Oral Answers to Questions

Jeff Smith Excerpts

Thursday 3rd September 2026 Commons Chamber

[Stephanie Peacock]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, and I pay tribute to him for all his work as the shadow Secretary of State and as a Minister before that. It has been a pleasure to work with him, and I look forward to continuing to do so.

Of course, there is more than one tax; we are cutting taxes, but we are also introducing an overnight levy. As I have outlined, we are working across Government, with the tourist sector and with mayors to make sure we get that right for local areas. It of course makes sense for that money to be reinvested in the tourism sector, but that will be up to local areas to decide.

[Jeff Smith (Manchester Withington) (Lab)]

I think rural and coastal communities can be encouraged by the success of the city visitor charge in Manchester, where we have raised £10 million for investment in advertising, tourism and cleaning the city. Will the Minister join me in rejecting the scaremongering and reminding people that this is a purely permissive measure? It is up to local areas to do it if they want.

[Stephanie Peacock]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who is an excellent champion for his city of Manchester. He shares a really important example. It is right to caution against scaremongering. It is absolutely right that local areas have the powers to make the decisions themselves.

Media Green Paper

Jeff Smith Excerpts

Wednesday 24th June 2026 Commons Chamber

[Lisa Nandy]

I am not going to take any lessons from him and his disgusting party, given the way that they spread misinformation and disinformation. This House has already come together to define what “public service media” is in law. The definition was passed by Parliament, and I do not recall there being a lot of concern about that; it has been enormously beneficial. One way that we could define “trusted news” would be to follow that definition, but we could also, for example, align with the editors’ code of practice. There are lots of different options, but to somehow claim that this is about the Government controlling what people see is absolute nonsense.

[Jeff Smith (Manchester Withington) (Lab)]

I warmly welcome the publication of the Green Paper. None of us has all the answers when it comes to the fast-moving media landscape, but setting out the challenges and some principled ways forward is a good start. I especially welcome the focus on a duty for media literacy. My personal view is that a public purpose for the BBC on media literacy might be better than one on growth, but that is a debate for another day. Is the Secretary of State slightly disappointed, as I was, in the tone of some of the contributions from the Opposition about the prominence of trusted news? We already have a prominence regime in place; we just need to update it for the modern age. In an era when misinformation and disinformation are rife, is it not more important than ever that people get access to trustworthy news, and is that not what a prominence regime allows?

[Lisa Nandy]

I agree. In particular, we are letting down a generation of young people, who, as I said to my hon. Friend the Member for Ealing Central and Acton (Dr Huq), are often consuming media very differently from my generation and the generations before us. It cannot be right that my generation, who often watch and consume broadcasts on television sets, are able to easily and quickly find high-quality content and trusted news, but the younger generation are not.

Oral Answers to Questions

Jeff Smith Excerpts

Thursday 18th June 2026 Commons Chamber

[Stephanie Peacock]

I will take no lessons from the hon. Gentleman, given the inheritance from the previous Conservative Government. If he had been paying any attention—I know he does not usually sit on the Front Bench—he would know that I have indeed committed to increasing visitor numbers. I regret his talking down our tourism industry, especially with the Isle of Wight festival starting today. It is going from strength to strength and I wish it the very best of luck.

[Jeff Smith (Manchester Withington) (Lab)]

9. What steps her Department is taking to help support UK artists touring in Europe.

[The Minister for Creative Industries, Media and Arts (Ian Murray)]

A tremendous question. Helping touring artists is a manifesto commitment. At last year’s UK-EU summit, the UK and the European Commission committed to supporting cultural exchange, recognising those touring artists. I discussed cultural professionals’ working conditions with the European culture commissioner at the first high-level meeting on culture in March. Digital ATA carnets that enable movement without customs declarations or duties were launched on 1 June across the UK, EU, Norway and Switzerland. We continue to engage with our EU counterparts at all levels and with industry to support touring.

[Jeff Smith]

I thank the Minister for that answer; there is some good news there. One of the many negatives of Brexit is that it has placed barriers on UK artists being able to tour in Europe. The Culture, Media and Sport Committee has just published its report, featuring a number of practical measures that the Government can take to remove those barriers. Will Ministers act on those recommendations? I point to one in particular. As well as leaving the EU, the UK decided not to participate in the Creative Europe scheme, which we were net beneficiaries of. Ahead of the upcoming EU-UK summit, a signal that we intend to participate in the successor scheme, AgoraEU, would be a positive message to our creative artists.

[Ian Murray]

I congratulate the Committee on its report, and I welcome its continued interest in recognising the importance of international touring to the UK’s world-leading arts and creative industries sector. We are carefully considering the recommendations and will form the response in due course.

The Prime Minister agreed with the European Commission President on Tuesday to press ahead with the UK-EU summit on 22 July, so that people on both sides can feel the benefits of the UK-EU collaboration as soon as possible. Touring artists were mentioned in the summit agreement last year. I cannot comment on the ongoing negotiations, but we are determined to ensure that UK touring artists can tour again in the EU as best as possible.

Independent Football Regulator

Jeff Smith Excerpts

Wednesday 12th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[Jeff Smith (Manchester Withington) (Lab)]

We now have an excellent, highly qualified individual who has been appointed to chair the football regulator, and we have an excellent Secretary of State who made a mistake for which she has apologised. Even the commissioner said that the breach of the code

“was not a knowing breach.”

What football fans want is not this debate in Parliament today; what they want is for the Secretary of State to get on with the job, to protect clubs and to protect supporters. Can I encourage her to ignore the Opposition, who are playing politics with our national game, and just get on with the job?

[Lisa Nandy]

I thank my hon. Friend for what he has said, and I am pleased that he has joined the Select Committee. He has extensive knowledge of football and has been a consistent champion of football fans, and I very much support what he has said. This Government are absolutely determined to appoint the right people to the right positions, so that when fans go through the difficulties caused by poor owners, as they did at Charlton, they do not feel that they have nowhere to turn.