Tag: Caroline Dinenage

The statement made by Caroline Dinenage, the Minister for Digital and Culture, in the House of Commons on 23 September 2020.

I am today launching a call for evidence on loot boxes in video games. I want to understand fully the existing research and concerns around loot boxes including any evidence of links to gambling-like behaviour and problem ​gambling amongst young people. This fulfils a commitment the Government announced on 8 June as part of their response to the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee’s report on immersive and addictive technologies.

The Government take concerns around potential harms from loot boxes seriously. This open call for evidence will seek detailed information on the impact of loot boxes on players, particularly children and young people, examining concerns that loot boxes may encourage gambling-like behaviour and lead to problem gambling, as well as examining the size and scale of the loot box market in the UK, and the impact of current voluntary and statutory protections. The call for evidence will also seek information on the direct experiences of video games players and adults responsible for children and young people who play video games.

In 2019, the Government committed to review the Gambling Act with a particular focus on tackling issues around online loot boxes. The results from the call for evidence will be considered alongside the review of the Gambling Act and will inform future actions in regard to loot boxes. The Government stand ready to take action should the outcomes of the call for evidence support taking a new approach to ensure users, and particularly young people, are better protected.

The Government continue to support the growth of the video games sector in the UK, recognising that video games bring great economic, cultural and social benefits. Over half the UK population plays games, the vast majority engaging safely with content that allows them to enjoy fun, exciting play, find moments of relaxation, socialise and learn new skills. The video games sector, a key part of the UK’s world-leading creative industries, is also a cutting edge creator and adopter of innovative new technologies, and a provider of highly skilled creative jobs.

However, evolving digital technologies such as video games also present new responsibilities to ensure that users, particularly children and vulnerable people, are not exposed to harm.

I believe the call for evidence the Government are launching today is an important step towards gathering the evidence required to ensure we can support the further growth of this innovative and important industry while protecting users.

The call for evidence document will be available on gov.uk.

Below is the text of the statement made by Caroline Dinenage, the Minister for Digital and Culture, in the House of Commons on 7 July 2020.

The UK’s arts and cultural heritage are not just beloved in the UK, but are the envy of the rest of the world. Our theatres, live music venues, museums and galleries are incredibly valuable to our economy, bringing in £32.3 billion in 2018 and employing approximately 680,000 people. However, they are much more than that: they are the lynchpins of their local communities, entertaining, enlightening and educating us, and bringing us together through shared experiences.

The coronavirus pandemic dealt those sectors a body blow, forcing thousands of institutions to close their doors. The Government have already provided substantial financial assistance to see them through the crisis, including loans, business rate holidays and the self-employed and furloughing schemes. Together, those schemes have provided hundreds of millions of pounds of support, saving livelihoods, beloved organisations and institutions. Of course, we have been working extremely closely with the sector and medical experts to try to get things back up and running as soon as it is safe to do so.

Our battle against coronavirus is not over. With social distancing still in place and crowded venues not possible for the foreseeable future, it was clear that the cultural sector desperately needed help to weather the ongoing storm. The Government have provided it this week, with an unprecedented £1.57 billion rescue package for museums, galleries, theatres, independent cinemas, heritage sites and music venues across the country in the form of emergency grants and loans. It is the single largest one-off investment in UK culture and proof of our commitment to protecting the sectors that do so much to enrich all our lives. It has widely been recognised as exceeding expectations and DDCMS Ministers would like to put on record our thanks to the many people who have worked so incredibly hard on this behind the scenes over the weeks.

The funding will support the country’s long-standing and rightly famous cultural institutions such as the Royal Shakespeare Company, the Ironbridge Gorge Museum, the Mary Rose Trust, which I visited yesterday, and the National Theatre, but it will also support lesser known but equally cherished cultural and heritage institutions and organisations in regions up and down the country—places that have been cultural anchors for their communities for years. That will include theatres, live music venues and museums, but it will not just be about cultural spaces, as it will include dance companies, orchestras and touring arts groups that do not have their own venues but that still play a key role in our cultural life and, of course, still need support. By protecting these organisations as well, the funding will help to support those working across the cultural sector.

The package will also see £120 million invested in rebuilding, upgrading and starting new construction work across our cultural infrastructure as part of our ​wider effort to build, build, build after coronavirus. This will help to revitalise historic buildings across the country, creating jobs and protecting livelihoods all across our regions. Another £100 million will be allocated to arm’s length bodies such as the British Library, the British Museum and the British Film Institute. An extra £188 million will be given to the devolved Administrations in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, as the Government support our whole Union; our cultural strength is stronger as a family of four.

