoted from rule maker to rule taker, but the constant anxiety that the UK may fall out of compliance with EU data laws is deeply unhelpful to individuals and UK businesses of whatever magnitude. If compliance with the charter of fundamental rights is required in practice to secure regulatory harmony and thus business confidence, the Government’s commitment to jettisoning the charter appears increasingly odd.

Securing the free flow of data, especially for an economy such as ours that is largely service-based, should be a pressing imperative for the Government. Ensuring that individuals are protected by rigorous data protection laws should be a top priority for the Government. I think it prudent therefore that the Government look again at their intention to bin the charter of fundamental rights as part of their EU withdrawal plans.