Asked by: Jason McCartney (Conservative - Colne Valley)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what steps her Department is taking to consult on the future of Channel 4.
Answered by Julia Lopez - Minister of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
The government has consulted on the best ownership model to support Channel 4 as part of our review of the public service broadcasting ecosystem.
The public consultation ran for 10 weeks before closing on 14 September. We received around 60,000 responses.
We are analysing every response to make sure we come to an informed decision on whether a change of ownership is the best way to secure Channel 4’s future.
Asked by: Jason McCartney (Conservative - Colne Valley)
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 adequacy of online gambling protections provided by gambling companies for (a) known frequent gamblers and (b) other online users.
Answered by John Whittingdale
Keeping gambling fair and open and free from crime, and protecting children and vulnerable people from being harmed or exploited are priorities for the government and key licensing objectives for the Gambling Commission. The Commission requires all operators to monitor gambling activity and to intervene where a customer may be at risk of harm. It has consulted on tightening its rules on customer interaction for online operators and will publish a response and next steps in the summer.
The government launched its Review of the Gambling Act 2005 on 8 December with the publication of a Call for Evidence. As part of the broad scope of the Review, we called for evidence on the effectiveness of our regulatory system, including protections for online gamblers and the Gambling Commission's powers and resources. We aim to publish a white paper by the end of the year.
Asked by: Jason McCartney (Conservative - Colne Valley)
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 effectiveness of the Gambling Commission in reducing gambling-related harms.
Answered by John Whittingdale
Keeping gambling fair and open and free from crime, and protecting children and vulnerable people from being harmed or exploited are priorities for the government and key licensing objectives for the Gambling Commission. The Commission requires all operators to monitor gambling activity and to intervene where a customer may be at risk of harm. It has consulted on tightening its rules on customer interaction for online operators and will publish a response and next steps in the summer.
The government launched its Review of the Gambling Act 2005 on 8 December with the publication of a Call for Evidence. As part of the broad scope of the Review, we called for evidence on the effectiveness of our regulatory system, including protections for online gamblers and the Gambling Commission's powers and resources. We aim to publish a white paper by the end of the year.
Asked by: Jason McCartney (Conservative - Colne Valley)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what specific steps his Department will take to enforce restrictions on online advertising of products high in fat, sugar and salt.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
In 2019 and 2020, the Government consulted on proposals to further restrict HFSS advertising on TV and online. We will be publishing the government response to the consultation shortly, which will set out the future policy direction for both TV and online HFSS advertising.
In the 2020 consultation we proposed that the day-to-day responsibility for applying HFSS advertising restrictions be given to the Advertising Standards Authority, recognising their expertise and experience in regulating advertising. Following the current regulatory regime, we propose that breaches would be resolved in line with current ASA policy of responding to individual complaints and promoting voluntary cooperation with the restriction.
If this approach failed or advertisers were committing repeated or severe breaches relating to HFSS marketing material, they would face stronger penalties through a statutory backstop. We would envisage that the backstop regulator would have powers to issue civil sanctions, including the ability to issue fines.
We want to ensure that the enforcement powers of the statutory regulator are designed and used in a way that incentivises compliance and allows for rapid remedial action. The Government will implement any new HFSS advertising restrictions across both online and TV simultaneously by the end of 2022, as outlined in the Tackling Obesity policy published on 27 July 2020.
Asked by: Jason McCartney (Conservative - Colne Valley)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, with reference to plans to restrict online advertising of products High in Fat, Sugar and Salt (HFSS), whether online platforms are planned to be held legally responsible under statutory rules for making sure that HFSS food and drink advertising does not appear.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
The government will shortly publish its response to consultations held in 2019 and 2020 which set out proposals to ban HFSS advertisements being shown on TV before 9pm, and for further statutory measures to restrict HFSS advertising online.
The response will set out the Government’s approach to online liability and enforcement.