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Written Question
Sports: Concussion
Monday 22nd April 2024

Asked by: Damian Collins (Conservative - Folkestone and Hythe)

Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, pursuant to the Answer of 20 March 2024 to Question 18418 on Sports: Concussion, who the members of the Sports Concussions Research Forum are; and what terms of reference were set for that forum's formulation of a report to identify priority research questions.

Answered by Stuart Andrew - Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport

The Sports Concussion Research Forum’s terms of reference are to develop a prioritised list of translatable research aims relating to concussion in sport, to be drawn from both the sports and academic communities, including consideration of such research that may extend beyond sport-specific areas, where appropriate.

The further aim of the Forum is to encourage academic institutions, foundations and other organisations to make concussion in sport one of their priorities and to focus their work in this area around the Forum’s prioritised list of research aims, which is expected to be published in 2024.

The members of the Sports Concussion Research Forum are:

  • Dr Robin Buckle (Chair), Chief Scientific Officer, Medical Research Council/UKRI
  • Prof Damian Bailey, University of South Wales
  • Prof Alan Carson, University of Edinburgh
  • Prof Peter Hutchinson, University of Cambridge and National Institute of Health Research
  • Prof Elizabeth Jeffries, University of York
  • Prof Fiona Lecky, University of Sheffield and Research Director of the Trauma Audit and Research Network
  • Prof Niklas Marklund, University of Lund, Sweden
  • Prof James Rowe, University of Cambridge
  • Prof David Sharp, Imperial College London and UK Dementia Research Institute


Written Question
Voluntary Work: Young People
Wednesday 17th April 2024

Asked by: Damian Collins (Conservative - Folkestone and Hythe)

Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, how many people have participated in a National Citizen Service programme since 2010.

Answered by Stuart Andrew - Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport

Over 800,000 young people participated in an NCS programme between 2010/11 and 2022/23. The NCS programme is due to deliver 261,000 experiences between 2023/24 and 2024/25, as per the 2023/24 Annual Business Plan. The number of experiences delivered in the year 2023/24 will be published in the Annual Report later this year.


Written Question
Arts: Tax Allowances
Wednesday 17th April 2024

Asked by: Damian Collins (Conservative - Folkestone and Hythe)

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether his Department has made an (a) assessment of the impact on the economy and (b) estimate of the number of recipients of (i) audio-visual (A) tax relief and (B) expenditure credit, (ii) museums and gallery exhibition tax relief and (iii) theatres and orchestras tax relief since 2010.

Answered by Nigel Huddleston

a) An evaluation of the creative industry tax reliefs covering Film Tax Relief, High-end Television Tax Relief, Animation Tax Relief and Children’s Television Tax Relief was published in 2022: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/creative-industry-tax-reliefs-evaluation

An evaluation of the video games tax relief was published in 2017: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/video-game-tax-relief-evaluation

A qualitative evaluation capturing the wider impacts of the Museums and Galleries relief was conducted in 2020: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/tax-relief-for-museums-and-galleries-qualitative-research

The government keeps the tax system under review.

b) The number of recipients of the creative industry tax reliefs is published in HMRC’s Creative Industries Statistics: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/creative-industries-statistics-august-2023


Written Question
Sports: Facilities
Wednesday 17th April 2024

Asked by: Damian Collins (Conservative - Folkestone and Hythe)

Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what the (a) number and (b) value of grants made through the Multi-Sport Grassroots Facilities Programme is since 2010.

Answered by Stuart Andrew - Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport

The Multi-Sport Grassroots Facilities Programme is investing over £325 million between 2021 and 2025 to level up facilities across the whole of the UK. The programme provides funding to make essential facility improvements, so that communities have a high-quality pitch to play on, and is a clear demonstration of the government’s commitment to levelling up all corners of the United Kingdom.

Since 2021, over £200 million has been invested in over 2,400 sites across the UK, improving the natural and artificial grass pitches on offer to communities and upgrading floodlights, goalposts, changing rooms and toilet facilities. All funded projects are listed on gov.uk at this link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/multi-sport-grassroots-facilities-programme-projects-2021-to-2025

Grants that were awarded in England prior to 2021 were delivered by the Football Foundation, funded through Sport England. Sport England’s funding to the Football Foundation is available on their website, along with all awards made by Sport England to football clubs since 2009: https://www.sportengland.org/

Sport is devolved - grants made in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland prior to the Multi-Sports Grassroots Facilities Programme are a matter for the Devolved Administrations.


Written Question
High Streets Heritage Action Zones Fund
Wednesday 17th April 2024

Asked by: Damian Collins (Conservative - Folkestone and Hythe)

Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what the value of grants awarded through the Heritage High Street Fund was in (a) the UK and (b) Kent since 2010.

Answered by Julia Lopez

The Government-funded High Streets Heritage Action Zones programme ran from 2019-2024, operating in England only. It was administered by Historic England. Since 2019, there have been £90,948,829 in grants awarded through the fund.

The programme has funded the transformation and restoration of over 60 high streets, creating economic growth and improving quality of life in these areas.

Two grants were awarded in Kent, in Ramsgate and Chatham. In total, the two schemes were awarded £2,241,797 over the course of the programme.

