Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what discussions he has had with stakeholders on the availability of the culture recovery fund to organisations that were previously in receipt of public funds.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
It has been agreed that in regards to public funds, such as the Job Retention Scheme, and the Culture Recovery Fund, organisations may apply for both, although of course organisations should not claim for the same costs through a public funding scheme and the Culture Recovery Fund. Where organisations have questions about this interaction they should speak to their relevant arms length body - Arts Council England, National Lottery Heritage Fund, Historic England or the British Film Institute.
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what assessment he has made of the adequacy of funding for charities and community projects which tackle loneliness.
Answered by John Whittingdale
In April, Government launched a £750 million charity funding package. This spearheaded a major effort to tackle loneliness, with over £23 million allocated to this activity. Activity includes a £5 million grant fund to support national organisations working to tackle loneliness and build social connections to help them continue and adapt their critical work. This has given grants of between £500,000 and £810,000 to 9 organisations. In addition, a further £44 million of the £750 million package was given to organisations supporting people with their mental health.
Government has also announced a £4 million microgrants fund, in partnership with The National Lottery Community Fund, to provide targeted funding to small grassroots organisations, to build relationships in communities to help reduce loneliness. This funding is due to be available shortly.
Government continues to work closely with the civil society sector to assess both the needs of vulnerable people and the sector itself, and how government can best support the continuation of its vital work.
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what assessment he has made of the adequacy of financial support available to self-employed and freelance people in creative industries.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
The government has taken active steps to support the self-employed. We’ve supported the self-employed with over £13 billion in grants and the Chancellor has doubled the generosity of the self-employed grant extension scheme from 20% to 40% of people’s profits. The expanded Jobs Support Scheme, announced by the Chancellor on 22 October, will include more generous and frequent cash grants, and more help for the self-employed.
DCMS continues to engage with HMT to feed into their assessment of the potential impacts of Government support. We will ensure the needs of our sectors are also factored into the developing economic response, and that DCMS sectors, including the live music industry, are supported throughout this time.
The Arts Council England has made £119 million available to individuals (including freelancers and self-employed), with £23.1 million already distributed and £95.9 million currently available to apply for via open funds.
The £1.57 billion Culture Recovery Fund will benefit freelancers, because it will invest in organisations and help them to reopen, and restart performances.
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what steps his Department is taking to tackle the online platforming of hate speech.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
Ministers have regular discussions with their Cabinet Colleagues on a range of issues, including tackling online hate speech. The Home Office are working closely with the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC), civil society partners and social media platforms to encourage victim reporting of online hate crime during the pandemic and to ensure that all police forces are providing reassurance to affected communities. Policy for combating online hate crime remains with the Home Office.
Ensuring the UK is the safest place in the world to go online is a priority for the Government. We are pressing ahead with legislation to establish a new Online Harms regulatory framework which will protect users from harm. The Government’s Online Harms White Paper, published in April 2019, set out our plans for world-leading legislation, by making companies more responsible for their users’ safety online.
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what recent discussions he has had with Cabinet colleagues on tackling the platforming of far-right hate speech online.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
Ministers have regular discussions with their Cabinet Colleagues on a range of issues, including tackling online hate speech. The Home Office are working closely with the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC), civil society partners and social media platforms to encourage victim reporting of online hate crime during the pandemic and to ensure that all police forces are providing reassurance to affected communities. Policy for combating online hate crime remains with the Home Office.
Ensuring the UK is the safest place in the world to go online is a priority for the Government. We are pressing ahead with legislation to establish a new Online Harms regulatory framework which will protect users from harm. The Government’s Online Harms White Paper, published in April 2019, set out our plans for world-leading legislation, by making companies more responsible for their users’ safety online.
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what further support the Government plans to provide to charities that face significant losses in donations due to the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by John Whittingdale
DCMS is continuing to work closely with the civil society sector to assess the needs of the sector and how the government can best support it to continue its vital work. The Government has committed a £750m targeted funding package to support the Voluntary and Community Sector, which builds on the significant package of support available across sectors, including the Job Retention Scheme. A further £150 million from dormant bank and building society accounts has been unlocked to support urgent work tackling youth unemployment, providing emergency loans for civil society organisations and improving the availability of fair, affordable credit to people in vulnerable circumstances.
Ensuring charities can begin fundraising activities will be a crucial part of the sector’s recovery. On the 24th June, DCMS published a collection of guidance for DCMS sectors relating to COVID-19. This includes practical guidance and resources from the Fundraising Regulator and Chartered Institute of Fundraising supporting charities to safeguard the public, staff and volunteers as they plan to return to fundraising activities in a safe and responsible way. This can be viewed at https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/guidance-for-dcms-sectors-in-relation-to-coronavirus-covid-19
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what steps his Department is taking to support child poverty charities working in BAME communities during the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by John Whittingdale
The Government has announced a broad package of support for businesses and charities to ensure that organisations that need support are able to access it. This includes the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme, the Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme, and the option to defer VAT payments due between 20 March and 30 June 2020.
In addition, on 8 April the Government announced a £750 million funding package to ensure charities providing frontline services to vulnerable people affected by the pandemic can continue their vital work. Of this, £360 million was to be allocated to individual government departments based on evidence of service need. This funding has now been allocated to government departments, who are using a range of approaches to award funding either directly to charities or through bidding processes. As part of this package, the Department for Education will provide £26.4 million to support vulnerable children in England.
£370 million has been allocated to support small and medium sized charities during the pandemic. This includes £60 million funding through the Barnett formula to support charities in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Of the £310 million to be spent in England, £200 million has been distributed to the National Lottery Community Fund to award grants through the Coronavirus Community Support Fund. Applications for this fund opened on 22 May and the National Lottery Community Fund is assessing applications in the order in which they are received, in order to award grants as quickly as possible. Child poverty charities working with BAME communities during the Covid-19 outbreak are eligible to apply for this funding.
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of establishing a Minister for young people to represent the perspectives and concerns of that age group.
Answered by John Whittingdale
Decisions on Ministerial remits and duties lie with the Prime Minister. A range of government departments (including DCMS) have policies that affect young people, and that is why the government believes there should be a cross-departmental approach.
This government is committed to supporting young people to have a voice on issues and concerns that matter to them, at both a local and national level. DCMS leads this work, and funds the British Youth Council (BYC) to deliver a youth voice programme including the UK Youth Parliament, the Make Your Mark ballot, the Youth Select Committee, The Government’s Youth Steering Group and the Young Inspectors group.
Officials are working collaboratively across Whitehall, with the youth sector, and young people to ensure that we support our young people during and post Covid-19, and that their voices are heard.