Asked by: Lee Dillon (Liberal Democrat - Newbury)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what assessment she has made of the potential impact of proposed US tariffs on foreign-produced films on the UK film industry.
Answered by Chris Bryant - Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
There are no tariffs on the UK film industry, but we continue to monitor the situation closely and recognise the seriousness of this issue.
We continue to take a calm and balanced approach to our discussions with the US following our recent UK-US Economic Prosperity Deal.
The US and the UK have a special, mutually beneficial relationship, unique cultural and linguistic ties. Our film sectors are heavily connected, founded on decades of partnership and exchange.
Our commitment to helping our film and TV industry flourish remains absolute and it is important to maintain the conditions that allow our sectors to continue to flourish together and avoid measures which undermine these conditions.
Asked by: Lee Dillon (Liberal Democrat - Newbury)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what support her Department is providing to schools that are having to reduce costs in Newbury constituency.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
Overall school funding is increasing by £3.7 billion in the 2025/26 financial year, meaning the core school budget will total £65.3 billion. This is a 6% rise in cash terms compared to 2024/25.
Schools in West Berkshire local authority are attracting £143.6 million through the dedicated schools grant. This represents an increase of 2.6% per pupil compared to 2024/25.
We are providing schools with an additional £615 million in the 2025/26 financial year to support them with the 4% teacher pay award and 3.2% support staff pay offer. Schools will be expected play their part in driving productivity across the public sector and find approximately the first 1% of pay awards by ensuring resources are deployed to maximise support for teaching and learning.
We are supporting schools to make savings and bring down operating costs. For example, 400 schools participating in the department’s new energy offer are projected to save an average of 36% compared to previous contracts.
We are also working to secure better banking solutions and provide services such as Get Help Buying for Schools and the Teaching Vacancies Service to reduce procurement and recruitment costs.
We know workforce deployment is the biggest component of school budgets. We will support schools to benefit fully from the tools we already offer to benchmark and integrate resourcing and curriculum planning, such as the Financial Benchmarking and Insights Tool. We will also introduce a new toolkit to support schools to adopt evidence-based deployment models.
Asked by: Lee Dillon (Liberal Democrat - Newbury)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what support her Department is providing to schools to ensure that at least 50 percent of children achieve passes in (a) maths and (b) English GCSEs in Newbury constituency.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Education)
In the 2023/24 academic year, 69.7% of students in the Newbury constituency achieved a grade 4 or above in both English and mathematics, and 49.5% of students achieved a grade 5 or above in both subjects.
High and rising school standards, with excellent foundations in reading, writing and mathematics, are at the heart of the government’s mission to break down barriers to opportunity and give every child the best start in life.
To drive standards in reading and writing, the government has committed £27.7 million in the 2025/26 financial year. This includes new training and resources for secondary school staff to support reading in key stage 3, with a specific focus on readers who are at risk of falling behind. The department’s English Hubs programme also supports the teaching of phonics, early language development and reading for pleasure. Newbury’s nearest English Hub is Whiteknights English Hub.
To drive standards in mathematics the department funds the Maths Hubs programme, supported by the National Centre for Excellence in the Teaching of Mathematics. Local maths hubs provide school-to-school support focused on mathematics subject knowledge and pedagogy training for teachers in primary and secondary schools. The Newbury constituency is served by the Buckinghamshire, Berkshire and Oxfordshire Maths Hub, which reports participation from 85% of schools from within its region.
Asked by: Lee Dillon (Liberal Democrat - Newbury)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he plans to take to help improve services at West Berkshire Community Hospital.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government is committed to shifting the focus of the National Health Service out of hospitals and into the community, and this will be referenced in our forthcoming 10-Year Health Plan. We recognise that delivering high-quality NHS healthcare services requires the right infrastructure in the right places.
The Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and West Berkshire Integrated Care Board (ICB) and providers have been provisionally allocated £39.3 million this financial year from our Constitutional Standards Recovery Fund to deliver new surgical hubs, diagnostic scanners, and beds to increase capacity for elective and emergency care. In addition, it has been provisionally allocated £2.8 million from our Primary Care Utilisation Fund to modernise and upgrade general practice surgeries, and £37.1 million from our Estates Safety Fund to address critical infrastructure and safety risks.
