Funding for the Arts

Debate between Philip Hollobone and Lord Vaizey of Didcot

Tuesday 13th September 2016 Westminster Hall

[Mr Edward Vaizey (Wantage) (Con)]

It is a great pleasure to appear under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. In fact, it is the first time in six years that I have appeared in order to propose a motion in Westminster Hall, so you can put that on your already extremely distinguished CV. It is also a great pleasure to talk about the arts, which has been a passion of mine all my life and has been—

[Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)]

Order. The right hon. Gentleman actually has to move the motion.

[Mr Vaizey]

I am already moved, but I will move the actual motion. I beg to move,

That this House has considered funding for the arts.

Thank you for pointing that out, Mr Hollobone, and emphasising how out of touch and rusty I am at speaking from the Back Benches.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Vaizey]

One of the things we wanted to do in the culture White Paper, which I published before I left the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, was to take forward a partnership with local councils showing how the arts and heritage play a huge role in place-making and how different funding streams—not just the core funding stream from Department for Communities and Local Government or via the Arts Council—could help to support arts organisations. There is a lot we can do. Things like the UK capital of culture programme, for example, are great ways of galvanizing local authorities into taking their arts and heritage more seriously, but there are still bad news stories. For example, I was depressed to learn this week that Walsall is thinking of closing the New Art Gallery Walsall, which I regard as a great cultural institution.

I do not want to be a backseat driver. I wanted to use this debate to praise our arts and heritage sectors and what they have achieved, and to look briefly forward at what can be achieved in the future. Last week the Minister announced the museums review. That is a great opportunity to put our national museums, and some of our key regional museums, on a secure footing and to make absolutely clear what the relationship is between central Government and our national and regional museums and also what central Government are prepared to fund as core support and what they would expect national and regional museums to raise for themselves. Similarly, with the review of the Arts Council and other organisations that may take place shortly, I hope the Minister will think deeply about the core level of funding that the arts and heritage should receive.

A new Government, with fresh Ministers and renewed energy, have a chance to put arts and heritage funding on a secure and core footing. I am not asking for the earth. I am not asking for a 100% increase in core arts and heritage funding. A small and modest increase would not only make a significant difference to the arts and heritage; perhaps more importantly, it would stand, as the words of the then Chancellor showed in last year’s autumn statement, as an extraordinary vote of confidence in some of the greatest organisations we will find anywhere in the world, and that vote of confidence would be repaid many times over.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)]

This is an hour-long debate, so we are due to finish at 5.30 pm. The guidelines are that the SNP Front Bench is allowed five minutes, Her Majesty’s Opposition are allowed five minutes, the Minister is allowed 10 minutes and then Ed Vaizey is allowed three minutes to sum up the debate at the end. Therefore, I want to call the Front-Bench speakers no later than seven minutes past 5 and there are three Members seeking to speak, so I am going to impose a time limit of six minutes, which will ensure that everyone gets in.

The first speaker is going to be Deidre Brock. I have had a nice note from the SNP Whips Office, and I think she is dangerously over-qualified to speak because it says that she

“was formerly the Deputy Provost responsible for Arts and Tourism on the City of Edinburgh Council, and is a former actor.”

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Philip Hollobone and Lord Vaizey of Didcot

Thursday 3rd March 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Vaizey]

I would certainly agree with the hon. Lady on that. Our forthcoming White Paper will announce new measures to increase access to the arts, but we have already supported, for example, music education hubs, extended the In Harmony scheme and introduced new schemes for the arts in schools, so I take great issue with her implicit criticism that we are not doing anything to increase access to the arts.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

13. If he will make an assessment of whether further steps need to be taken to investigate allegations of historical sex abuse in the public service broadcasting sector.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Philip Hollobone and Lord Vaizey of Didcot

Thursday 3rd December 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Vaizey]

My understanding is that tonight in Dewsbury there will be a fantastic free arts event for families at Crow Nest park funded by the Arts Council. The creative people and places fund targets funding outside London. More than half of the multimillion-pound Grants for the Arts programme goes to a quarter of the most deprived areas in England. The Arts Council is doing a lot. We are doing a lot more than was done under the last Labour Government. We have massively increased the funding that goes outside London, which Labour never addressed.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

Last Saturday evening, my family and I attended the Kettering gang show at the Lighthouse theatre in Kettering, organised by the local Kettering scouts. It was a fantastic show. Given that the scouts do so much very good work with boys and girls in disadvantaged communities throughout this country, will the Minister take this opportunity to praise the scout movement for how it encourages young people to get involved in the arts?

