Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, if he will make an estimate of the amount of funding his Department has spent on arts and culture provision in former coalfield communities in each of the last five years.

Historic England and Heritage Lottery Fund support coalfield communities by conserving and protecting key industrial heritage sites, their associated settlements and community buildings which provide a strong sense of place and community identity, supporting the economic and social regeneration of coalfield communities through heritage regeneration.

Between April 2012 and March 2017, Heritage Lottery Fund awarded £285.3m to 1,302 projects in coalfield community areas within the UK. By regional breakdown this includes East Midlands - £53,132,700; North East -£18,846,633; North West - £6,848,900; South East -£22,186,300; West Midlands -£35,198,600; Yorkshire and The Humber -£58,670,600.

Arts Council England have also provided significant investment into coalfield communities over the last five years: 2012/2013, £38,970,236; 2013/2014, £31,766,586; 2014/2015, £28,307,054; 2015/2016, £34,077,475; and 2016/2017, £41,625,973.

In addition to this, between 2013/14 and 2017/18 the National Coal Mining Museum England has received, on average, £2.45 million a year of funding.