Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, with reference to Part 4 of the Digital Strategy released on 1 March 2017, what estimate his Department has made of the number of businesses the Productivity Council will connect, in person, to share what good looks like.

Once established, the Productivity Council will seek to connect businesses through peer to peer networks and by sign-posting existing initiatives, as well as engaging directly with businesses in its own right. As part of these efforts, the Productivity Council will look to support and amplify the work of Local Enterprise Partnerships and Growth Hubs.

The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy has made no estimate of the number of peer-to-peer connections the Productivity Council will facilitate. Such forecasts will be discussed in the context of providing government funding for the establishment of the Productivity Council.