Asked by: Lilian Greenwood (Labour - Nottingham South)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, when he plans to enable bowling alleys to reopen.
Answered by Nigel Huddleston - Financial Secretary (HM Treasury)
Physical activity facilities play a crucial role in supporting adults and children to be active. From 1 August, we will reopen bowling alleys.
The Government is committed to reopening leisure facilities and visitor attractions, including bowling alleys, as soon as it is safe to do so. The Sport Working Group and the Visitor Economy Working Group both feed into the Cultural Renewal Taskforce, and ensure strong sector and expert support for the co-development of guidance. This will help ten pin bowling alleys become Covid-19 Secure and re-open as early as possible.
As with all aspects of the Government’s response to Covid-19, our decisions will continue to be based on scientific evidence and public health assessments.
Asked by: Lilian Greenwood (Labour - Nottingham South)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, for what reason bowling alleys were not included in the reopening of businesses on 4, 11 and 13 July 2020.
Answered by Nigel Huddleston - Financial Secretary (HM Treasury)
Physical activity facilities play a crucial role in supporting adults and children to be active. From 1 August, we will reopen bowling alleys.
The Government is committed to reopening leisure facilities and visitor attractions, including bowling alleys, as soon as it is safe to do so. The Sport Working Group and the Visitor Economy Working Group both feed into the Cultural Renewal Taskforce, and ensure strong sector and expert support for the co-development of guidance. This will help ten pin bowling alleys become Covid-19 Secure and re-open as early as possible.
As with all aspects of the Government’s response to Covid-19, our decisions will continue to be based on scientific evidence and public health assessments.
Asked by: Lilian Greenwood (Labour - Nottingham South)
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 facilities in cinemas for deaf children and young people who require subtitles.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
I refer the hon. Member for Nottingham South to the answer given by my hon. Friend, the previous Minister for Sport, Media and Creative Industries (Nigel Adams) on 11 February, in response to question 13526.
Asked by: Lilian Greenwood (Labour - Nottingham South)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Minister of State, Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what assessment he has made of the adequacy of facilities in cinemas for deaf children and young people that require subtitles.
Answered by Nigel Adams
The Government recognises the importance of ensuring that the cinema experience is accessible to as wide a range of people as possible, including the deaf and hard of hearing. We welcome steps taken by industry, including the UK Cinema Association's Technology Challenge Fund, to explore solutions to enable this, for example through specially adapted glasses. We also welcome the fact that the National Deaf Children's Society are advisors on this project.
Asked by: Lilian Greenwood (Labour - Nottingham South)
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 HM Treasury on the application of 20 per cent VAT on e-publications; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Margot James
The application of 20 per cent VAT on e-publications is a long-standing concerns of parts of the publishing industry. The Cairncross Review into a sustainable future for journalism recommended extending the zero-rating of VAT to digital newspapers and magazines, including digital-only news publications. The Government is currently considering its response to the Review's recommendations. Decisions on taxation are a matter for HM Treasury.
Asked by: Lilian Greenwood (Labour - Nottingham South)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, pursuant to the Answer of 12 June 2015 to Question 1237 on television: disability, what targets his Department uses to judge if significant progress has been made on the provision of access service on Video on Demand.
Answered by Lord Vaizey of Didcot
Government will use information from a variety of sources and engagement with relevant parties to develop a target that we would expect to see reached by mid-2016. That information includes the Action on Hearing Loss, Sense and RNIB paper (April 2015). We have been monitoring progress of the provision of access services for Video on Demand content since 2013 through engagement with The Authority for Television On Demand (ATVOD), platform operators and content providers. Discussions with those parties are also helping us to understand better the technical challenges in providing such services.