Oral Answers to Questions

Elizabeth Truss Excerpts

Thursday 22nd March 2012 Commons Chamber

[Hugh Robertson]

The right hon. Lady makes an extremely good point. She knows, as I do, that those regulations date back to the London Olympic Games and Paralympic Games Act 2006 and were put in place to give us the best possible chance of raising as much sponsorship as possible from the private sector. The result, of course, was that the organising committee was extraordinarily successful in raising £700 million of sponsorship, which brings with it intellectual property issues.

That said, I absolutely recognise the issue that the right hon. Lady has itemised. Because the process has been such a success, we want the country and individual businesses to go out and tell that story. The regulations, of course, apply only until just after the games, and we will do all we can to ensure that they work.

[Elizabeth Truss (South West Norfolk) (Con)]

12. What steps he is taking to promote the digital economy.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (Mr Edward Vaizey)]

My Department is delivering a number of programmes and initiatives that will support growth and innovation across the digital economy and the economy more generally. We are investing up to £830 million in digital communications infrastructure by 2015 and working with Ofcom to deliver the 4G spectrum auction this year, and we will shortly publish a Green Paper setting out proposals for a regulatory framework for the communications and media sectors aimed at providing a thriving environment for growth and innovation in the UK.

[Elizabeth Truss]

I was delighted to read earlier this week that Britain leads the world in e-commerce, with 10% of all business taking place online. However, I am concerned about getting more young people involved in the industry, given that the number of people studying computer science is lower now than it was a decade ago and the proportion of women doing computer science has gone down to only 14%. What are we going to do to get more young people involved in the industry?

[Mr Vaizey]

I thank my hon. Friend for that important question. As she is probably aware, e-Skills, the sector skills council, had a specific computing for girls scheme to encourage girls at school to study computing, but the Secretary of State for Education’s important speech on revolutionising the computer science curriculum in January shows that this Government are committed to ensuring that more people study computer science. We are working with industry to ensure that more children choose that option.