Oral Answers to Questions Debate
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Rebecca Pow
Main Page: Rebecca Pow (Conservative - Taunton Deane)Department Debates - View all Rebecca Pow's debates with the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport
(6 years, 5 months ago)
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Tracey Crouch
It is a live consultation, and I encourage the right hon. Gentleman to submit his views to it.
Rebecca Pow (Taunton Deane) (Con)
The Natural History Museum is embarking on the monumental task of digitising 800 million items, including a collection of dung beetles and flea beetles. These items could hold the keys to our future biodiversity, climate change and pollution problems, so they are very important. Does the Minister agree that this is the kind of project the Government should be supporting in conjunction with our global partners?
John Glen
I thank my hon. Friend for that question. The Government are indeed supporting that sort of work, and we have some internationally renowned institutions doing wonderful work. Digitisation is really important, and the University of Sheffield, for example, is working closely with the Natural History Museum to take advantage of some of the pioneering work it has already undertaken.