Asked by: Martin Whitfield (Labour - East Lothian)
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 ensure that cable and satellite TV companies to share their subscription information with TV Licensing to improve the investigation and enforcement process as set out in section 5 of the TV licence free enforcement review.
Answered by Margot James
The government expects the BBC to collect the licence fee in an efficient and proportionate way to reduce costs and evasion. We continue to explore the feasibility of subscription data sharing.
Asked by: Martin Whitfield (Labour - East Lothian)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, on what date he expects Wave 3 of the Local Full Fibre Network Challenge Fund to open for applications.
Answered by Margot James
Wave 2 of the Challenge Fund closed to applications on 26th January 2018. We expect to notify applicants about the successful applications in March 2018 and we anticipate that the next wave of the Challenge Fund will open to applications in the summer of 2018.
Asked by: Martin Whitfield (Labour - East Lothian)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what assessment she has made of the potential effect of the UK leaving the EU on the digital and tech industries.
Answered by Matt Hancock
Ensuring that the UK's digital and technology sectors remain strong and at the forefront of international innovation and enterprise are priorities for this Government
Since the 2016 referendum, we have carried out extensive and diverse engagement with hundreds of businesses of all sizes across the UK on the potential implications of our withdrawal from the EU, alongside extensive wider analysis and engagement.
Investment continues to flow into the UK’s tech businesses as they go from strength to strength. Only yesterday, FinTech start-up Neyber received a huge £100m boost.