Asked by: Neil Duncan-Jordan (Labour - Poole)
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 implications for his policies of the Russian Chess Federation's attempt to have sanctions against them lifted.
Answered by Ian Murray - Minister of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
The UK Government recognises the independence and autonomy of international chess bodies. Decisions on who they include in events and competitions are for the organisers to take, within the framework of their own rules and regulations.
Asked by: Neil Duncan-Jordan (Labour - Poole)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what lessons her Department has learned from the experience of the Strengthening Chess in Primary Schools grant made in the 2023-24 financial year.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
My right hon. Friend, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, has announced £1.5 million in funding from 2026 to support participation in chess, which includes funding for chess in schools. The department will reflect upon insights gathered from the strengthening chess in primary schools grant in developing arrangements for use of the new funding. Further details will be announced in due course.
Asked by: Neil Duncan-Jordan (Labour - Poole)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether her Department plans to distribute funds to support chess in schools during 2025-26.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
The core funding schools receive is not ringfenced, and it is for headteachers to decide how best to manage their budgets.
Asked by: Neil Duncan-Jordan (Labour - Poole)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, pursuant to the Answer of 12 June 2025 to Question 58502, whether she has made an assessment of the potential impact of chess in prisons on reducing offending behaviour.
Answered by Nicholas Dakin - Vice Chamberlain (HM Household) (Whip, House of Commons)
The Ministry of Justice is aware of research that is in progress in relation to regular chess sessions across the prison estate. To date, no formal assessment has been made of any effect on re-offending.
As chess is not a structured physical activity, it is not included in the management information that is collected centrally. To determine how many prisons hold regular chess sessions, it would be necessary to consult each individual establishment, and this could not be done without incurring disproportionate cost.
Asked by: Neil Duncan-Jordan (Labour - Poole)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, pursuant to the Answer of 12 June 2025 to Question 58502, how many prisons currently hold regular chess activity sessions.
Answered by Nicholas Dakin - Vice Chamberlain (HM Household) (Whip, House of Commons)
The Ministry of Justice is aware of research that is in progress in relation to regular chess sessions across the prison estate. To date, no formal assessment has been made of any effect on re-offending.
As chess is not a structured physical activity, it is not included in the management information that is collected centrally. To determine how many prisons hold regular chess sessions, it would be necessary to consult each individual establishment, and this could not be done without incurring disproportionate cost.
Asked by: Neil Duncan-Jordan (Labour - Poole)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what estimate her Department has made of the amount spent on providing (a) football, (b) pool, (c) table-tennis, (d) gym, (e) running, (f) yoga, (g) chess and (h) other sporting activities in prisons in the last year.
Answered by Nicholas Dakin - Vice Chamberlain (HM Household) (Whip, House of Commons)
H M Prison and Probation Service recognises the importance physical activity plays in the overall well-being of prisoners and the effect sport, exercise and movement can have on supporting other programmes designed to reduce offending behaviour.
Data on the amount spent in providing the activities specified are not held centrally, and could not be obtained without incurring disproportionate cost.
Asked by: Grahame Morris (Labour - Easington)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if she will list the providers that have entered into Prison Education Service contracts in the last 12 months.