The broader package comes on top of the announcement made last week by the Arts Council to reopen its project grants competition and make an additional £39 million of funding available to support creativity—in particular from freelancers, creative practitioners and independent organisations.

We all want to see full audiences back in our venues and institutions, enjoying the very best of British culture as soon as possible. We will keep our foot very firmly on the pedal, and are finalising guidance for a phased return of the performing arts sectors as we speak. This package allows us to protect some of our precious cultural assets during an uncertain time ahead. It will help thousands of organisations to make it through this crisis and out the other side for future generations to enjoy. I ask the House to join the arts sector in welcoming this massive rescue package. It is a lifeline to help the sector weather this storm and bounce back even stronger.

Below is the text of the speech made by Caroline Dineage, the Creative Industries Minister, on 8 June 2020.

Thank you Tim for that introduction, and many thanks to Janet for inviting me to speak here today. I’m delighted to be participating in Createch 2020 at CogX. Also I’d like to congratulate Tim for his recent appointment as Director General of the BBC, it’s well deserved, and I look forward to continuing our work together in the future.

Let me start by saying two things: First, that the importance of the creative industries cannot be overstated.

And second, that many of those creative industries have been knocked off their feet by COVID. That’s going to make the relationship between tech and the creative industries more meaningful than ever.

In economic terms, the creative industries punch far above their weight. Before coronavirus, they were worth £112bn to our economy in 2018, and their contribution has grown twice as fast as the rest of the economy since 2010. In total, the Creative Industries are now bigger than UK Life Sciences, Aerospace and Automotive sectors combined.

And these are exporting businesses too: they contribute 12% of all UK services sold overseas, which is twice their share of the economy.

They are also enablers of the wider economy. Creative skills and services such as software, architecture, design, and advertising allow businesses – from aerospace to construction – to improve their products, boosting long-term productivity in the UK; which, as many people here will know, is something government and industry both care deeply about.

Around two-thirds of UK firms use design in some form. The architecture sector is critical to construction and how people live their lives; while the advertising sector underpins the whole economy and ensures creative content can reach consumers in the UK and abroad.

But it’s really important to remember that the creative industries aren’t just important economically. They make an incredible social and cultural contribution to this country, and help level-up growth and opportunity across our nations and regions. There are almost 50 clusters of creative businesses around the country – from Dundee’s games hub right the way through to Silicon Beach in Brighton.

Which gives me the opportunity to make an unapologetic plug for the DCMS-funded Creative Scale Up Programme, this is a pilot project designed to help creative business grow and raise finance in the West Midlands, Manchester and the West of England regions.

Culturally, sub-sectors such as film, music, fashion, games, publishing and architecture enrich all of our lives. Critically, they provide content that reflects the experiences of people and communities across the entire UK; content that otherwise would be undersupplied by overseas providers. They allow us to highlight the prestigious UK brand, and our values around the world, and is one of the reasons why we ranked second globally in the Portland Soft Power Index.

Given that importance, the government is investing more than £150m in supporting the Creative Industries Sector Deal and that launched in 2018.

I’d like to emphasise this expenditure comes alongside investment from industry itself, as a result of dialogue with the Creative Industries Council, that Tim co-chairs along with the Secretary of States for DCMS and BEIS. This council has representatives from 30 trade bodies and companies across the sectors, and Tim knows that the government places incredible value on this forum and the close working relationship that it has with industry.

I’ve already mentioned the Creative Scale-Up Programme, but another part of the Sector Deal is the Creative Industries Clusters programme, which runs until 2023 and will create at least 900 business-led collaborations, 360 jobs and 65 new businesses. And then there’s a very exciting project that I am especially keen on: Audiences of the Future programme, which is harnessing the power of immersive tech to help double the UK’s share of the global creative immersive content market by 2025.

The COVID pandemic has given Audiences of the Future added urgency. It’s now a central part of a major new coronavirus-linked campaign by the Arts and Humanities Research Council called Boundless Creativity, and it is looking for new ways for culture to thrive in a digital age.

Boundless Creativity involves all sorts of talented thinkers and creatives, from Mary Beard to Bernardine Evaristo, who together with the UK’s leading arts organisations and creative businesses will experiment with Augmented Reality, Virtual Reality and other technologies in a series of special projects.

