Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what steps her Department is taking to reduce barriers to entry for young deaf people in (a) sport and (b) other activities.

The Government is dedicated to making sport in this country accessible and inclusive for everyone, including d/Deaf people.

That is why, through our arm's length body, Sport England, we have provided £1.2 million between 2022 and 2027 to support deaf sport at the grassroots level, build wider participation, and develop strong governance within UK Deaf Sport.

Sport England are also exploring a series of small-scale talent pilots for d/Deaf athletes. These pilots will see Sport England, National Governing Bodies, and UK Deaf Sport working together to explore these issues and suggest potential solutions.

The Government-funded School Games programme offers children the opportunity to take part in competitions in over 40 sports at local and regional level, including inclusive, modified versions of the sports. Since 2010, the School Games have offered 13.4 million participation opportunities for young people.

Outside of the school day, the £57 million investment in the Opening School Facilities programme allows schools to open their sport facilities outside of the core school hours. Up to 1350 schools across England have been targeted, with the funding aimed at having the most positive impact on their communities, including for children with special educational needs and disabilities.

The National Lottery Heritage Fund (NLHF) has supported a range of funding to help widen access to heritage. For example, in 2020 they supported Funky Kids to enable families of children with D/deafness or hearing impairments to take part in social activities that taught them about local heritage, traditions and skills passed down through generations.

Arts Councils across the UK are working together with the British Film Institute to launch a free, UK-wide arts access scheme, called ‘All-In’. The pilot of this scheme is set to launch in spring 2024. This scheme will operate across the UK in arts and cultural venues, for seamless, barrier-free booking which is responsive to individual circumstances and needs, including those who are d/Deaf.

DCMS investment is enabling important accessibility upgrades in cultural venues across the country, including via infrastructure grants to DCMS-sponsored cultural bodies. The joint DCMS/Wolfson Museums and Galleries Improvement Fund, which is available to a wide range of museums and galleries across England, also has improvements to access and/or interpretation for visitors with disabilities as a core criterion. Recent grants have supported projects at the National Science and Media Museum in Bradford and the People’s History Museum in Manchester who are working with d/Deaf people, and other groups, to improve accessibility to their galleries and spaces.