Duncan Hames
Main Page: Duncan Hames (Liberal Democrat - Chippenham)Department Debates - View all Duncan Hames's debates with the Leader of the House
(13 years, 7 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Hugh Robertson
Tempting though it is, the answer is absolutely not. If the hon. Lady gets hold of a copy of the letter I wrote to the chief executive of the Rugby Football League when I took over, she will see that I said I was absolutely determined to ensure that precisely the same treatment was applied to both codes of rugby—for obvious reasons. The slight problem was that the RFL did not ask the then Government—of course, the hon. Lady’s Government—as the Rugby Football Union did when mounting the bid. My intention is to treat both similarly.
Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)
Before taking office, my right hon. Friend was keen to promote the subtitling of parliamentary coverage. He may be aware that the service often ends by 6 o’clock in the evening, long before our debates here conclude. Will he urge broadcasters to ensure that all our proceedings are accessible to the 1 million users of subtitles who are either deaf or hard of hearing?
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (Mr Edward Vaizey)
We are obviously keen to make parliamentary proceedings accessible to everybody, particularly late-night Adjournment debates, which I take. We now have an e-accessibility forum that is progressing that agenda, and we have also increased the amount of subtitling by broadcasters on a voluntary basis.