Asked by: Maria Eagle (Labour - Garston and Halewood)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what his Department's planned expenditure on resources is for Ofcom in each year up to 2028.
Answered by Lord Vaizey of Didcot
The Government and Department set Ofcom’s overall spending cap as part of the 2015 Spending Review. Where significant changes are made to Ofcom’s remit or activities, Government will review the spending cap to ensure Ofcom is adequately resourced.
Asked by: Maria Eagle (Labour - Garston and Halewood)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what his policy is on the future availability of protected sporting events on free-to-air television; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Lord Vaizey of Didcot
The Ofcom Code on Listed Events ensures that key sporting events are made available for free-to-air channels. Our sport strategy, Sporting Future: A new strategy for an active nation, published December 2015, made clear that the Government does not propose to review this list.
Asked by: Maria Eagle (Labour - Garston and Halewood)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, when he plans to bring forward legislative proposals to close the iPlayer loophole.
Answered by Lord Vaizey of Didcot
The Government will bring forward legislative proposals to close the iPlayer loophole by the Summer.
Asked by: Maria Eagle (Labour - Garston and Halewood)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, with reference to page 17 of the White Paper, A BBC for the future: a broadcaster of distinction, published in May 2016, if he will provide details of how the more flexible payment plans for payment of television licence fees will help people on lower incomes.
Answered by Lord Vaizey of Didcot
The government intends to update legislation to allow clearer and more flexible payment schemes, especially for those facing difficulty in paying the licence fee. This will enable the BBC to trial alternative payment plans, including removing the requirement for individuals to pay the cost of a 12-month licence over six months. This would help those who struggle to make higher initial payments.
Asked by: Maria Eagle (Labour - Garston and Halewood)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what estimate he has made of the savings to his Department's budget arising from the Government's decision not to automatically roll-out broadband to all households and businesses.
Answered by Lord Vaizey of Didcot
The Government's plans to implement a broadband Universal Service Obligation will have no impact on the Department's budget for the roll out of superfast broadband. The contracts we have put in place with Openreach mean that the more homes and businesses that sign up for superfast broadband, the more money Openreach has to return to local authorities to extend the roll out even further. So far, Openreach has confirmed more than £200 million of savings that can be reinvested, over and above the £1.7bn of public funding already allocated, and we expect more funding to be confirmed in due course. We will be reinvesting that funding to extend superfast broadband to as many additional rural homes and businesses as possible.
Asked by: Maria Eagle (Labour - Garston and Halewood)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what steps his Department is taking to help arts and cultural organisations apply for funding from the EU's Creative Europe programme.
Answered by Lord Vaizey of Didcot
The Creative Europe Desk UK, which is part-funded by DCMS, raises awareness of the opportunities offered by the EU’s Creative Europe programme; encourages the UK’s creative sectors to engage in the programme through taking part in supported international initiatives and networks; and provides advice and support to UK-based applicants of Creative Europe. The Desk is led by the British Council and the BFI with a consortium of partners in the UK (Arts Council England, Creative Scotland, Arts Council of Northern Ireland, Welsh Government).
Asked by: Maria Eagle (Labour - Garston and Halewood)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what (a) grants and (b) indirect funding were provided by the EU's Creative Europe programme the UK arts and cultural organisations in (i) 2013-14, (ii) 2014-15 and (iii) 2015-16 to date.
Answered by Lord Vaizey of Didcot
The Creative Europe Programme (2014-2020) was launched in January 2014. The programme consists of two sub-programmes; the Culture sub-programme to promote the culture sector, and the MEDIA sub-programme to support the audiovisual sector. Prior to 2014, the European Commission ran separate Culture and MEDIA programmes.
The Creative Europe UK Desk reports the following support was received by UK cultural and creative organisations and audiovisual companies through each of the sub-programmes in 2013, 2014 and 2015.
UK Results for EU Commission Culture and MEDIA programmes 2013, and Creative Europe Programme 2014-2015
| MEDIA | Culture | ||
| Direct Grants | Indirect Funding | Direct Grants | Indirect Funding |
2013 | € 7,688,041 | € 6,118,515 | € 4,825,000 | N/A |
2014 | € 9,289,292 | € 7,775,310 | € 5,880,208 | N/A |
2015 | € 6,677,272 | € 4,745,231 | € 5,451,385 | N/A |
Note: Indirect funding in the MEDIA sub-programme relates to awards to non-UK distribution companies distributing UK films in foreign markets. In the Culture sub-programme all awards are direct grants to UK led projects.
Asked by: Maria Eagle (Labour - Garston and Halewood)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, with reference to page 92 of the Budget 2016, what steps he is taking to respond to planned changes to his Capital DEL in 2019-20.
Answered by Lord Vaizey of Didcot
Departmental budgets were set out at Spending Review 2015. Budget 2016 set out that around £1.5 billion capital investment in areas such as housing, schools and transport will be accelerated.
Asked by: Maria Eagle (Labour - Garston and Halewood)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, with reference to page 91 of the Budget 2016, what steps he is taking to respond to planned changes to his Resource DEL in 2019-20.
Answered by Lord Vaizey of Didcot
The Budget sets out that the government will find a further £3.5 billion of savings from public spending in 2019-20, building on the plans set out at Spending Review 2015. To inform future spending decisions and the delivery of these savings, the government is launching an efficiency review. The Chief Secretary to the Treasury, with the support of the Paymaster General, will lead this efficiency review, which will report in 2018. The Department for Culture Media and Sport will actively support this review.
Asked by: Maria Eagle (Labour - Garston and Halewood)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what assessment he has made of the potential effect on consumers of a merger between BT and EE; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Lord Vaizey of Didcot
It is for the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) to assess the potential impacts of company mergers in the UK. Its role is to protect competition for the benefit of consumers, not the commercial interests of competitors.
In the case of the takeover of EE by BT, the CMA considered the merger and all representations made to it and published its final decision in January, which can be found here [https://www.gov.uk/government/news/cma-clears-btee-merger]