We are encouraging local NHS trusts and ICBs to explore possible options that could address constitutional standards recovery alongside addressing infrastructure issues, maximising value for money and patient benefits.
Alongside national programme allocations, the system has been provisionally allocated £123.1 million in operational capital funding, including primary care business-as-usual capital, for 2025/26, to be prioritised according to local needs, such as investing in acute and community hospital infrastructure.
Asked by: Lee Dillon (Liberal Democrat - Newbury)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will support plans to relocate additional facilities to West Berkshire Community Hospital to help ease pressures at the Royal Berkshire Hospital.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
National Health Service commissioners are responsible for delivery, implementation, and funding decisions for services, rather than the Department. Local health and care organisations are best placed to make decisions on commissioning services for their communities. Decisions about services should be clinically led, following appropriate engagement with the local authority, the local population, and stakeholders.
All service changes should be based on clear evidence that they will deliver better outcomes for patients.
Substantial planned service change is subject to a full public consultation and must meet the Government and NHS England’s ‘tests’ to ensure good decision making.
Asked by: Lee Dillon (Liberal Democrat - Newbury)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, what steps his Department is taking to support UK film exports, in the context of the announcement of 100% tariffs on films produced in the UK by the US President on 5 May 2025.
Answered by Gareth Thomas - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade)
My department has a dedicated exports promotion programme for the film and high-end TV industry, which includes providing export support for businesses at major international film festivals and markets. We work with the UK film and TV sectors to remove market access barriers to enable businesses to increase their exports and use free trade agreements to grow exports.
Asked by: Lee Dillon (Liberal Democrat - Newbury)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what progress her Department has made on making at least 10,000 extra driving tests available each month.
Answered by Lilian Greenwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
On the 23 April, the Secretary of State for Transport appeared before the Transport Select Committee and announced that the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) will take further actions to reduce waiting times for all customers across Great Britain.
Since announcing these measures, DVSA has:
The ATA scheme is designed to encourage a high level of take up. It is too early to provide information on how many volunteers might take up the offer nationally and the number of additional tests created.
As part of the measures announced 23 April, DVSA also has:
Further information on these actions and progress of DVSA’s plan to reduce driving test waiting times, which was announced in December 2024, can be found on GOV.UK.
Asked by: Lee Dillon (Liberal Democrat - Newbury)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what his Department's timetable is for announcing future funding arrangements for the Stewardship Scheme.
Answered by Daniel Zeichner - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
We will open our improved Countryside Stewardship Higher Tier (CSHT) later this year. We have started inviting farmers and land managers to begin the pre-application process and have published information that sets out what farmers and land managers can do now to help prepare to apply. CSHT will initially roll out in a controlled way by invitation, so everyone gets the right level of support.
Asked by: Lee Dillon (Liberal Democrat - Newbury)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether her Department plans to increase school funding to expand the provision of free school meals.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The department spends around £1.5 billion annually on free lunches for 2.1 million school pupils under benefits-based free school meals, over 90,000 disadvantaged students in further education, and around 1.3 million infants under universal infant free school meals. In addition to this, eligibility for free meals drives billions of additional pounds in disadvantage funding.
Schools have autonomy to allocate their budgets to comply with their duty to provide free meals in line with nutritional guidance set out in the school food standards.
As with all government programmes, including free school meals, we keep our approach under continued review.
Asked by: Lee Dillon (Liberal Democrat - Newbury)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to ensure that funding allocated to schools for free school meals is not used for other purposes.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The department spends around £1.5 billion annually on free lunches for 2.1 million school pupils under benefits-based free school meals, over 90,000 disadvantaged students in further education, and around 1.3 million infants under universal infant free school meals. In addition to this, eligibility for free meals drives billions of additional pounds in disadvantage funding.
Schools have autonomy to allocate their budgets to comply with their duty to provide free meals in line with nutritional guidance set out in the school food standards.
As with all government programmes, including free school meals, we keep our approach under continued review.