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

To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what assessment his Department has made of the potential effect of the UK leaving the EU without a deal on the UK's digital technology sector.

We are confident that the digital technology sector will continue to go from strength to strength. Research by Dealroom and Tech Nation showed that British tech businesses attracted $7.8bn of funding last year, which was almost double the amount received in 2016 and more than Germany, France and Sweden combined (https://technation.io/news/uk-tech-extends-lead-over-europe/).

It is the job of a responsible Government to prepare for all scenarios, including the unlikely event that we reach March 2019 without agreeing a deal. This does not reflect an increased likelihood of ‘no deal’.

We have engaged with the digital technology sector to understand the potential effect of all scenarios. As part of ‘no deal’ preparations we are now publishing a series of technical notices which will advise organisations on potential courses of action to take in the unlikely event of ‘no deal’ with the EU. With the first batch already published, areas such as data protection will follow shortly.

We firmly believe it is in the interests of both the EU and the UK to strike a deal. That remains the goal on both sides and we are confident that this will be achieved.