Asked by: Simon Kirby (Conservative - Brighton, Kemptown)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what steps he has taken to insulate his departmental estate in order to improve energy efficiency; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Helen Grant - Shadow Solicitor General
DCMS is a tenant of HMRC at 100 Parliament Street and responsibility for insulation rests with them.
Asked by: Simon Kirby (Conservative - Brighton, Kemptown)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what steps he is taking to reduce water (a) usage and (b) bills in his Department; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Helen Grant - Shadow Solicitor General
DCMS is a tenant of HMRC at 100 Parliament Street and responsibility for water usage rests with them.
Asked by: Simon Kirby (Conservative - Brighton, Kemptown)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what steps his Department is taking to ensure its services are available online; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Lord Vaizey of Didcot
DCMS is responsible for transforming the digital infrastructure in the UK. DCMS is on track to deliver superfast broadband to 95% of the UK by 2017 and is launching 1,000 free public wi-fi hotspots in public buildings across the UK.
As part of the Government’s UK wide superfast broadband rollout, DCMS funds the superfast broadband connection vouchers scheme that’s aimed at providing local businesses and SMEs with faster broadband. DCMS has created a dedicated website for businesses to access suppliers offering the most competitive voucher packages in their areas at www.connectionvouchers.co.uk
DCMS also ensures it adheres to GOV.UK and Government Digital Services best practice, outlined in its Digital Strategy which is available on GOV.UK at www.gov.uk/government/publications/dcms-digital-strategy.
The DCMS reported against actions in its Digital Strategy in December 2013 www.gov.uk/government/publications/department-for-culture-media-and-sport-government-digital-strategy-actions/dcmss-actions-in-response-to-the-government-digital-strategy
Asked by: Simon Kirby (Conservative - Brighton, Kemptown)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, how often his Department reviews its processes regarding the logging of emails, letters and other correspondence received; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Helen Grant - Shadow Solicitor General
DCMS aims to reply to all correspondence within twenty working days of receipt. Correspondence processes are reviewed regularly to ensure DCMS delivers the best possible service in this area of work. The last review took place in August 2014.
Asked by: Simon Kirby (Conservative - Brighton, Kemptown)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, how many private finance initiative projects his Department contracted for in each year from 1997 to 2010.
Answered by Helen Grant - Shadow Solicitor General
I refer the Honourable Member to the information contained in the link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/private-finance-initiative-projects-2013-summary-data.
The data can be filtered by procuring authority and then by date of financial close in order to determine how many PFI projects were contracted by DCMS in each year from 1997 to 2010. This information is provided by DCMS and published by the Treasury each year. The current data is as at 31 March 2013, but will be updated with data as at 31 March 2014 shortly.
Asked by: Simon Kirby (Conservative - Brighton, Kemptown)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what the total private finance initiative liabilities of his Department are for the next 20 years; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Helen Grant - Shadow Solicitor General
DCMS has given undertakings to providing revenue support to a range of library and leisure schemes across England, consistent with the long term nature of PFI contracts.
Based on current levels of agreed revenue support, the forecast liability for the next 20 years would be £481m at today’s prices.
Asked by: Simon Kirby (Conservative - Brighton, Kemptown)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what steps he is taking to reduce energy costs in his Department; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Helen Grant - Shadow Solicitor General
DCMS is a tenant of HMRC at 100 Parliament Street and responsibility for energy efficiency rests with HMRC.
Asked by: Simon Kirby (Conservative - Brighton, Kemptown)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, whether he has any plans to increase the number of replies within his Department's working day standard; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Helen Grant - Shadow Solicitor General
This year to date the Department has replied to 90% of letters from Hon. Members within the 20 working day standard. We aim to improve still further during the remainder of the year.
Asked by: Simon Kirby (Conservative - Brighton, Kemptown)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, if he will review his departmental estate in order to reduce costs; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Helen Grant - Shadow Solicitor General
I am pleased to say that the Department has been making strong progress to date on the delivery of efficiency commitments made at Spending Review 2010 and Spending Round 2013 – which included reviewing the Department’s estate. The move last financial year to 100 Parliament Street and share space with HM Customs and Revenue is delivering savings of around £2m a year savings from 2013/14.
Since 2010-11 expenditure on the departments estate has declined from £8,533,000 to a forecast cost for this financial year (2014-15) of £4,930,000 – a saving since 2010-11 of £3.6m per annum. We continue to look for savings and bear down on all unnecessary expenditure.
Asked by: Simon Kirby (Conservative - Brighton, Kemptown)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, if he will estimate how much money will be raised from society lotteries in (a) Brighton, Kemptown and (b) Brighton and Hove in the next 12 months; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Helen Grant - Shadow Solicitor General
Society Lotteries are entirely independent of government (unlike the National Lottery) so detailed figures on society lottery income and distribution are not collected by Government. The Gambling Commission publish data about society lotteries (found at http://www.gamblingcommission.gov.uk/gambling_data__analysis/statistics/industry_statistics-1.aspx ) but this isn't broken down geographically.