Asked by: Julie Elliott (Labour - Sunderland Central)
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 recommendation 45 in the Fan-Led Review of Football Governance on a review of women's football; and whether she has plans to implement that recommendation.
Answered by Nigel Huddleston - Shadow Financial Secretary (Treasury)
The Government welcomes the Independent Fan Led Review of Football Governance and has endorsed in principle the primary recommendation of the review, that football requires a strong, independent regulator to secure the future of our national game.
The Government will now work at pace to review the report in full, including the recommendations made on a dedicated review of women’s football.
The Government will continue to engage with stakeholders as we work towards issuing a full response to the report in the Spring.
Asked by: Julie Elliott (Labour - Sunderland Central)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what recent assessment she has made of the level of risk and harm to children and young people from accessing commercial non-user to user generated pornography.
Answered by Chris Philp - Shadow Leader of the House of Commons
Preventing children from accessing harmful content such as online pornography is a priority for the government and the strongest protections in the draft Online Safety Bill are for children. The draft Bill covers many of the most visited pornography sites, social media platforms, video-sharing sites, forums and search engines - thereby capturing many of the sites through which children access pornography.
The Government recognises that a large amount of pornography is available on the internet with little or no protection to ensure that those accessing it are old enough to do so and that this is changing the way young people understand healthy relationships, sex and consent. Research published by the British Board of Film Classification in 2020, showed that the three most likely routes for children’s intentional viewing of pornography are image or video search engines (53% of children who intentionally sought out pornography have seen it here), social media sites (44% of children who intentionally sought out pornography have seen it here), and dedicated pornography sites (43% of children who intentionally sought out pornography have seen it here). While these figures only account for where children have seen pornography and not the total number or frequency of visits, it does highlight that children use a range of sources to access pornography.
My department has also commissioned research recently to develop the evidence base on the prevalence and impact of harmful content online to children, which includes online pornography.
Asked by: Julie Elliott (Labour - Sunderland Central)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what recent estimate she has made of the number of children accessing online commercial pornography sites.
Answered by Chris Philp - Shadow Leader of the House of Commons
Preventing children from accessing harmful content such as online pornography is a priority for the government and the strongest protections in the draft Online Safety Bill are for children. The draft Bill covers many of the most visited pornography sites, social media platforms, video-sharing sites, forums and search engines - thereby capturing many of the sites through which children access pornography.
The Government recognises that a large amount of pornography is available on the internet with little or no protection to ensure that those accessing it are old enough to do so and that this is changing the way young people understand healthy relationships, sex and consent. Research published by the British Board of Film Classification in 2020, showed that the three most likely routes for children’s intentional viewing of pornography are image or video search engines (53% of children who intentionally sought out pornography have seen it here), social media sites (44% of children who intentionally sought out pornography have seen it here), and dedicated pornography sites (43% of children who intentionally sought out pornography have seen it here). While these figures only account for where children have seen pornography and not the total number or frequency of visits, it does highlight that children use a range of sources to access pornography.
My department has also commissioned research recently to develop the evidence base on the prevalence and impact of harmful content online to children, which includes online pornography.
Asked by: Julie Elliott (Labour - Sunderland Central)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, pursuant to the Answer of 3 December 2021 to Question 84357 on Events Industry: Insurance, how many polices have been underwritten by the Live Events Reinsurance Scheme since its launch.
Answered by Julia Lopez - Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport
As set out in its response of 3 December, the government is unable to share commercially sensitive data related to the Live Events Reinsurance Scheme.
Asked by: Julie Elliott (Labour - Sunderland Central)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, pursuant to the Answer of 3 December 2021 to Question 84357 on Events Industry: Insurance, if she will publish a breakdown of which sectors have taken out a policy underwritten by the Live Events Reinsurance scheme for (a) live music events, (b) conferences, (c) theatre productions and (d) commercial Christmas events.
Answered by Julia Lopez - Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport
As set out in its response of 3 December, the government is unable to share commercially sensitive data about the events that have purchased eligible policies. We can confirm the scheme has provided cover to a broad range of events, including conferences and Christmas events.
Asked by: Julie Elliott (Labour - Sunderland Central)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, how many organisers of live events have applied for coverage through the Live Events Reinsurance Scheme established by the Government since it was announced on 5 August 2021; and how many live events have been provided cover under that scheme to date.
Answered by Julia Lopez - Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport
The Government recognises the important contribution that the Live Events sector makes to the UK’s culture and economy, and the significant challenges the Covid-19 pandemic has presented. The Live Events Reinsurance Scheme is designed to provide confidence to event organisers and enable them to plan future events, thereby supporting the economic recovery out of Covid-19.
The scheme is a reinsurance scheme whereby insurers provide cover to purchasers, and eligible policies are then reinsured under a reinsurance contract with the government - the terms of which are publicly available. As such the government does not receive applications to the scheme: policies are either eligible or ineligible. We cannot share specific operational data due to the commercial sensitivity of the information.