[Mr Vaizey]

I would love to take this opportunity to praise the scout movement and all the volunteers and voluntary organisations that do so much for the arts. Their contribution should not be forgotten; we should not simply look at those organisations that are funded by the Arts Council.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Philip Hollobone and Lord Vaizey of Didcot

Thursday 27th November 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Vaizey]

The Secretary of State for Education was not saying that. She was simply making the point that a lot of people said that doing a maths or science degree narrowed children’s career opportunities. She was correcting that impression; it was not an either/or. Both channels are good ways to get wonderful career opportunities after leaving school.

We are working with Into Film, providing film education for hundreds of thousands of children. We are working with English Heritage on the new heritage schools initiative, which has massively increased engagement with heritage already. We are funding the Sorrell Saturday clubs, and we are working with the Arts Council on arts awards and the pioneering Artsbox.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

The situation that the hon. Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart) describes is not the situation in Kettering, where there are loads of dance, ballet, theatre and other groups, with many dedicated and committed volunteers. Would my hon. Friend the Minister like to take this opportunity to praise all those volunteers and all the mums and dads who put the extra effort in outside school to ensure that their children engage in worthwhile activities?

[Mr Vaizey]

I certainly would. It is important to recognise the massive contribution that volunteers make. I take this opportunity, as I always do, to praise the hon. Gentleman himself. He is a towering and powerful local representative for his wonderful constituency.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Philip Hollobone and Lord Vaizey of Didcot

Thursday 16th October 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Vaizey]

I was recently at an event at Tate where we were praising the Ofer family, who not only have given millions to the National Maritime museum but recently gave £10 million to Tate Modern. There is a great deal of philanthropy in London. I am also pleased that there is a lot outside London—for example, the recent donation by Andrew and Zoë Law of £1 million to the Lowry in Salford.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

May I impress upon the Minister the popularity and importance to small local communities of highly localised heritage and arts centres such as those in Desborough, Rothwell and Burton Latimer in the Kettering constituency? For relatively small sums of money, very big things can be done in small local communities, to the immense benefit of large numbers of people.

[Mr Vaizey]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend, which is why I am so pleased that the majority of arts funding is now going outside London. However, it is also important to stress that many of the organisations that are funded in London—because they have London postcodes—are touring organisations whose work is seen far and wide outside the capital.

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[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

I congratulate the Minister on the fact that England’s museums and galleries attracted almost 5.9 million visitors in August. That figure was up more than 10% on the year before and represented the highest monthly total ever recorded. To what does he attribute that success?

[Mr Vaizey]

Those record figures were partly thanks to this Government’s decision to maintain free admission to museums, and also down to the leadership of our national and regional museums shown by some incredible men and women.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Philip Hollobone and Lord Vaizey of Didcot

Thursday 11th September 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

11. How many registered businesses there were in May 2010; and how many such businesses there are now.

[The Minister for Culture and the Digital Economy (Mr Edward Vaizey)]

I am delighted to say that Office for National Statistics figures show that there were 2.1 million registered businesses in March 2010, and that now there are 2.17 million.

[Mr Hollobone]

New businesses are established as a result of brave decisions taken by individuals who are trying to make the most of their own enterprise and initiative. Since the Department has declared Northamptonshire the most enterprising county in the country, is it not now time to praise entrepreneurs such as those who attend the monthly business breakfast club in Kettering run by the Federation of Small Businesses, who have refused to be cowed by the longest and deepest recession since the war and who through their own hard work and initiative are getting Britain back to work?

[Mr Vaizey]

It does not surprise me at all to hear that Northamptonshire is the most enterprising county in England, because it has one of the most enterprising Members of Parliament, and my hon. Friend continues to innovate in his role. I am delighted that Kettering and Northamptonshire reflect the huge boom in businesses—part of the 400,000 extra businesses overall that we have seen created since the coalition came to power.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Philip Hollobone and Lord Vaizey of Didcot

Thursday 3rd July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Vaizey]

I hear what the hon. Gentleman says. I work closely with the Minister for Policing, Criminal Justice and Victims and the Under-Secretary of State for Education, my hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mr Timpson), on the UK Council for Child Internet Safety. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman’s representations have been heard and they will be considered in the usual way.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

T9. Will the libraries Minister join me in congratulating Northamptonshire county council’s library and information service on being named the best council services team at this year’s Municipal Journal awards? Whereas other local authorities are closing libraries and cutting opening times, the Conservative council in Northamptonshire is extending opening to seven days a week and extending the range of services on offer, and has recruited more than 600 library volunteers.