Answered by Nicholas Dakin - Vice Chamberlain (HM Household) (Whip, House of Commons)
The information requested is in the public domain. The names of contractors are published via Contracts Finder - GOV.UK. For ease of reference, Prison Education Services entered into in the last 12 months are provided below:
Supplier |
Associated Training Services (ATS) Ltd |
Barber Training & Education |
Beating Time (also known as "Choirs Beating Time") |
Belong: Making Justice Happen |
Brighton Table Tennis Club |
CAP Enterprise (Kent) cic |
Career Connect |
Catimor Ltd t/a Redemption Roasters |
Changing Tunes |
Chess in Schools and Communities |
Chichester College Group |
City and Guilds of London Institute |
Combat2Coffee C.I.C |
Community Arts Projects UK |
Community Training Solutions Limited |
Complete skills solutions |
Cronin Music Ltd |
Dominic Waldron |
Elite Project Services Ltd |
Food Behind Bars |
FTW Training |
Fusion21 Ltd |
Get Skills Employment & Training Ltd |
Get Wise Enterprise C.I.C |
GLA Group |
Good Vibrations |
GREEN SKILLS PARTNERSHIP C.I.C. |
Hampshire Cultural Trust |
Independent sewing machines |
Ingeus UK Limited |
Inside Ecommerce Academy CIC |
Ipswich and Suffolk Council for Racial Equality |
karenmackeyconsultants |
Key Training and Learning Ltd |
Kinetic Youth Ltd |
Liberty Kitchen |
Life Cycle UK |
Lincolnshire Action Trust |
LTE Group (Trading as Novus) |
Mainstream Training |
Maverick Sounds Ltd |
Milton Keynes College |
Momentic Limited |
n-ergy Group Limited |
Northampton Saints Foundation |
Odd Arts |
Open College Network London Region |
Ormiston Families |
PeoplePlus Group Ltd |
Prison Advice & Care Trust (pact) |
RECOOP |
RIFT Social Reform |
RMF Construction Training Academy Ltd. |
Rocketeer Enterprise Ltd |
Saints Foundation |
Seetec Business Technology Centre Limited |
SevenThreeOne |
Shakespeare Un'bard |
Shannon Trust |
spark Inside |
St Giles Trust |
Synergy Theatre Project |
The Clink Charity |
The Growth Company Ltd |
The Prison Phoenix Trust |
The Restore Trust |
The Safety Box |
The Zahid Mubarek Trust |
Unity Restorative Practices |
University of Central Lancashire |
Unlock Drama |
WANT2ACHIEVE THE ACADEMY LIMITED |
Asked by: Lord Wigley (Plaid Cymru - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask His Majesty's Government how much financial support has been provided to schools for the promotion of chess in each of the last three years.
Answered by Baroness Smith of Malvern - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Education is a devolved matter, and the response outlines the information for England only.
In the 2023/24 financial year, the department allocated £200,000 through the Strengthening Chess in Primary Schools grant, supporting primary schools to improve their pupils’ access to chess.
More broadly, at the Autumn Budget 2024, the government announced an additional £2.3 billion for mainstream schools and young people with high needs for the 2025/26 financial year, compared to 2024/25. This means that overall core school funding will total almost £63.9 billion next year.
Each year schools receive core funding from the department to cover their expenditures. These expenditures could include teacher salaries, school lunches, electronic resources, art and craft supplies, or any other number of items.
It is for headteachers to decide how best to manage their budgets, including spending on the promotion of extracurricular activities such as chess. This funding is not ringfenced.
Schools may also choose to utilise their pupil premium funding to support enrichment. The pupil premium grant is funding to improve educational outcomes for disadvantaged pupils in state-funded schools in England. Schools must use this funding in line with the menu of approaches which are based on the evidence of how best to improve attainment for disadvantaged pupils. This includes the flexibility to use pupil premium to tackle non-academic barriers to success, including providing enrichment opportunities to benefit those pupils who may not be able to have access otherwise.
Asked by: Baroness Debbonaire (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, with reference to his Department's guidance entitled Installing chess tables in parks and public spaces: prospectus, published on 1 September 2023, if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of providing additional funding to local authorities for chess pieces to accompany the chess tables.
Answered by Jacob Young
85 local authorities that received Levelling Up Parks Fund funding were invited to apply for the chess tables funding. In total, 55 local authorities applied for the funding. We have provided funding to those 55 local authorities to install 99 chess tables across England.
We have asked local authorities to consider how the location they choose creates new opportunities, helps to strengthen relationships, builds local social cohesion and provides opportunities for people to come together in a joint activity.
Prior to the announcement of funding, we engaged stakeholders across Government, as well as local authorities and the English Chess Federation.
Local authorities know their communities best and are best placed to manage the use and assess the effects of the chess tables locally, if they choose to do so.
Any decisions to provide chess sets are for local authorities to take.
Further announcements will be set out in the usual way.
Asked by: Baroness Debbonaire (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, if he will take steps to ensure that newly-installed chess tables funded by his Department are used for their intended purpose.
Answered by Jacob Young
85 local authorities that received Levelling Up Parks Fund funding were invited to apply for the chess tables funding. In total, 55 local authorities applied for the funding. We have provided funding to those 55 local authorities to install 99 chess tables across England.
We have asked local authorities to consider how the location they choose creates new opportunities, helps to strengthen relationships, builds local social cohesion and provides opportunities for people to come together in a joint activity.
Prior to the announcement of funding, we engaged stakeholders across Government, as well as local authorities and the English Chess Federation.
Local authorities know their communities best and are best placed to manage the use and assess the effects of the chess tables locally, if they choose to do so.
Any decisions to provide chess sets are for local authorities to take.
Further announcements will be set out in the usual way.