Asked by: Jonathan Gullis (Conservative - Stoke-on-Trent North)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what progress his Department has made on distributing the tampon tax to support women and girls.
Answered by John Whittingdale
To date more than £62 million of VAT on sanitary products has gone to good causes supporting women and girls, through the Tampon Tax Fund. The successful applicants to the 20/21 round of the Tampon Tax Fund were announced on gov.uk on Friday 27th November 2020 and funding will be distributed in due course.
Asked by: Jonathan Gullis (Conservative - Stoke-on-Trent North)
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 increase the availability of full fibre broadband in Stoke-on-Trent.
Answered by Matt Warman
Good progress has been made in the Stoke-on-Trent North constituency, with over 99% of premises in the constituency able to access superfast broadband. This is up from 73% in March 2013. Gigabit-capable coverage in the constituency stands at 8%.
There is an active Local Full Fibre Network Project (LFFN) taking place in Stoke-on-Trent with around 110km of new fibre network being built with the aim of creating 100% city wide full fibre connectivity. DCMS have invested over £9 million into this project with a supplier also contributing. There is a video which gives an overview of this Government funded project in Stoke here: https://vimeo.com/368247591
On top of that, 25 premises took advantage of our recently closed Gigabit Voucher Scheme in the area.
For those premises that are still struggling with slow speeds, there are a number of options available to them. DCMS runs another voucher scheme that can be used by rural communities across the UK to reduce the cost of installing gigabit-capable connectivity. This provides a voucher worth up to £3,500 for eligible small businesses and vouchers worth up to £1,500 for residents. However, Staffordshire County Council have recently committed to “top up” these voucher values investing £1m of funding in addition to eligible funding from the Rural Gigabit Connectivity Programme. This means that in rural areas of Staffordshire, residents can get a voucher of up to £3,500 and small businesses a voucher of up to £5,500.
Asked by: Jonathan Gullis (Conservative - Stoke-on-Trent North)
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 to tackle (a) anti-semitism and (b) islamophobia online.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
The Government is absolutely clear that there is no place for hateful content online. In April 2019 the Government published the Online Harms White Paper setting out our plans for world-leading legislation to make the UK the safest place to be online. In February 2020 the Initial Government Response to the consultation was published indicating the direction of travel for the legislation. The Full Government Response detailing proposals for the legislation will be published later this year.
Government recognises that incidents of online hate crime are becoming more prevalent and we are taking action to tackle the issue. We allocated £200,000 for a new national police hub to tackle the emerging threat of online hate crimes which went live in January 2018.?We have been supporting initiatives specific to tackling islamophobia and anti-semitism. We have committed £100,000 for the Antisemitism Policy Trust to support their work to tackle online antisemitism,?and acknowledge this as a growing area of concern. We have also supported Tell MAMA?(Measuring Anti-Muslim Attacks)?with?just over £2.8m between 2016 and 2020 to monitor and combat anti-Muslim hatred (including online).
Asked by: Jonathan Gullis (Conservative - Stoke-on-Trent North)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, how many organisations in (a) Stoke-on-Trent and (b) Staffordshire have received funding through the £1.57 billion arts, culture and heritage covid-19 rescue fund.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
Arts Council England, British Film Institute, Historic England and National Lottery Heritage Fund are considering applications for grant funding against agreed criteria, as set out in the published guidance.
Our priority is to ensure that organisations get the funding they need as swiftly as possible and we expect some funding decisions to be made this month with announcements soon after that. A list of the recipients of the Arts Council’s Emergency Grassroots Music Venues Fund can be found here:
https://www.artscouncil.org.uk/document/emergency-grassroots-music-venues-fund-recipients
This funding will provide a lifeline for thousands of organisations facing imminent challenges and will be available this financial year.
Asked by: Jonathan Gullis (Conservative - Stoke-on-Trent North)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what progress he has made on plans for UK Festival 2022; and how (a) Stoke-on-Trent and (b) Staffordshire can participate in that festival.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
Festival UK 2022 is a major nationwide festival of creativity and innovation. It will deliver a programme of ten ground-breaking large-scale new commissions with the ambition of bringing people together and promoting the UK’s creativity to the world.
The programme, led by Martin Green, Chief Creative Officer, recently launched a £3m R&D Project. This is an open call for creative teams of organisations and individuals from across Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Maths to come together to receive funding to develop new ideas for 2022.
I encourage people and organisations in Stoke-on-Trent and Staffordshire to get involved by registering on the Festival website (www.festival2022.uk)
Asked by: Jonathan Gullis (Conservative - Stoke-on-Trent North)
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 to support (a) the film sector and (b) other creative industries.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
The Government recognises the huge contribution the film and wider creative industries sectors make, not only to the economy and international reputation of the United Kingdom, but also to the wellbeing and enrichment of its people.
Regarding the film sector specifically, the Government has worked alongside industry to quickly develop guidance allowing for the restart of production activity and has continued to support the sector in applying this guidance. In addition, in July 2020 the Government granted quarantine exemption for cast and crew of eligible film and high-end television productions, bespoke action which has helped ensure that significant inward investment projects have still been able to operate safely in the UK.
Since then, the Government has also announced the Film and TV Production Restart Scheme, a £500m scheme to help TV and film productions get back up and running across the country, despite a lack of available insurance for Covid-19 losses. It is a temporary scheme that will compensate eligible productions for costs incurred due to delays or abandonment of productions because of Covid-19.
As you will know, in March, the Government implemented an unprecedented package to support businesses, charitable organisations, workers and the self-employed through the Coronavirus crisis. The Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme, Self-Employed Income Support Scheme, Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CBILS) and business rates relief in particular are providing support to organisations across these sectors.
The extension of the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme was announced in May, which was extended to the end of July, with more flexibility being introduced from August to October.
The Self-Employment Income Support Scheme has also been extended with applications opening in August for a second and final grant. The grant will operate in the same way as the existing scheme with self-employed workers eligible for a single payment covering three months, at a level of 70% of average monthly earnings up to a maximum of £6,570 (i.e. down from 80% and a maximum of £7,500).
The Secretary of State provided a major £1.57 billion support package for key cultural organisations to help them through the coronavirus pandemic. This funding will provide targeted support to organisations across a range of cultural and creative sectors.
We are committed to continuing to work with the film and creatives industries sectors to understand the difficulties they face and help them access support through these challenging times and through recovery.