Asked by: Janet Daby (Labour - Lewisham East)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, when she plans to respond to correspondence of 9 June 2023 from the hon. Member for Lewisham East, case reference JD34532.
Answered by John Whittingdale
The department aims to reply to correspondence within 20 working days. A reply was issued on 29 June 2023, which was therefore within this target time frame.
Asked by: Janet Daby (Labour - Lewisham East)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, when she plans to respond to correspondence of 15 March 2023 from the hon. Member for Lewisham East, case reference JD33004.
Answered by John Whittingdale
A reply was issued on 7 June 2023.
Asked by: Janet Daby (Labour - Lewisham East)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what recent discussions she has had with representatives of phone and broadband providers on potential in-contract price rises in the next financial year.
Answered by Julia Lopez - Minister of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
On November 29 2022, I convened a roundtable with the UK’s major mobile, broadband, and landline providers to discuss the affordability of connectivity services. I urged the industry to remain mindful of the impact any price rises on households, particularly when many are facing additional pressures on their finances due to the global rise in the cost of living.
Ofcom has a statutory duty to monitor the ongoing affordability of telecommunication services, and officials continue to engage regularly with both Ofcom and operators to explore ways we can support households in staying connected.
Asked by: Janet Daby (Labour - Lewisham East)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, how much funding her Department has provided through grants to art galleries in each financial year since 2017-18.
Answered by Stuart Andrew - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
The table below shows the amount of grant funding DCMS and its delivery body Arts Council England (ACE) are estimated to have awarded to art galleries in each financial year from Financial Year 2017-18 to 21-22. These figures include an estimate of grants provided to arts galleries via Arts Council England, and DCMS direct Grant in Aid provided to the National Gallery, National Portrait Gallery and the Tate. We have not included individual art galleries part of other DCMS sponsored Arm’s Length Bodies as it is not possible to break down costs at this level.
These figures include estimates produced by ACE that include both exchequer and lottery funds. ACE does not have a method of calculating funding spent on art galleries specifically (beyond Museums, and Visual Arts, as high-level classifiers), but can determine funding for projects taking place in galleries, and can identify some galleries funding through name-searching for galleries in funding databases. This provides an estimate for ACE funding support for galleries and activity in galleries, but is not precise.
| TOTAL (£m) |
2017/18 | £69.29* |
2018/19 | £156.23 |
2019/20 | £168.30 |
2020/21 | £203.66 |
2021/22 | £206.42 |
TOTAL | £803.90 |
*There is no comparable funding data available from ACE for 2017/18, this therefore includes only DCMS direct Grant in Aid provided to the National Gallery, National Portrait Gallery and the Tate Galleries.
Asked by: Janet Daby (Labour - Lewisham East)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what assessment she has made of the depiction of women in artworks exhibited in art galleries in receipt of funding from her Department.
Answered by Stuart Andrew - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave on 28th October 2022 to Question UIN 71270.
Art galleries operate independently from the government. Decisions related to the content of exhibitions, such as curatorial decisions on the depiction of women in artworks, are operational matters for the galleries.
Asked by: Janet Daby (Labour - Lewisham East)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what assessment she has made of the diversity of artists exhibited in art galleries in receipt of funding from her Department.
Answered by Stuart Andrew - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
DCMS sponsors a number of art galleries, and funds are provided to some art galleries through Arts Council England (ACE) to its National Portfolio Organisations (NPOs).
DCMS supports a vibrant and dynamic museums and galleries sector that remains committed to diverse public programming and collections. However, art galleries operate independently from the government, and decisions related to exhibitions are operational matters for the galleries.
ACE works with funded organisations to agree targets for how their governance, leadership, employees, participants, audiences and the work they make can reflect the diversity of their local communities.
Diversity of artists is captured under workforce in the ACE NPO annual survey and refers to employed and commissioned artists within that period. Diversity of artists whose art is bought directly from a supplier for display is not currently captured.
Asked by: Janet Daby (Labour - Lewisham East)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what steps his Department is taking with social media companies to tackle fake social media profiles that spread misinformation and are operated from hostile states.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
We take the issue of dis- and misinformation very seriously and DCMS leads work across Government to tackle it. We engage regularly with social media companies to encourage the introduction of systems and processes that promote authoritative sources of information, and to help them identify and take action to remove dis- and misinformation, in line with their terms and conditions.