One of those projects which I love the sound of is called “Dinosaurs and Robots”, led by London-based factory42, in collaboration with Sky, the Science Museum Group and the Natural History Museum. This project enables people to tour their buildings and enjoy the exhibitions from their own homes this summer, through a mixed reality experience that combines storytelling and cutting-edge technology.

That’s exactly the kind of collaboration the government wants to see between technology and the creative industries: finding new and unusual ways to get round the obstacles that coronavirus has presented.

I should also emphasise that although major elements of the Sector Deal are funded for a number of years to come, DCMS is looking to deliver new help and incentives to the Creative Industries – such as through the launch of 5G Create earlier this year.

Up to £30 million of government funding is available in this 5G Testbeds and Trials programme, which is designed to encourage the exploration and development of new use-cases and 5G technical capabilities.

In particular we want to encourage partnerships between creative and infrastructure companies, so that for example, specialist content companies can look at innovative ways of distributing that content over 5G.

In terms of future prospects, the Creative Industries are critical to the UK’s recovery from COVID-19, given their role as key enablers of the wider economy and significant contributions to the UK’s culture and society.

While we know that some sub-sectors such as gaming and Video on Demand have thrived during the COVID crisis, others have been hit hard. Theatres and music venues are shuttered; Film and TV production has been halted or at least radically changed; and the advertising industry is facing some really widespread disruption. Sectors dependent on advertising like press and commercial broadcasting have been really struggling, even as demand for their services has spiked. The creative workforce, many of whom are freelance, have seen demand fall sharply.

As Tim has said, the existing challenges faced by the Creative Industries are being compounded by COVID, so during this global crisis, Government has provided an unprecedented level of financial support across the economy. Our Creative Industries can benefit from grants and loans for small businesses, the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme, the Self-Employed Income Support Scheme, tax deferrals and the £1.25 billion fund to protect the UK’s most innovative companies. That includes the Future Fund which is now open for applications until September 2020.

But as we emerge from lockdown, we need to think about the future of the Creative Industries, and how they can not only survive, but regain the very strong growth path they previously had. We need to think about how over the next decade they will become a cornerstone of our country, accounting for an even greater proportion of the economy and employment, and cementing the UK’s soft power around the globe.

That to me is why Createch is so vital to the future of the Creative Industries. We clearly need every tool available, from government policy to innovation and technology, to recover from the current situation and re-start a path of strong growth.

Technology will be central to our recovery, just as it has been a central part of the lockdown – allowing us to work, exercise, socialise and school our kids from the safety of our homes over the last few weeks and months.

The take-up of tech has been staggering over the last few months. Just look at the number of Zoom users, which rose from 10 million in December to 300m in March.

That’s just as true for the creative industries. Through necessity, designers, architects and a whole host of creatives are now collaborating digitally throughout the UK and across borders as never before. I’m sure that not all of this digital work will return to face-to-face working practices in the future.

There is perhaps a new norm going on here, and remote working, or at least spending a greater percentage of the working week at home, may become standard practice in many companies across the economy and the creative industries specifically. In fact, Mark Zuckerberg is already planning for half of all Facebook staff to work from home forever.

But there are other significant changes in terms of technology usage in the Creative Industries. For example, online streaming and delivery of content ‘over-the-top’ is now penetrating from millennials into all age categories you will be pleased to know. Apparently the UK’s so-called peak “hour” for internet use now stretches from noon to 9pm.

Will advertising revenues that have shifted online from traditional media return to their former outlets? That is a question that we are all asking ourselves. Possibly, but it’s probable that companies that rely on traditional advertising will have to adapt business models quicker and rely more on digital revenue streams.

Overall, the application of technology to the Creative Industries is providing and will provide both opportunities and challenges. The Government wants to encourage and incentivise the growth of Createch wherever we can.

It has already produced some incredibly innovative collaborations – like the Future Fashion Factory in Leeds, which is part of our Creative Industries Clusters Programme.

Led by the School of Design at the University of Leeds and partnered with fashion houses like Burberry, it uses digital and advanced textile technologies and applies them to the world of fashion.

For example, there is an amazing piece of tech currently being tested that translates the feel of fabrics into code. This code can then be sent digitally, and used to recreate the feel of the fabric by other designers anywhere in the world.

