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

To ask Her Majesty's Government what steps they are taking, if any, to ensure the Urban Forest is preserved in its entirety as stipulated in the Deed of Dedication between the Millennium Commission and Sandwell Metropolitan Council.

The responsibility for enforcing Deeds entered into by the Millennium Commission is now the responsibility of the Big Lottery Fund (operating as The National Lottery Community Fund) which carries out those functions in accordance with their regulations and directions from DCMS and in line with current policies relating to the administration of legacy funders such as the Millennium Commission.

The National Lottery Community Fund is a non-departmental public body which means that it operates at arm’s-length from Government and, as a distributor of Lottery money, rather than of taxpayers’ funds, it makes its funding decisions independently. The Government cannot, therefore, intervene in or influence the Fund’s decision-making process.