Oral Answers to Questions

Emma Lewell-Buck Excerpts

Thursday 27th April 2023 Commons Chamber

[Julia Lopez]

My hon. Friend is very fortunate to represent one of our beautiful coastal communities, and he is right about the importance of promoting non-London destinations. There is a tremendous amount of fantastic things to visit out there beyond our capital. To give a couple of examples, we have a GREAT-funded campaign to see things differently, which includes the Pembrokeshire coast national park, Thorpe Bay beach and Brighton pier. Earlier this year, VisitBritain welcomed more than 120 international trade buyers in the travel industry for a series of educational visits across Britain that focused on coastal communities. I hope that they will take the wonderful things that they saw back to the buyers in their own countries.

[Mrs Emma Lewell-Buck (South Shields) (Lab)]

T3. First, I wish to thank you, Mr Speaker, for hosting last week’s reception celebrating the successful four decades of our Great North Run. Chuter Ede community centre in South Shields is facing closure, as are many other centres with sports facilities across the country. Does the Minister think it is the lack of Government help with their high energy bills, the Conservative cost of living crisis or the Conservative-led local authority cuts that are to blame?