Question to the Department for Business and Trade:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, what assessment he has made of the potential impact of the cooling-off period proposals in section 267 of the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024 on printed news products.

The Government has consulted on how refunds should work when consumers exercise their statutory cooling-off rights (Consultation on the implementation of the new subscription contracts regime). We are analysing all the responses, including in relation to digital platform fees and views from the printed news sector.

The impact assessment for the subscriptions chapter in the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumer Act can be found here: Subscription traps: annex 2 impact assessment. Together the subscription measures are anticipated to provide £400m of consumer benefits per year and the estimated net direct cost to businesses is £171m per year. Sector-specific analysis has not been conducted.