Asked by: Julie Elliott (Labour - Sunderland Central)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, if she will list the live events that have successfully had their events covered through the Live Events Reinsurance Scheme since it was announced on 5 August 2021.
Answered by Julia Lopez - Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport
The Government recognises the important contribution that the live events sector makes to the UK’s culture and economy, and the significant challenges the sector has faced as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. The Live Events Reinsurance Scheme will provide live events across the country - such as music festivals, conferences and business events with the confidence to plan for future events, and as such will support the UK’s post-Covid economic recovery.
We are unable to share commercially sensitive data including the name of events who have secured policies but we can say that a broad range of events located across the UK have purchased cover through this scheme.
The scheme recently welcomed a sixth participating insurer and £800M of cover is available to support the live events sector.
Asked by: Julie Elliott (Labour - Sunderland Central)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, if she will make an assessment of the implications for her policies of the findings of the recent Harvey Nash Group's Hot Skills & Salary Report, in respect of its findings on (a) what types of digital skills are needed the most by businesses and (b) how the UK compares with other nations on tech skills' gaps; and what plans the Government has to (i) encourage people to take-up digital skills training and (ii) support providers of digital skills training.
Answered by Chris Philp - Shadow Leader of the House of Commons
The high level of demand for cyber security skills identified in the Harvey Nash report is consistent with findings of the annual DCMS-commissioned surveys of the labour market. Some of the skills clusters identified through DCMS research, using Burning Glass data (2019), were: productivity software, software and programming and data science.
The government has introduced various qualifications such as digital T levels in digital production, design and development; digital apprenticeships which provide work based training in technical occupations; and digital bootcamps as a way for people to take up digital skills training. The government is also offering 33 Level 3 digital skills courses from May 2021 to adults aged 19-24. As well as this, HMG is supporting young people to take up digital skills training. For example, people aged between 11-18 can sign up to CyberFirst extracurricular activities to build understanding of digital and technical skills.
Government supports the development of regional digital skills capability through its Local Digital Skills Partnerships. These partnerships are now operating in seven regions and bring together local cross-sector partners to design, develop and coordinate the delivery of digital skills programmes to upskill the current workforce, tackle digital exclusion and raise awareness of the importance of digital skills regionally. An 8th Local Digital Skills Partnership in Hull and East Yorkshire will formally launch in early December 2021.
The government recently published its first National Artificial Intelligence (AI) Strategy, setting out how we can ensure everyone in every region of the UK has the skills, understanding and opportunities to benefit from AI technologies. This will include: continuing to support future skills through Turing Fellowships, Centres for Doctoral Training and Postgraduate Industrial Masters and AI and Data Science Conversion Courses; publishing research into what skills are needed to enable employees to use AI in a business setting; and identify how national skills provision can meet those needs.
The National Centre for Computing Education (NCCE), with £84m of government funding, is also aiming to improve the teaching of the computing curriculum in schools. The National AI Strategy will also support the NCCE to ensure programmes for children in AI are accessible.
Asked by: Julie Elliott (Labour - Sunderland Central)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what discussions he has had with social media companies on content that may encourage the development of eating disorders; and what steps he is taking to remove content of that nature.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
Ministers and officials have regular meetings with a wide range of stakeholders, including social media platforms, on a variety of issues, including eating disorders content. Details of Ministerial meetings are published quarterly on the Gov.uk website.
Under the draft Online Safety Bill, services in scope will need to minimise and remove illegal content, including illegal online abuse. In addition, services which are “likely to be accessed” by children will be required to provide further protections for children from content and activity which is legal but harmful. Major platforms will also need to address legal but harmful content for adults. The government will set out priority categories of legal but harmful material in secondary legislation, for example content which encourages or promotes eating disorders.
Asked by: Julie Elliott (Labour - Sunderland Central)
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 plans to take to help tackle gambling addiction among women.
Answered by John Whittingdale - Shadow Minister (Health and Social Care)
The NHS Long-Term plan, published in January 2019, announced the creation of up to 15 specialist gambling clinics by 2023/24. Work continues on the phased expansion of these services, enabling the NHS to explore how best to use existing treatment models to reach those most in need of support. In June 2020, the largest five (now four) gambling operators committed £100m over four years to problem gambling treatment services through the charity GambleAware, which is consulting with DHSC on the most effective way to use that money.A range of specialist support services for women are also available, such as GamCare’s Women’s Programme and Gordon Moody’s Retreat & Counselling Programme. Gordon Moody will also open a bespoke residential treatment centre for women this autumn.
The government launched its Review of the Gambling Act 2005 on 8 December with the publication of a Call for Evidence. The Review will be wide-ranging and evidence-led and aims to make sure we have the right protections in place to make gambling safer for all.