Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Alison McGovern and Julia Lopez(1 year, 8 months ago)
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Julia Lopez
I thank my hon. Friend for raising his concerns about British Gas. As the digital infrastructure Minister, I want to ensure that everyone has great access to the internet, but he might be interested to know that suppliers with more than 50,000 customers must allow people to pay energy bills in cash or on prepayment, and talk to them over the phone.
Alison McGovern (Wirral South) (Lab)
What assessment has the Minister made of the impact of cryptocurrency technologies on low-income households?
Julia Lopez
I confess that cryptocurrency is not in my portfolio, but I am happy to refer the hon. Lady to a Minister who may be able to answer that.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Alison McGovern and Julia Lopez(3 years, 2 months ago)
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Julia Lopez
I thank the hon. Lady for her question. As I mentioned, there have been intensive negotiations at a ministerial level with our EU counterparts and a lot of progress has been made. As I mentioned in my opening reply, we now have agreements with 19 of the 27 members states that allow visa and permit-free touring, but we want to make more progress because we know this is a very important issue for musicians and artists across the country.
Alison McGovern (Wirral South) (Lab)
We welcome all the new Ministers, but I want to be clear on this issue: the Minister said in response to those questions that extensive efforts are being made, yet on 4 August when the Department published a statement describing the situation, the industry was clear that nothing has changed. Will she refer to that 4 August statement on touring and tell me, since the original Brexit deal was signed, exactly what has changed?
Julia Lopez
I thank the hon. Lady for her passion, and we share that intensity of desire to get this issue sorted for UK musicians. The challenge is our desire to secure the same freedoms for our musicians in the EU that EU musicians are allowed when they come over to the UK. It is a shame, because the quality of musicianship in our country is second to none, so in a sense EU member states are missing out if they continue not to provide the freedoms that we provide to their artists. We will continue our intensive negotiations, but we have to accept that this is not in our control. We put forward a very fair and sensible deal to our EU counterparts and it is for them to agree the same freedoms that we grant them.