[Mr Vaizey]

Libraries are funded and run by local authorities, and it does not surprise me that an excellent Conservative local authority is investing in its libraries.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Philip Hollobone and Lord Vaizey of Didcot

Thursday 13th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Vaizey]

Working with social media companies in a flexible, responsive way is the best way forward. We have covered a whole range of issues, including age and identity verification, the reporting of abuse, adjudication, auditing, filtering and funding; we can cover all of those comprehensively and flexibly through dialogue.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

Adam Simmonds, the police and crime commissioner for Northamptonshire, is determined to tackle online crime, and particularly the issue of child victims. He set up a child exploitation prevention team, which is a national lead pilot. Will the Minister work with colleagues in the Home Office to ensure that Government funding for such pilots can be directed at local police forces, and not just at regional or national crime agencies?

[Mr Vaizey]

I will certainly bring my hon. Friend’s concerns to the attention of the Minister for Policing, Criminal Justice and Victims; in fact, this afternoon, he and I will chair the UK Council for Child Internet Safety, which brings together a range of stakeholders to talk about these issues.

European Union (Approvals) Bill [Lords]

Debate between Philip Hollobone and Lord Vaizey of Didcot

Monday 13th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Vaizey]

I accept that point, and as a good Conservative, I am always in favour of anything that has no cost to the taxpayer. I also think that we all, as constituency MPs, know that when there is an opportunity for support, whether from the Big Lottery Fund or any other grants programme, we would encourage our constituents to apply for it, where appropriate.

Another example of the kind of programmes that are likely to be supported is shown by the recent grant of €100,000 to the National Council for Voluntary Organisations, which is a British organisation. It received the money last year to help European bodies understand how to run voluntary organisations. The rest of the budget will be spent on programme administration and the evaluation and dissemination of best practice between participating organisations.

Like its predecessor, the programme will be implemented through grants based on open calls for proposals and through service contracts based on calls for tender. To provide for the analysis and dissemination of the results, these activities will be supported by regular external and independent evaluation. Priority will be given to projects using new working methods or proposing innovative activities. An interim evaluation report on the implementation of the programme will be drawn up by the European Commission no later than the end of 2017, and a final evaluation report will be drawn up no later than 2023. The programme has no new impact on UK domestic policy. Such activities have been supported since the programme first began.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

Will the Minister update the House on the size of the budget of the programme compared with the size of the budget of its predecessor, and on whether the budget reflects the search across the European Union—supposedly—for savings for the taxpayer in these straitened times?

[Mr Vaizey]

I will certainly do so, but to put the answer to my hon. Friend’s question in context, it is important to stress that the Bill will have no financial effect on the UK Budget. Some might say, for the sake of argument, that the money could be better spent in the UK, but the fact is that it forms part of the European Union budget that has been agreed, so money not spent on this European project would be spent on a different one. I therefore take my hon. Friend’s intervention as an opportunity to remind the House that the Prime Minister secured a significant reduction in the European Union’s overall budget. In fact, I think it is the first time the EU has ever reduced its budget.

The original budget proposed for the programme was €229 million, which would have been a 7% increase on the budget for the 2007-2013 programme, which was €215 million, but I am pleased to say that, following the budget negotiations—otherwise known as the multi-annual financial framework—that figure came down to just over €185 million, which was a reduction of €44 million. It is also important to stress that the €185 million is spread over seven years and that we estimate the UK contribution to be about £2 million to £3 million a year. With that, I commend the Bill to the House.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Philip Hollobone and Lord Vaizey of Didcot

Thursday 31st October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Vaizey]

As I have said repeatedly, it is up to local authorities to publish their local broadband plans and I am delighted, particularly after the Secretary of State wrote to them, that many have now done so. People in Wiltshire and Yorkshire will know where the project is rolling out.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

It seems to me that BT is a big company that sometimes does not treat small communities very well. May I draw to the attention of the Minister the village of Rushden in my constituency, where residents are complaining that they are not getting the proper broadband access they deserve, despite their best efforts with BT?

