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

To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what discussions her Department has had with regional tourism bodies on the potential effect the Maritime and Coastguard Agency’s proposals for older passenger boats will have on the UK’s (a) fleet of passenger boats and (b) tourism industry.

The Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport has not had any discussions with regional tourism bodies on the Maritime and Coastguard Agency’s proposals for older passenger boats.

The Department for Transport held an initial public consultation which ran from 6 November 2018 to 29 January 2019 with a second consultation running from 29th May 2019 to 10 July 2019, which included impact assessments and took comments from a range of stakeholders. Officials at the Maritime and Coastguard Agency are happy to discuss impacts with any interested parties and consider relevant evidence.