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

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what discussions she has had with the Secretary of State for Education on the decision to end Strategic Priorities Grant funding for journalism courses in higher education.

The Government has had to make tough prioritisation decisions driven by the challenging fiscal context that we inherited. For the Department of Education, this has meant prioritising support for high-cost subjects that are essential to delivery of our industrial strategy and core funding to support access to higher education for disadvantaged groups. It is important that the targeted funding allocated through the Strategic Priorities Grant (SPG) supports courses that have higher costs of delivery and our Plan for Growth.

The Government remains committed to supporting the invaluable role which journalism plays in the fabric of our society. We acknowledge journalism as an important and valued subject in higher education, alongside numerous other subjects that do not attract SPG high-cost subject funding, such as history, languages, economics, maths and law.

DCMS officials are engaging with the Department for Education, as well as the press sector and the key journalism professional bodies, to better understand the impact this will have on the journalism industry, as part of the wider creative industries.