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

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, with reference to page 53 of the consultation document entitled Disability Action Plan: Consultation, published in July 2023, what steps her Department is taking to encourage autism-friendly programmes in the cultural and heritage sectors; and whether she (a) has made and (b) plans to make an assessment of the effectiveness of those programmes.

The Department for Culture, Media and Sport works closely with its arm’s-length bodies, such as Arts Council England (ACE), the National Lottery Heritage Fund (NLHF) and Historic England (HE), to ensure that the cultural and heritage sectors are accessible to everyone, including those who are autistic.

ACE provides regular funding to disability-led organisations across the country through its National Portfolio Organisation investment programme. This programme includes organisations that support neurodivergent creatives and autism-friendly programming – for example, Unanima Theatre: a new joiner to the 2023–26 investment programme, which has an exclusively learning disabled and autistic cast who draw on their lives and experiences when creating work.

More broadly, ACE has worked to increase the investment in disability-led organisations across the National Portfolio; within the current portfolio there are now 32 such organisations. ACE monitors each organisation throughout the funding period, in this case 2023–26, to ensure they deliver the plans and activity agreed with ACE.

NLHF regularly funds projects that focus on autism. In 2022, it awarded £245,104 to The National Autistic Society which celebrated and preserved the stories, voices and memories of autistic people. In the same year, VocalEyes was awarded £99,814 to launch a digital heritage volunteering initiative providing neurodiverse people with valuable heritage volunteering experience and contributing to vital access and inclusion work in the sector. As a funding body, NLHF expects funding recipients to report back on expected outcomes and the intended effectiveness/impact of the programme.

Finally, HE has recently launched a new funding round for its Everyday Heritage Grants programme, with neurodiversity and disability identified as groups of people HE is particularly keen to engage and fund. HE will be measuring funded projects looking at the impact on wellbeing outcomes.