Asked by: Ruth Cadbury (Labour - Brentford and Isleworth)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what steps his Department is taking to support tennis clubs during the November 2020 covid-19 lockdown.
Answered by Nigel Huddleston - Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport
Sports and physical activity providers and facilities are at the heart of our communities, and play a crucial role in supporting adults and children to be active.
Government has provided unprecedented support to businesses through tax reliefs, cash grants and employee wage support, which many sport clubs have benefited from. An income scheme announced in July by the Secretary of State for Local Government, aims to support local authorities who have incurred irrecoverable loss of income from sales, fees and charge which they had reasonably budgeted for. On 22 October, the Government announced a £100m support fund for local authority leisure centres. In addition, Sport England have provided over £220million as a package of support to help the sport and physical activity sector through this crisis. Part of this figure is the Community Emergency Fund of £35 million specifically to help community clubs and local physical activity organisations through the pandemic.
We are continuing to work with organisations to understand what they need and how we may be able to support them.
Asked by: Ruth Cadbury (Labour - Brentford and Isleworth)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what steps his Department is taking to ensure that (a) tennis, (b) golf and (c) other outdoor single sports can resume safely after the November 2020 covid-19 lockdown.
Answered by Nigel Huddleston - Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport
Sport and physical activity are incredibly important for our physical and mental health, and are a vital weapon against coronavirus.
Sports and physical activity are incredibly important for our physical and mental health, and are a vital weapon against coronavirus. That’s why we made sure that people could exercise at least once a day even during the height of the first period of enhanced national restrictions and why we opened up grassroots sport and leisure facilities as soon as it was safe to do so.
Nobody wanted to be in the position of having to introduce further National Restrictions. However as the Prime Minister said, with the virus spreading faster than expected we cannot allow our health system to be overwhelmed. The National Restrictions are designed to get the R rate under control through limiting social contact and reducing transmissions. We have not introduced further exemptions because when you unpick at one activity the effectiveness of the whole package is compromised.
However, as the Prime Minister said on 23 November national restrictions will end on Wednesday 2 December and gyms and the wider leisure sector including golf courses and tennis clubs can reopen across all tiers.
Asked by: Ruth Cadbury (Labour - Brentford and Isleworth)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what discussions she has had with the Secretary of State for Transport on the Maritime and Coastguard Agency's proposals for older passenger boats on the National Historic Ships Register that are unable to comply with new requirements set out in the review of standards for older passenger ships.
Answered by Helen Whately - Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
The Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport has not met with the Secretary of State for Transport to discuss this matter. However, National Historic Ships UK (NHS-UK), an independent advisory body reporting to DCMS, responded to the Maritime and Coastguard Agency's 2019 consultations on behalf of the sector, and discussed the potential impacts of the new requirements on vessels on the National Historic Ships Register, which it maintains. NHS-UK praised the Marine and Coastguard Agency’s inclusive approach.