Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lucy Frazer and Andrew Jones

Thursday 11th January 2024 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Jones (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (Con)]

12. What progress she has made on increasing women and girls’ access to sport.

[The Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport (Lucy Frazer)]

Women and girls should have exactly the same access to sport as boys and men. That is why we supported the recommendations in Karen Carney’s excellent report. It is why we are investing £600 million to boost equal access to sport, and why we recently announced £30 million for the Lionesses Futures Fund to deliver 30 pitches across the country with priority access for women and girls, with further opportunities for 8,000 women and girls.

[Andrew Jones]

We have had fantastic success with women’s football, particularly the Lionesses, including Harrogate’s Rachel Daly, who has been a great inspiration locally, but what steps is my right hon. and learned Friend taking to ensure that sports with a smaller following can sustain a competitive grassroots environment for girls?

[Lucy Frazer]

I recognise Rachel’s success as the top scorer in the women’s super league last year. We support sport at every level. Sport England’s This Girl Can campaign, funded by the Government, inspires millions of women and girls to get involved in all sports. The School Games programme, also funded by the Government, encourages children to take up sport and get active.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lucy Frazer and Andrew Jones

Monday 9th January 2023 Commons Chamber

[Lucy Frazer]

What I can confirm is that we will be bringing forward legislation in this Parliament to make valuations easier for those extending their leases, to make the lease extension experience easier and cheaper, to make it quicker for freeholders to take control of the management of their buildings with a right to manage and a number of other measures.

[Andrew Jones (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (Con)]

7. What steps his Department is taking to support the building of high-quality homes.

[The Minister of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Lucy Frazer)]

The design of our homes matters. That is why we have already taken steps to embed design quality in the planning system through changes to national planning policy and guidance. Furthermore, the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill requires areas to adopt local design codes, setting clear rules for development.

[Andrew Jones]

I thank the Minister for that answer. Councils can only require developers to build homes with energy measures that are in line with national guidelines. What work is being done to update these frameworks so that developers can be mandated to install measures such as solar panels or ground-source heat pumps and thereby reduce carbon emissions and, crucially, cut domestic energy bills?

[Lucy Frazer]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to highlight the importance of ensuring that our homes use green energy. In 2021, the Government introduced an uplift in the energy efficiency standards that means that new homes are now expected to produce 30% less carbon dioxide than the current standards. Furthermore, that is just a stepping stone to the 2025 future homes standard. Although we do not mandate specific technologies to enable innovation and tailoring to individual sites, we expect that most developers will use solar panels or heat pumps to meet those new standards.