In layperson terms that’s done by a piece of kit that, from the code of the original fabric, creates and blows a column of air that combines smaller individual ones. You pass your hand over the column and you can literally feel what appears to be the original fabric, whether rough or smooth.

Digitally conveying the tactile properties of a fabric is a truly groundbreaking application of technology to the Creative Industries. Tech here is directly helping the creativity of our fantastic UK fashion designers, and also reduces the economic and environmental impact of the sampling process.

Another fascinating Cluster Programme is the Bristol and Bath Creative R&D project, which brings together the region’s four universities, the Watershed and many industry partners to explore user engagement in new platforms.

The cluster is working at several sites to combine 5G connectivity, Extended Reality technologies and live arts, in order to imagine and develop the future of the Creative Industries.

We need to build on these examples and the success of the Creative Industries Clusters Programme in general. As Tim has mentioned, DCMS is currently talking with industry through the Creative Industries Council – some of whose members are in the audience today – about how the Government can continue to help the adoption of new technologies into all the creative sub-sectors.

Of course achieving this has to come from a joint and ongoing effort from all of us. From government, universities, entrepreneurs and innovators, and from companies within non-tech native sub-sectors themselves. We need the continued contribution of partners such as Digital Catapult, which is leading the early adoption of advanced digital technologies, and companies such as Improbable, which is pioneering groundbreaking tech applications in the games sector.

Government will continue to do its part – and yes I know, we need to do more – but we also need trade bodies, companies and individuals to do their part too as I know you know.

As we slowly start making moves towards recovery, together we’ll continue to drive Createch so that the creative industries can maintain their rightful place at the heart of our economy and society.

Thank you.

Below is the text of the speech made by Caroline Dinenage, the Minister for Digital and Culture, in the House of Commons on 2 March 2020.

I thank the hon. Member for Rutherglen and Hamilton West (Margaret Ferrier) for securing this debate on an important topic. She has made a passionate case—I never anticipated for a second that the story of the Parthenon sculptures would take us as far as “Fifteen to One” and YouTube, and I congratulate her on the scope of her argument. The underlying question about where cultural objects belong is not only important but a highly complex issue.

In the UK, museums have a legal responsibility to care for their collections, and they operate independently from Government. It is therefore up to individual museums and their trustees how they respond to restitution claims. Legislation prevents our national museums from removing objects from the national collection, although as the hon. Lady articulated, there are two exceptions to that legal position. One such exemption is Nazi-looted art. In 2000, the Government established the Spoliation Advisory Panel to consider claims for the return of cultural objects lost during the Nazi era, and since then, 13 cultural objects have been returned to families. In 2009, legislation was introduced to allow national museums to return items in that way.​

We also have legal measures in place so that human remains under 1,000 years old can be returned to their ancestors around the world. Since the introduction of that measure, there have been a number of successful repatriations of human remains from our national museums, notably from the Natural History Museum, which is in the process of returning the remains of 442 individuals to Australia, New Zealand and Hawaii. Recently, museums have explored other circumstances in which it may be necessary to return objects in their care. For example, at the end of last year, Manchester Museum, which is not subject to primary legislation on its collection, chose to return 43 sacred aboriginal objects to Australia.

I stress, however, that in all those cases, the long-standing principle and legal position in the UK, which has been supported by successive Governments, is that politicians do not interfere in the management of museum collections. That means that in the UK, all decisions related to the collection and the deaccessioning or restitution of artefacts are for each museum and its trustees, within their legal obligations.

We are none the less committed to supporting our museums across the sector in delivering their duties. For example, to further support museums on this particular matter, our national development agency for museums and cultural property, Arts Council England—it is sponsored by my Department—is working to refresh sector guidelines on the restitution of cultural property. It will create a comprehensive and practical recourse for museums to support them in dealing confidently and proactively with all aspects of restitution. It will also provide a signpost for support where necessary.

In the particular case of the Parthenon sculptures, which the hon. Lady raises today, I recognise the very strong desire of some, including the Greek Government, to see the sculptures reunified in the Acropolis Museum in Athens. There are extremely passionate views on both sides of the debate—we have seen examples of that in the Chamber this evening—and that demonstrates the cultural importance of these sculptures. They are currently on display in the British Museum. They were legally acquired under the laws pertaining at the time. As per the situation I have just set out, the trustees of the museum are legally responsible for managing the collections in their care. The Government have great faith in their ability to do so.

