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

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, if her Department will consider changing the terms of reference for the UK City of Culture competition to allow towns to participate.

The Government’s approach to a future City of Culture competition will be announced in due course.

The current application guidance for the UK City of Culture competition already allows towns to enter. We keep under review our competition criteria feeding in lessons from previous rounds to provide the best support to each bidding place.

Towns have great potential to benefit from culture driven development.