Oral Answers to Questions

Baroness Harman Excerpts

Thursday 12th December 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Grant]

As always, my hon. Friend makes a good and important point. We must not spoil this opportunity. It will be a fantastic occasion and we want people to be inspired by sport, inspired by rugby and to have a wonderful time.

[Ms Harriet Harman (Camberwell and Peckham) (Lab)]

The House will have heard the powerful points put by my hon. Friends. Next year, 2.3 million tickets will go on sale for rugby union world cup matches in this country. It is the third-largest sporting tournament in the world. As the Minister knows, the organisers want to protect rugby fans from ticket touts and are asking for us to do the same as we did in the Olympics and ban the secondary ticketing market. So far, she is refusing to do this. We would help with the legislation, as my hon. Friend the Member for Blaenau Gwent (Nick Smith) rightly said. Will she think again so that the 2015 rugby union world cup can be enjoyed by rugby supporters, not exploited by ticket touts?

[Mrs Grant]

The event will be enjoyed by rugby supporters and not exploited by ticket touts. I met England rugby 2015 recently and am aware of its concerns. I will always listen, but I am confident that mechanisms are in place to ensure that this event is enjoyed and not spoiled. There are many different mechanisms that can be put in place, including barcoding, named tickets and staggered releases, and I am delighted that 500,000 tickets will go on sale through the RFU’s members next May.

Oral Answers to Questions

Baroness Harman Excerpts

Thursday 31st October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Maria Miller]

I thank my hon. Friend for his comments. I would add that the public overwhelmingly support a free press, so it is important that we strike the right balance. I am sure that everyone here today would agree that the new system has to have a free press at its heart, while giving individuals the right level of redress, as I believe it will.

[Ms Harriet Harman (Camberwell and Peckham) (Lab)]

I thank the Secretary of State for the key role that she has played in finally getting the royal charter sealed by the Privy Council yesterday. Clear evidence was presented to Lord Justice Leveson of innocent people suffering as a result of press abuse, and it is almost a year since he produced his report, so a proper complaints system that does not infringe the freedom of the press and that is truly independent of the press and politicians is long overdue. Does the right hon. Lady agree that the press have nothing to fear from an independent complaints system? Will she join me in encouraging the industry to establish a genuinely independent self-regulator and put it forward for recognition?

[Maria Miller]

I thank the right hon. and learned Lady for her kind sentiments. It is also important to place on record the fact that the press are making good progress on setting up a self-regulator. They have already issued papers and are well into the necessary negotiations. Perhaps I could ask her a further question. Will she join me in staving off any form of pressure for statutory regulation of the press, because it is clear that some are still trying to use that as a threat?

Oral Answers to Questions

Baroness Harman Excerpts

Thursday 20th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Maria Miller]

I pay tribute to all the work that my hon. Friend has done in this regard. As he will know, the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Bill is currently being debated in the other place. We are continuing to discuss the issue that he has raised with transgender groups, but I gently remind him that it is actually an issue for the Ministry of Justice. Perhaps he could raise it with my right hon. Friend the Lord Chancellor.

[Ms Harriet Harman (Camberwell and Peckham) (Lab)]

May I take up the points made by my hon. Friend the Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Katy Clark)?

I hope the Secretary of State agrees that, despite our political differences and the occasional blip, and despite the fact that we are by no means out of the woods yet, we worked well together on the basis of trust and good faith, and worked well with the Liberal Democrats, in trying to sort out the question of press complaints following the Leveson report. However, as she has just said, we have yet to deal with the important issue of monopoly media ownership, which prevents the market from operating by preventing new entrants to it, as well as being bad for democracy.

May I ask the Secretary of State to do what the Government did before, namely set up and lead cross-party talks on the question of media ownership? We—and, I am sure, the Liberal Democrats—would be very willing to work with the Government to deal with that aspect of the Leveson inquiry, which is important and has not yet been tackled.

[Maria Miller]

I observed no blips in our working together; I thought that it went very well indeed.

We have already agreed on how to deal with the issue raised by the right hon. and learned Lady. We will seek views on it in the summer. Lord Justice Leveson himself said that he was not able to devote enough time to considering media plurality matters in detail, and I think that we need to do so now. I think that if we are to provide the sort of broad policy framework that we need, we should seek views on those matters rather than engaging in further political discussion.

Oral Answers to Questions

Baroness Harman Excerpts

Thursday 14th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Minister of State, Department for Culture, Media and Sport (Hugh Robertson)]

I join my hon. Friend with pleasure in congratulating those volunteers. I should add to his excellent question by saying that more than 1,000 local community sports clubs have benefited from funding under Places People Play. The funding was made available by the reforms to the lottery introduced by this Government and opposed by the Labour party.

[Ms Harriet Harman (Camberwell and Peckham) (Lab)]

With the Arts Council cut by 30%; with regional development agencies, which did so much to support the arts in the regions, abolished; with arts donors smeared as tax dodgers; with the Education Secretary trying to squeeze arts out of the curriculum; and with local government, especially in hard-pressed areas, which does so much to support arts in local communities, facing the biggest cuts in a generation, does the Secretary of State not realise that it is her job to fight for the arts for everyone? Will she therefore withdraw her shameful assertion that the arts community is disingenuous and that its fears are pure fiction?

[Maria Miller]

The right hon. and learned Lady will know that the arts and culture in this country are at the heart not just of making this a great place to live, but of the growth strategy. That is the work that our Department is doing. It is important to show that arts and culture are not just on the periphery, but at the heart of making this a great country. I am glad she has decided to show an interest in this area—I welcome that. I hope she will underline the importance of sending messages to local authorities such as those in Newcastle that the arts are important.