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

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, whether his Department is undertaking any work in partnership with the Department of Health to promote positive health and wellbeing through the arts.

DCMS and the Department for Health held a joint Ministerial round table earlier this year to discuss the ways in which the arts can impact on health and wellbeing. We have published two reports on the social and wellbeing impacts of culture which can be found at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/quantifying-the-social-impacts-of-sport-and-culture and www.gov.uk/government/publications/quantifying-and-valuing-the-wellbeing-impacts-of-culture-and-sport

The Government is funding a What Works Centre on Wellbeing, working with Public Health England to develop further evidence on the impact of culture on wellbeing so that this can be communicated directly to local level practitioners.