Dave Doogan (Angus) (SNP)

Does the Minister not agree that, notwithstanding the helpful context about how these decisions are taken and, crucially, without the interference of Government, that it was a black mark and a dark day when the British Museum refused to engage with UNESCO over a possible mediation on a location for these artefacts? Would it not be better, if such an opportunity arose again, for the museum to take a much more proactive and co-operative approach to any discussion?

Caroline Dinenage

As I have set out, it is very much the responsibility of the museum to manage its collections as it sees fit. We have faith in its ability to do so and the trustees believe very strongly that the museum is the very best place for the sculptures to be seen. That is ​based on the context of their rich contribution to the history of humanity. The Government fully support the position they have taken.

The hon. Lady raised the speculation that the future of the Parthenon sculptures is implicated in our discussion with the EU on our future trade agreement. The UK’s position remains unchanged: the Parthenon sculptures are the legal responsibility of the British Museum. That is not up for discussion as part of our trade negotiations.

We are very proud of the achievements of our world-class national museums. They do a fantastic job of caring for their collections on behalf of the nation, and they ensure that they are seen by a wide and diverse audience for free. Four of our national museums are in the top 10 most visited in the world. As my hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) mentioned, the British Museum alone welcomes over 6 million visitors a year. Those 6 million people see the Parthenon sculptures in an unparalleled world history context.

The public also benefit from the national collections beyond the walls of these historic institutions. In 2017-18, the UK’s national museums lent over 69,000 objects to over 2,000 venues around the world for exhibitions and displays. Those loans were seen by over 32 million people. Technology has also revolutionised the way in which the museum sector engages with the public. Through digitisation projects, much of our national collection is now available online, making it more widely accessible to communities everywhere. Our museums are dedicated to making their collections accessible, so that as many people as possible can experience and engage with them.

These collections are also the focus of scholarship and research, and the national museums are internationally recognised as leaders in their academic fields. They partner with experts from universities, museums and other organisations to advance our knowledge of history and science. In 2017-18, the national museums collaborated with over 1,000 UK and international academic and research institutions. It is not an exaggeration to say that this work can change the world, from significant scientific breakthroughs to conferences and exhibitions that share new knowledge. Much of that research is rightly focused on the provenance of museum collections. Some individual items have incredibly complicated histories and it is important that we do everything we can to understand that. Museums have rightly committed a lot of time to this type of research, and they take their due diligence in regard to their collections seriously.

The question of provenance, as the hon. Lady says, can be very complicated, but the Government take it very seriously and work with the police and relevant authorities to ensure that stolen or looted cultural objects do not enter the country in the first place. We are committed to combating the illicit trade of cultural property and to ensuring that objects of dubious provenance do not find their way into our museum collections. This is demonstrated through our international efforts to protect cultural heritage as a signatory of several international conventions.

The UK is a world leader in the fields of culture and heritage. Our museums co-operate extensively with partner institutions around the world on the promotion, protection and circulation of their collections. This sharing of ​knowledge and collections has enabled them to be proactive in international engagement and lead programmes that promote collaborative training, research and dialogue.

In the case of the British Museum and its wider relationship with its Greek counterparts, it continues a long tradition of fruitful collaboration. A curator from the Thessaloniki museum will join the museum’s annual global training programme this summer, and the Byzantine and Christian Museum in Athens will borrow a 15th-century print for an exhibition next year to mark the bicentenary of the Greek war of independence in 2021. Prior to that, the museum has lent several objects to an exhibition in the Acropolis Museum and presented a newly commissioned replica of a lion-head water spout from the Parthenon to the Acropolis Restoration Service. The museum has worked with Greek colleagues to research the Parthenon frieze, including through the use of 3D image scanning.

Visually impaired visitors to the British Museum can now enjoy a new touch-tour using casts of the Parthenon sculptures, and from March 2021, the museum will hold ​a free exhibition of historic drawings from its collection that illustrate the long and complex history of the Parthenon as a church, temple and mosque. The trustees have never been asked for a loan of the Parthenon sculptures by the Greek Government, only for their permanent transfer to Athens. As the museum has stated publicly, the trustees would of course consider any request for any part of the collection to be borrowed and then returned, provided that the borrowing institution acknowledges the British Museum’s ownership and that the normal loan conditions are satisfied.

The Government support the position that the Parthenon sculptures should remain in the British Museum, where they are accessible to millions of people for free in the context of world history.