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

To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, whether his Department has received representations from health experts on the health risks of rubber crumbs from artificial sports pitches.

Government is working closely with Sport England, officials from the Environment Agency, Public Health England and many of the major National Governing Bodies (NGBs) of sport on the subject of playing surfaces in England, including rubber crumb pitches.

The department is aware of, and feeding into the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) consultation on the restriction of microplastics. We will continue to work closely with experts in this field and will monitor the situation closely.