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

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what assessment he has made of the feasibility of the Local Government Association's recommendation within the report entitled Ambition for Public Libraries in England 2016-2021, published on 23 March 2016, that library services should be included as part of the devolution deals for local authorities.

In its response to the consultation on the Leadership for Libraries Taskforce’s Ambition document, the Local Government Association supported the principle of library authorities working in partnership, collaborating and harnessing their potential for acting together when they want to do this. It is the responsibility for the relevant local authorities to explore and discuss the feasibility of including libraries as part of their devolution deals. DCMS will continue to work with the Libraries Taskforce to consider how we can support library authorities to engage with devolution discussions and share lessons learned with other local authorities.