[Mr Vaizey]

I hear what my hon. Friend says. BT is a big global company that we should be proud of, but from time to time issues will be raised by our constituents. I am happy to meet him to discuss the problem in detail.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Philip Hollobone and Lord Vaizey of Didcot

Thursday 5th September 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

Residents in the borough of Kettering are plagued by nuisance calls and they tell me that, despite registering with the Telephone Preference Service, the calls still get through. What can the Minister or Ofcom—or anyone—do, especially about companies that phone from other countries and jurisdictions?

[Mr Vaizey]

Two important points arise from my hon. Friend’s question, the first of which is that we have to examine carefully consumers’ consent, because we need much more clarity about when a consumer gives consent for a direct marketing call. On calls from abroad, we need to change the technology, but I was pleased by BT’s evidence that we will begin to be able to identify such calls.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Philip Hollobone and Lord Vaizey of Didcot

Thursday 18th April 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Vaizey]

The right hon. Gentleman could have cited the battle that we had with Newcastle, which initially planned to cut all its arts funding. I believe that local authorities should invest in the arts, as has the city of Liverpool, which, on the back of being the European capital of culture, is now a cultural and tourist destination that is second to none.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

Kettering’s Alfred East art gallery is the oldest purpose-built gallery in Northamptonshire and, to celebrate its centenary this year, it recently put on display some 350 pictures, filling the gallery. Will my hon. Friend encourage other art galleries around the country to get paintings out of their archives and to put them on display?

[Mr Vaizey]

I know that it is the Arts Council’s intention to pursue a policy of lending out paintings, and I would certainly encourage art galleries and museums to lend paintings when it is possible to do so.

Prime Minister’s Evidence (Leveson Inquiry)

Debate between Philip Hollobone and Lord Vaizey of Didcot

Tuesday 13th November 2012 Westminster Hall

[Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)]

The hon. Gentleman, unusually for him, is muddling some of the parliamentary procedure here. In half-hour debates, if an additional speaker wants to speak they have to seek the permission of both the Member who has tabled the debate and the Minister who is replying. That rule does not apply, however, to interventions, and it is entirely at the discretion of the Member who is on his feet at the time—in this case, the Minister.

[Mr Vaizey]

Further to that point of order, Mr Hollobone. Is it in order for a Member to accuse you of having dubious chairmanship and of being wrong in your rulings?

[Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)]

I do not know whether that is in order, but it is certainly not appreciated, and it is just wasting the time available to respond to the debate. I would have thought the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) would want to hear the Minister’s remarks.

[Mr Vaizey]

That is right, Mr Hollobone.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)]

The title of the debate is the Prime Minister and the Leveson inquiry. I was listening to the Minister’s remarks and he was talking about the Leveson inquiry, and I have ruled that to be in order.

[Mr Vaizey]

The hon. Member for Rhondda said from a sedentary position that I was not talking about the inquiry—again questioning your ruling, Mr Hollobone—but I of course was, because I was making the point that the reason we set up the Leveson inquiry—

[Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)]

Order.

4G (Interference)

Debate between Philip Hollobone and Lord Vaizey of Didcot

Tuesday 30th October 2012 Westminster Hall

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (Mr Edward Vaizey)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Maldon (Mr Whittingdale) on securing this important debate. As he points out, apart from a brief evidence session before his Select Committee, Parliament has not debated 4G interference with digital terrestrial television, so this debate is a useful opportunity to set out the Government’s position and perhaps address some of the concerns that he highlighted in his excellent speech.

First, I make it clear—my hon. Friend is an expert in such matters, but those watching the debate may not be—that we are talking about interference from the 800 MHz spectrum. As hon. Members may know, after the spectrum auction, mobile phones will use a range of spectrums—800 MHz, 900 MHz, 1,800 MHz, 2.1 GHz and 2.6 GHz—but only the 800 MHz spectrum risks causing interference as it is adjacent to the 700 MHz spectrum used for digital terrestrial television. It is important to make that point, because as my hon. Friend points out, today sees the launch of the UK’s first 4G service by EE, as we must now learn to call it, but that is in the 1,800 MHz spectrum, so nobody need go home tonight in fear that they will miss “BBC News at Ten” or “Newsnight.”

Secondly, only digital terrestrial television viewers will be affected. Again, effectively that is people watching Freeview. People who get their television through Freesat, cable or a commercial satellite provider will not be affected by the 800 MHz spectrum.

