Asked by: Justin Tomlinson (Conservative - North Swindon)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what estimate he has made of the number of people using public libraries in each of the last five years.
Answered by Michael Ellis
The detail requested is not collected by this Department. However, the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) collect annually from the individual library authorities comprehensive information relating to library service provision in Great Britain. The following table outlines the number of physical library visits in each of the last five years in England.
| Visits (million) |
2012/13 | 238.9 |
2013/14 | 223.9 |
2014/15 | 224.6 |
2015/16 | 210.8 |
2016/17 | 204.3 |
The CIPFA library statistics can be accessed from the House library.
Asked by: Justin Tomlinson (Conservative - North Swindon)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what steps he is taking to assess the accuracy of rates of (a) access and (b) take-up for superfast broadband.
Answered by Margot James
Statistics on the availability of superfast broadband are available from a number of published sources including Ofcom’s Connected Nations Report and International Communications Market Report, and the Thinkbroadband website. The government also tracks coverage based on data reported by suppliers.
Coverage delivered through the government’s Superfast Broadband Programme is reported quarterly by suppliers at address level. For technologies such as Fibre to the Cabinet which do not provide fibre all the way to individual premises, the reported coverage data is based on modelled speeds, as the actual speeds that are attainable for a specific premises cannot be confirmed until an upgraded broadband service goes live. BT has undertaken three comparisons of actual against modelled speeds for its Fibre to the Cabinet coverage under the Superfast Broadband Programme, most recently with a dataset of 1.5 million lines, and the results show that in aggregate the number of premises that can obtain superfast speeds in practice is greater than the modelled figure.
Take-up rates are published by suppliers in their quarterly and annual reports. Rates of take-up in areas which have gained coverage as a result of the Superfast Broadband Programme are reported to Local Bodies. This is disaggregated to local levels to allow Local Bodies to identify where take-up is either lower or higher than the average, to support targeting of local demand stimulation activities. Take-up rates from projects in the Phase 1 Superfast Broadband Programme now average over 40%, significantly higher than the level expected by suppliers at the start of the programme.
Asked by: Justin Tomlinson (Conservative - North Swindon)
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 the BBC on the introduction of subscription for non-core services provided by that corporation.
Answered by Margot James
The government decided to retain the licence fee funding model for the duration of the current BBC Royal Charter. Alongside this the BBC has committed to consider and explore whether elements of subscription have a role to play alongside the core licence fee model in its future funding, to develop and test the scope for additional sources of commercial revenue.
Asked by: Justin Tomlinson (Conservative - North Swindon)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what recent assessment he has made of progress on the targets set out in Sporting Futures: a new strategy for an active nation, published in December 2015.
Answered by Tracey Crouch
In line with the action set out in Sporting Future, Government has been working with Sport England to develop targets for the increases in activity levels that it expects to see by 2020, with a view to setting subsequent targets for 2025 in due course.
Government will publish these targets in the second annual report to parliament on the Sporting Future strategy, which is due to be published in due course.
Asked by: Justin Tomlinson (Conservative - North Swindon)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, how many people aged (a) under 18 and (b) over 18 regularly participated in sport in each year since 2010.
Answered by Tracey Crouch
Sport England collects data on the number of people aged 16+ who engage in sport and physical activity in England through the Active Lives Survey. The latest data is available online (covering the period May 2016 to May 2017): https://www.sportengland.org/media/12458/active-lives-adult-may-16-17-report.pdf
The Active Lives Survey replaced the Active People Survey which collected data from the period of October 2005 to September 2016. Data is available online: https://www.sportengland.org/research/about-our-research/active-people-survey/. Owing to the different methodologies employed, the data sets from the two surveys are not directly comparable.
The Active Lives Survey does not currently capture data for children. Government’s Sporting Future strategy, published in 2015, extended the remit of Sport England to include children aged 5 years and up, outside of the school day. In line with this, Sport England has developed the Active Lives Children survey which is capturing data for children aged 5-15, both in and outside of school. The survey was launched in schools in September 2017 with the first set of results available in early 2019.
Asked by: Justin Tomlinson (Conservative - North Swindon)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, how many (a) men and (b) women regularly participated in sport in each year since 2010.
Answered by Tracey Crouch
Sport England collects data on the number of people aged 16+ who engage in sport and physical activity in England through the Active Lives Survey. The latest data is available online (covering the period May 2016 to May 2017): https://www.sportengland.org/media/12458/active-lives-adult-may-16-17-report.pdf
The Active Lives Survey replaced the Active People Survey which collected data from the period of October 2005 to September 2016. Data is available online: https://www.sportengland.org/research/about-our-research/active-people-survey/. Owing to the different methodologies employed, the data sets from the two surveys are not directly comparable.
The Active Lives Survey does not currently capture data for children. Government’s Sporting Future strategy, published in 2015, extended the remit of Sport England to include children aged 5 years and up, outside of the school day. In line with this, Sport England has developed the Active Lives Children survey which is capturing data for children aged 5-15, both in and outside of school. The survey was launched in schools in September 2017 with the first set of results available in early 2019.
Asked by: Justin Tomlinson (Conservative - North Swindon)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what estimate her Department has made of the contribution of the licensed hospitality industry to the UK tourism economy.
Answered by John Glen
Tourism as a whole contributed £62.4bn to the economy in 2015. We cannot make an estimate into the contribution of licensed hospitality to the UK economy as we do not hold information on businesses which are specifically licensed versus those that are not.
Asked by: Justin Tomlinson (Conservative - North Swindon)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what estimate she has made of the value of the video games industry to the UK economy in each of the last five years.
Answered by Matt Hancock
DCMS’ annual Economic Estimates show the value of the Computer Games sub-sector for 2013 to 2015 only. Latest figures, published in November 2016, show that the sector contributed over £400 million to the UK economy per year in that period. 2016 data will be published at the end of this year.
Asked by: Justin Tomlinson (Conservative - North Swindon)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, how many people have participated in the National Citizen Service since its creation.
Answered by Tracey Crouch
Since 2011 over 300,000 young people have participated in National Citizen Service. A further 100,000 are expected to participate this year meaning that it continues to demonstrate year on year growth.