It is a Government priority to protect the UK against foreign interference. We know that certain states routinely use disinformation as a foreign policy tool and have seen evidence of this happening in other countries. We monitor for disinformation campaigns so that we can be ready to respond to them quickly and effectively. We work closely with international partners to share information to better understand and then develop approaches to counter the threat from disinformation.
The Government is legislating on these issues. The Counter State Threats Bill will provide the Security Services and Law Enforcement Agencies with the tools they need to tackle the evolving threat from hostile activity by states and actors. The legislation will make the UK a harder environment for states to conduct hostile activity in, and increase the cost to them of doing so.
We have also published the draft Online Safety Bill, which will bring in a legal duty of care and give companies clear legal responsibilities to improve user safety. The new laws will have robust and proportionate measures to deal with disinformation that could cause significant physical or psychological harm to an individual, such as anti-vaccination content and falsehoods about COVID-19.
Asked by: Janet Daby (Labour - Lewisham East)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, with reference to the BBC's reporting on Sir Cliff Richard in 2014 and the BBC's rehiring of Martin Bashir, if he will make an assessment of the BBC's effectiveness in delivery of reforms under the Charter.
Answered by John Whittingdale
The BBC has a duty to deliver impartial and accurate news coverage and content under its Royal Charter.
It is for the BBC Board to ensure that BBC output meets the highest standards the public expects and for Ofcom to hold the BBC to account on its delivery against the Mission and Public Purposes set out in 2017.
However, in light of the findings of the Dyson Report, the Secretary of State has said that the BBC needs to improve its culture to ensure similar events never happen again which means a new emphasis on accuracy, impartiality and diversity of opinion.
The government will therefore reflect on Lord Dyson’s thorough report and any changes made following the review being conducted. We will then consider whether further governance and regulatory reforms at the BBC are needed in the upcoming mid-term Charter review.
Asked by: Janet Daby (Labour - Lewisham East)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what assessment his Department has made of the potential merits of issuing mandatory diversity quotas for artists whose art is displayed by galleries which receive funding from his Department.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
The Government is clear that it expects the cultural sectors to represent our diverse society in their artistic talent, workforce and audiences. As the national development agency for art and culture, Arts Council England (ACE) has a responsibility to ensure that public money benefits all of the public.
ACE ensures there is diversity in audiences, leaders, producers and creators of arts and culture. Their Inclusivity and Relevance principle sets out how organisations in receipt of public funding, including galleries, can work towards this objective across their workforce and governing bodies, the programmes they present, and the audiences they engage with.
ACE has also developed a set of accessible resources which are available online to support organisations to develop their ambitions of becoming more inclusive, including addressing any barriers faced for example by disabled people and those from lower socio-economic backgrounds.
Asked by: Janet Daby (Labour - Lewisham East)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what progress has been made on the proposed arrangement for musicians to tour in the EU without needing individual visas for each country.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
Regrettably we do not believe the sector’s visa waiver proposal is viable. The Commission would be likely to argue that any EU-wide visa waiver agreement can only be part of a wider package with a binding non-discrimination clause and a reciprocal visa waiver agreement covering all current and future Member States, as they proposed in negotiaions. This remains incompatible with our manifesto commitment to take control of our borders.
The UK took an ambitious approach during negotiations that would have ensured that touring artists and their support staff did not need work-permits to perform in the EU. Regrettably, our proposals were rejected by the EU, but our door remains open if the EU wants to reconsider its position.
UK performers, artists, and musicians are of course still able to tour and perform in the EU, and vice versa. As the Secretary of State has said, we have moved at pace and with urgency and have provided much greater clarity about the current position.
We have published guidance on GOV.UK, signposting to official information provided by EU countries about their business travel routes. And through our bilateral discussions with EU Member States, we have established that in at least 17 out of 27 Member States some touring activities are possible without visas or work-permits. The UK has significantly more generous arrangements for touring professionals than many Member States, and should they be willing to change their rules to more closely align with ours we will have those discussions and encourage them to do so.