My hon. Friend points out that Ofcom has estimated that some 2.3 million households will be close enough to mobile phone base stations using the 800 MHz spectrum to risk being affected by interference. That is an estimate, and the figure may be substantially lower. There are a number of reasons why that may be the case. First, Ofcom estimates that only 40% of those households will be viewing Freeview; the rest will be getting their television in other ways. That brings the figure to 900,000 homes.

My hon. Friend asks whether mobile operators will be compelled to put filters on their base stations. I am pleased to inform him that all the base stations being procured by potential winners of the 800 MHz licence will include a filter as a matter of course. Without wishing to confine myself to a specific figure, I have been informed that it is therefore likely that the new base stations, which are substantially more advanced than the ones used in other countries, may substantially reduce the number of households affected. When that becomes clearer, I will, of course, inform him.

My job as a Minister, working with Ofcom, was to work out the best way to reduce any interference for potentially affected households. First, the obvious decision was to put the mitigation measures into the hands of the mobile operators. They are the ones who will site the base stations and procure the relevant technology, so it seems sensible that, as the people potentially causing the interference, they are in charge of reducing that interference as much and as upstream as possible.

Secondly, I was given a range of financial support options that I could make available for mitigation. To put it bluntly, those options included zero and figures across the spectrum. I chose the higher end of the spectrum. I would rather be the Minister who set aside too much money for this programme than the Minister who set aside too little to get the job done.

How will the money be used? First, all the households that might be affected by the base stations will receive a free filter. So, on the current figure, 2.3 million households will receive a free filter. That means that, for the sake of argument, if a household receives the signal for the main television set in the living room through cable or satellite, it will receive a free filter for, say, a Freeview set in the bedroom. That will help many households that have second sets.

If we zone in, as it were, on the 900,000 households that use Freeview for their primary set, we estimate that some 150,000 of those households will be able to fit a filter without any problem. I have fitted a filter, and my hon. Friend has fitted a filter, which is literally a piece of aerial, to put it in layman’s terms. I simply unplugged the aerial, attached the filter and put the aerial back in. That took me 10 seconds, and I would not class myself as a DIY expert.

We are then left with 220,000 households that are technically vulnerable, which means people with disabilities or people aged over 75. I do not want to get into a secondary debate—I know many 75-year-olds who might not class themselves as vulnerable—but technically, they are vulnerable. That is about one in four of the 900,000 households, and help will be available to them should they so choose. We know from the digital switchover scheme that, of the people who were eligible for help, only 15% chose to make use of the available help scheme. Nevertheless, money will be set aside on the basis that every single one of those households will use the help scheme.

The next category is people with amplifiers, which are used to boost the power level of the TV signal. Before the switchover, amplifiers were quite prevalent because, obviously, people were using them to boost weak digital signals before we completed the switchover. Sometimes amplifiers are used to boost a strong signal where there are two or three televisions in a home. Ofcom estimates that some 380,000 of the affected Freeview homes have amplifiers, but many of those will no longer be in use and there will be no need to fit a filter. Where there is an amplifier, there is no reason why, in quite a significant number of cases, a normal able-bodied person will not be able to fit a filter. There has been a suggestion that, if the amplifier is in the loft, that could be a problem, but it should be possible to go into the loft to fit the aerial extension.

We acknowledge, however, that if the amplifier is on the roof, we certainly would not expect someone to get out the ladder and climb on the roof to fit the aerial. Ofcom estimates that there are some 125,000 households in that category and, as a result of the high-profile concerns that were raised on that specific issue, we have instructed that about £12 million of the £180 million be set aside to pay for the reasonable costs of professional installation. We have estimated those costs to be about £50 plus VAT. It is important to stress that by “professional installation” we mean going up a ladder safely and putting the aerial extension into an amplifier. That is not the same as adjusting an aerial for the digital terrestrial television switchover, which was a more complicated, technical task, but we expect people to use a registered digital installer. That is something that we inherited from the digital switchover scheme and will ensure that people are using professional installers.

Finally, there comes the issue of fitting filters to communal properties. We think there are about 20,000 such properties, which make up the rest of the 900,000 affected households. Those properties will require a more sophisticated filter, which we think will cost up to £300, but those filters will be provided to communal properties free of charge. Fitting such a filter is probably more demanding than fitting the filter that my hon. Friend and I have used, and we think a figure of about £220 is right. As a general rule, we would expect landlords to be responsible for ensuring the fitting of that filter to their property.

