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

To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what assessment he has made of the effect of the extension of covid-19 lockdown restrictions on loneliness.

Government is monitoring the level of loneliness via the Community Life Survey; the most robust source for assessing the level of loneliness across the UK. As this survey only produces yearly data, our understanding of loneliness over the various lockdowns is supplemented by more timely tracking data from the UCL COVID Study and the ONS Social Impacts of Coronavirus Study.

We will continue to work closely with the civil society sector and across government to assess how we can best support the continuation of vital work to tackle loneliness.

Government is committed to tackling loneliness. We have delivered £34 million of funding to tackle loneliness over the past year, are encouraging organisations to take action and are aiming to reduce the stigma of loneliness through our campaign ‘Let’s Talk Loneliness’.