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

To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of extending the timeframe in which successful applicants to the Culture Recovery Fund have to spend their funding; and whether he plans to make further rounds available to help people to safely recover and reopen after the covid-19 outbreak.

Last year the government announced the unprecedented £1.57 billion support package for the culture sector, of which over £1 billion has now been allocated to over 3,000 arts and culture organisations across the country. This funding is supporting the arts and culture sector up and down the country to survive the pandemic.

In order to support organisations as they prepare to welcome back audiences and visitors between April and June of this year, a second round of the Culture Recovery Fund has been announced. Over £300m of grants and £100m in repayable finance are available during this second round to support the costs organisations face.

An assessment was made of the merits of extending the timeframe in which successful applicants to the Culture Recovery Fund can spend existing funding. Relevant Arms Length Bodies have now contacted all recipients from the first round of the Culture Recovery Fund to confirm that they can request permission to use unspent funds from their round one awards until June 2021 on any eligible costs set out in guidance for the first or second rounds of the fund. We continue to keep the situation under review in order to provide as much support as we can to the sector.