Asked by: James Davies (Conservative - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what his policy is on enabling organised walking groups to resume their activities as the covid-19 lockdown restrictions are eased.
Answered by Nigel Huddleston - Financial Secretary (HM Treasury)
Sports and physical activity facilities play a crucial role in supporting adults and children to be active.The Government has made it clear that it will adopt a phased approach based on scientific and medical advice, and that the primary goal is to protect public health.
The government's guidance remains that people should gather in groups of no larger than six people from different households, or two households, adhering to social distancing including when as part of organised walking groups.
Asked by: James Davies (Conservative - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, if he will bring forward proposals to grant (a) music venues, (b) community sporting venues and (c) semi-professional sports clubs temporary charitable status for the purpose of donations during the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by John Whittingdale
It is not within DCMS’s gift to grant charitable status on a temporary basis and there are no plans to widen the definition of charity. Some music venues, community sporting venues and amateur sports clubs already qualify for charitable status and can therefore benefit from gift aid on donations. In England and Wales, charitable status is dependent on meeting the definition of a charity set out by Parliament in the Charities Act 2011. The advancement of arts, culture or amateur sport for the public benefit are determined to be charitable purposes within scope of the Charities Act 2011. To meet the definition of charity, organisations must exist for public benefit rather than private benefit. Further detail is set out in the Charity Commission’s Guidance on ‘Charitable Purposes’.
Arts and sporting organisations can benefit from the broad range of support the Government has made available to support organisations through the crisis, including the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme. In addition to the £750 million funding package the Government has provided specifically for voluntary, community and social enterprise organisations, the Government has unlocked £150 million from dormant bank and building society accounts, part of which will provide emergency loans for civil society organisations and improve the availability of fair, affordable credit to people in vulnerable circumstances.
The Government has also provided more targeted provision to support arts and sporting organisations through the crisis. On the 5th July, the Government announced a £1.57bn targeted rescue package to protect the arts, cultural and heritage industry. This represents the largest one off investment in culture, and will include investment in music venues to ensure future sustainability of the sector. Sport England has provided up to £210m of funding to support community and grassroots clubs facing financial challenges over the period of the COVID-19 crisis. This includes £35m of public funding under the banner of Community Emergency Funding (CEF) available to community clubs.
Asked by: James Davies (Conservative - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what recent discussions he has had with representatives of the entertainment sector on long-term support for freelancers who have been affected by the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
The government appreciates that the Covid-19 pandemic presents a significant challenge to many of DCMS’ sectors including the Creative Industries, which is why we announced unprecedented support for business and workers to protect them against the current economic emergency.
To ensure we are assisting the sectors as effectively as possible, regular ministerially-chaired roundtables are held with business representative organisations as well as trade associations from across the Creative Industries. In addition, officials are in regular contact with stakeholders from these sectors, and we continue to speak with HM Treasury colleagues to ensure that the full spectrum of government support reaches the UK's world-leading media and Creative Industries.
Asked by: James Davies (Conservative - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, if he will take steps to work with the devolved administrations to support and protect sports teams which are in financial difficulty as a result of the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Nigel Huddleston - Financial Secretary (HM Treasury)
Sport is a devolved matter, but we remain in close contact with the Devolved Administrations on a range of ways to support sport at this time, We are seeing fantastic levels of cooperation between all political parties and governments as we work together to tackle this crisis.
The Government has announced an unprecedented package of support to protect businesses across the UK, including the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (covering 80% of furloughed employees wages up to a cap of £2,500 per month), and Self-Employed Income Support Scheme (up to £2,500 per month in grants for eligible self-employed workers). These support measures are open to businesses across the UK and in every sector, including Sport.
Asked by: James Davies (Conservative - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, if he will take steps to encourage BT to improve (a) the information it provides online about broadband roll-out, (b) the accuracy of its communications to residents about when cabinets will come on stream and (c) information about support residents can access in the event of delays in roll-out.
Answered by Lord Vaizey of Didcot
On 25 February Ofcom published their initial conclusions for the Strategic Review of Digital Communications including a range of measures to improve the quality of service delivered by the whole of the telecoms industry, including Openreach, BT’s access network division.
Ofcom will work with industry to improve providers’ coordination and communication to benefit consumers, including detailed information about engineer visits for installation and fault repairs. Ofcom also plans to introduce tougher minimum standards of customer service for Openreach with rigorous enforcement and fines for underperformance. In addition, the regulator plans to publish annual performance data on all operators and will look to introduce automatic compensation for consumers and small businesses when service levels fall below minimum standards.
BT recently launched a new website providing more detailed and accurate information to the public on broadband service in any given area - http://www.superfast-openreach.co.uk/where-and-when/