The High Streets Heritage Action Zone programme came to an end in March 2024.


Written Question
Sports: Concussion
Wednesday 20th March 2024

Asked by: Damian Collins (Conservative - Folkestone and Hythe)

Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, how many times the Sports Concussion Research Forum has met as of 13 March 2024; what priority areas for research it has (a) identified and (b) taken steps to deliver; and what (i) guidance and (ii) findings it has presented to (A) her Department and (B) other bodies for which she is responsible.

Answered by Stuart Andrew - Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport

Evidence-based sports research is an important component in ensuring that sport is made as safe as possible for all participants. To that end, DCMS established a Sports Concussion Research Forum in July 2022, chaired by the Medical Research Council, part of UK Research and Innovation. This brings together key academic experts with experience of traumatic brain injury, neurology and concussion to identify the priority research questions for the sporting sector.

The Research Forum has met five times since its inception and is now formulating a report to identify those priority research questions, with the report expected to be completed in 2024.

The Government remains committed to working with sports stakeholders to build on the positive work that is already taking place to mitigate the causes and effects of concussion in sport.


Written Question
British Overseas Territories and Caribbean: Digital Technology
Wednesday 20th March 2024

Asked by: Damian Collins (Conservative - Folkestone and Hythe)

Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, what assistance has been provided for the development of digital infrastructure in (a) the British Overseas Territories and (b) Caribbean Commonwealth countries since 2014.

Answered by David Rutley

Whilst digital infrastructure is a mostly devolved matter, the UK provides significant support to the four Official Development Assistance (ODA) eligible Territories. The FCDO-funded capital investment programme in Montserrat recently delivered a sub-sea fibre cable and in St Helena we are supporting improvements in the local telecommunications infrastructure.

The UK has not provided support for digital infrastructure in the Caribbean through our bilateral ODA. However, we continue to support the development of digital infrastructure through our shareholding in multilateral agencies including the World Bank, Inter-American and Caribbean Development Banks.


Written Question
Health Services: Kent
Tuesday 28th November 2023

Asked by: Damian Collins (Conservative - Folkestone and Hythe)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what funding her Department has allocated to (a) primary care in Folkestone and Hythe constituency, (b) East Kent Hospitals University NHS Foundation Trust and (c) capital investment in the (i) William Harvey Hospital in Ashford, (ii) Royal Victoria Hospital in Folkestone and (iii) Buckland Hospital in Dover in each year since 2010.

Answered by Andrew Stephenson

We do not hold the requested information centrally.

The ‘Financial assistance under section 40 of the National Health Service Act 2006’ reports set out all funding that was provided to NHS trusts for each financial year and are published with the Department of Health and Social Care Annual Report and Accounts. However, this does not itemise the funding at the individual hospital and site level. The reports are available at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/guidance-on-financing-available-to-nhs-trusts-and-foundation-trusts


Written Question
Police: Kent
Tuesday 28th November 2023

Asked by: Damian Collins (Conservative - Folkestone and Hythe)

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many police officers were serving in (a) the Folkestone and Hythe district and (b) Kent Police, in each year since 2010.

Answered by Chris Philp - Shadow Home Secretary

The Home Office collects and publishes data on the size of the police workforce in England and Wales, broken down by Police Force Area (PFA), on a bi-annual basis in the ‘Police Workforce, England and Wales’ statistical bulletin which can be accessed here: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/police-workforce-england-and-wales.

These data are collected by PFA level only, and information at lower levels of geography, such as districts are not collected. Data on the number of police officers in Kent as at 31 March each year, from 2007 to 2023, on a full-time equivalent and headcount basis, can be found in the ‘Police Workforce Open Data Table’ here: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1172892/open-data-table-police-workforce-260723.ods.


Written Question
Schools: Folkestone and Hythe
Monday 27th November 2023

Asked by: Damian Collins (Conservative - Folkestone and Hythe)

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how much funding has been provided for school buildings in the Folkestone and Hythe district for each year since 2010; and how much funding was received by each school in the district in each of those years.

Answered by Damian Hinds

The department has allocated over £15 billion since 2015 to keep schools safe and operational, including £1.8 billion in 2023/24.

Between 2015/16, when the current condition funding system was introduced, and 2023/24, Kent local authority has been allocated a total of £170,514,468 in school condition allocations (SCA), devolved formula capital (DFC) and one-off funding allocations to improve the condition of its maintained schools, including those in Folkestone and Hythe. Larger multi-academy trusts and voluntary aided school bodies (which cross local authority and parliamentary constituency boundaries) will also have been allocated condition funding in respect of the schools for which they are responsible. Funding allocations prior to 2015 are visible on the National Archives website available at: https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/ukgwa/*/https:/www.gov.uk/government/publications/capital-allocations. It is for local authorities, academy trusts and voluntary-aided school bodies to prioritise School Condition Allocations across their schools based on local knowledge of need.

In addition, 32 projects at 11 schools within the constituency have received funding through the Condition Improvement Fund and two schools were included in the Priority School Building Programme.

Funding allocations for 2023/24 are available at: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/school-capital-funding.