My hon. Friend says that he thinks people with second or third sets should get additional free filters. I am afraid that at this stage all I can do is agree to disagree with him. Additional filters will be easy to obtain and should cost £10 or less. It is difficult to give an open-ended commitment to provide free filters and to ask people to write in to say that they have two, three, four, five or six television sets, or to try to guess how many television sets they have. I think it is easier simply to give everyone a free filter and then say, “If you want a second filter, they are relatively cheap.”

I have also noted my hon. Friend’s suggestion for a pilot or trial period before rolling out 4G. There have been a number of technical trials already, and we have seen commercial roll-out in other countries, so we have a great deal of experience to draw on. We do not believe that a trial would add anything to our knowledge, and it would significantly delay much-anticipated 4G services. We will keep the matter under review, but it is important to explain again that 4G will roll out gradually; not all the country will be covered by services the minute 4G goes live in the 800 spectrum category.

I note my hon. Friend’s concerns about the lack of a public awareness campaign. Again, the mitigation programme is different from the digital switchover programme, because it does not affect every household in the country. Far fewer households will be affected. Also, every single household within range of a base station will get at least four weeks’ notice, and the roll-out process will take two to three years. We believe that embarking on a widespread publicity campaign at the moment might not have the impact that my hon. Friend suggests.

It is also important to stress that those who hold 800 MHz licences after the auction will have strict key performance indicators on the provision of public information as part of their licence conditions. Our final guarantee is that if any of the mobile network operators fails to meet the key performance indicators, the immediate sanction will be that they must switch off the offending base station and not add any others until they have remedied the issues for local TV viewers. That strikes me as an elegant and effective way of ensuring that mobile network operators take the issue seriously.

My hon. Friend is right to point out that because of our work in clearing the spectrum more quickly than we had anticipated, bringing the benefits of 4G to the UK more quickly than planned, we have a stretching timetable, but I am pleased that the mobile network operators moved quickly to set up the mitigation company, which has the elegant title of Digital Mobile Spectrum Limited and Andrew Pinder as its interim chair. The creation of the company has been at the heart of discussions with the MNOs about bringing forward the roll-out of services, and the MNOs are still required to have the mitigation company operational in time to launch services. I am confident that the MNOs are taking that requirement seriously. Furthermore, we will have oversight through an oversight board. I am delighted to tell my hon. Friend that the board had its first meeting this morning, and it was very productive.

Finally, let me address three points quickly; I am conscious that I might run out of time. My hon. Friend said that 38,500 people could be so seriously affected that no filter will help them. That figure may change over time as base stations become more sophisticated, but yes, we have made provisions for them to have a full platform change, or even a direct digital terrestrial television relay should one be required.

We note the concerns of the programme making and special events sector. I met with Lord Grade recently to hear its concerns. It is for Ofcom to deal with the PMSE sector and find suitable frequencies for it. It has a dedicated channel, channel 38, but we will keep the issue under review, and I promised Lord Grade that we would meet regularly.

Finally, my hon. Friend mentioned the long-term future of 700 MHz. We note concerns about the long-term future for spectrum as mobile phone demand increases, and we have an ambitious campaign to release public sector spectrum. There is, of course, an international dimension to the designation of the 700 MHz band, and we will undoubtedly continue to negotiate with our international partners about its future use, but I note absolutely my hon. Friend’s comments. It is important that we do not run before we can walk.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)]

I do not think that there were any problems with transmission or reception during that debate, but I am afraid it is time to tune out and switch off.

Question put and agreed to.

Science and Public Service Broadcasting

Debate between Philip Hollobone and Lord Vaizey of Didcot

Tuesday 4th September 2012 Westminster Hall

[Mr Vaizey]

My hon. Friend invites me to fall into the trap that I said no Minister should fall into, so I think that a period of silence from me on that point would be appropriate. All I will say is that every hon. Member can engage with this ongoing debate. We should be proud of our science heritage and the science that is happening now in this country. As a constituency MP, I am certainly aware that we are one of the foremost science nations in the world.

Finally, speaking as a Culture Minister, I am pleased that more people are talking about the link between the arts and the sciences. Again, the hon. Lady was right that we cannot have a society divided between boffins and artists. They are two sides of the same coin, and both flourish when they work together.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)]

I thank hon. Members for taking part in that interesting and important debate.