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Departmental Sponsorship

Jim Knight: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport if she will list the financial initiatives and resources sponsored by her Department in the last 12 months for Dorset, which are additional to the Government SSA grants. [29896]

Dr. Howells: My Department and our sponsored NDPBs are responsible for supporting an enormous range of cultural and leisure activity and funding is available from a variety of sources. In some cases it is possible to identify where this funding has been allocated to projects in Dorset but there are grants for the south-west region, and for England as a whole, which it is not possible to disaggregate.

According to information supplied to us by the distributing bodies for the National Lottery awards database a total of £14,428,240 National Lottery funding was distributed to 205 different projects in Dorset during 2001. £3,700,000 of this related to sport and leisure activity and £797,412 to libraries. I am arranging for a full list of Dorset's lottery awards in the last 12 months to be placed in the Libraries of both Houses.

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Resource—The Council for Museums, Archives and Libraries, has allocated £82,000 to the tank museums in Bovington. In addition Resource has so far this year provided £485,903 to the South West Museums Council which covers the Dorset area. A further £119,379 will be paid next month.

Apsley House

Mr. Yeo: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport if she will publish the details of the proposal for a trust to manage Apsley House and the Wellington Museum referred to on 9 March 2000 by Lord McIntosh of Haringey. [29977]

Dr. Howells: The Department has considered a number of options for the future management of Apsley House and the Wellington Museum including the establishment of an independent trust. No decisions have been taken in favour of a trust as opposed to any other option. If the Contracting Out Order is approved, the Department will invite tenders from any interested parties.

Mr. Yeo: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport on whose authority the advertisements for the post of Director of the Wellington Museum Trust, were placed. [29980]

Dr. Howells: The Wellington Museum Trust is an independent body created to bid for the contract to run the Wellington Museum and to maintain the fabric of Apsley House, provided that the Contracting Out Order currently

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before Parliament is approved. The advertisement for a director of the trust was discussed with the Department. However, the trust does not require the Department's authority to place an advertisement and the appointment of a director will not require the Department's consent.

Mr. Yeo: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport (1) how many tenders were received for the future management of Apsley House; [29978]

(2) when she decided which tender for the management of Apsley House to accept. [29979]

Dr. Howells: No tenders have yet been invited. These will be sought if the draft Contracting Out Order to be debated in both Houses is approved.

Tourist Boards

Mr. Don Foster: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport what was (a) the total bill for salaries and expenses for board members, (b) the administrative operating costs and (c) the total annual budget in the latest year for which figures are available for each tourist board in England. [30201]

Dr. Howells: The 10 regional tourist boards (RTBs) of England are private companies and not public bodies. They are not required to present their financial records to the Government for scrutiny. The English Tourist Council have identified the following financial details based on information provided by the RTB's 2000–01 annual reports.

£

Regional Tourist Board	Board members emoluments(8)	Executive directors' emoluments(9)	Operational expenses(10)	Total costs(11)
Cumbria	0	130,294	n/a	1,574,077
East of England	0	79,138	n/a	2,006,799
London	20,000	91,406	669,126	4,981,111
Heart of England	0	52,270	n/a	2,946,964
Northumbria	0	(12)—	963,146	1,696,614
North West	5,000	(12)—	439,777	3,378,632
South East England	0	65,765	754,129	1,632,227
Southern	0	104,720	605,984	4,190,237
South West	9,000	92,235	n/a	2,612,918
Yorkshire	0	(12)—	n/a	4,078,187

⁽⁸⁾ Only three RTB's indicate that fees are payed to their chairman and non-executive directors.

⁽⁹⁾ Where separately identified, emoluments for executive directors are recorded. Some boards refer to the executive directors as board members.

⁽¹⁰⁾ Some RTB's publish an aggregated group expenditure. Others allocate overheads over a range of activities.

⁽¹¹⁾ None of the RTB's publish an annual budget in their accounts. Total annual expenditure is shown here.

⁽¹²⁾ For the Northumbria, North West and Yorkshire RTBs, neither the chief executive nor the finance director are listed as a director of the board.

Note:

Most RTB's appear to pay an attendance allowance to their board members only if they are not funded by the entity that they are normally employed by. Expenses are not separately identified as they are not considered to be significant.

Museums

Judy Mallaber: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport if she will make a statement on her policy towards making funds available for (a) the National Tramway Museum and (b) the other six museums which have been designated through her Department as having outstanding collections and which are not in receipt of core funding from central or local sources. [28507]

Dr. Howells: The National Tramway Museum and six other major independent museums are among the museums and galleries whose collections have been recognised as being of pre-eminent importance under the Designated Museums Scheme. The Designated Museums Challenge Fund, which has provided £15 million for designated museums over the period 1999–2000 to 2001–02, will continue with a further £10 million to be awarded in 2002–03 and 2003–04. Designated Museums will shortly have an opportunity to bid for the first tranche of £5 million.

Children's Television

Ms Shipley: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport if she will make a statement on the regulation of advertising in relation to children's television programmes. [30282]

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Dr. Howells: Under the UK's broadcasting arrangements, responsibility for what is broadcast on television rests with the broadcasters and the broadcasting regulatory bodies. Television advertising is subject to regulation by the Independent Television Commission (ITC) and broadcasters must comply with their codes of advertising standards and practices.

The general principle governing advertising to children is that, at times when large numbers of children are likely to be viewing, no product or service may be advertised, and no method of advertising may be used, which might result in harm to them physically, mentally or morally; and no method of advertising may be employed which takes advantage of the natural credulity and sense of loyalty of children (regarded as those aged 15 and under).

Broadcasting Licences

Mr. Swayne: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport what plans she has to change the law in respect of ownership of digital broadcast licences by religious broadcasters; and if she will make a statement. [31072]

Dr. Howells: The recent paper "Consultation on Media Ownership Rules" announced that the Government will bring forward legislation to allow religious bodies to hold a local digital sound programme licence. The paper also invited views on whether the restrictions on ownership of other terrestrial licences by religious bodies should be relaxed, and we are currently considering the responses. The Government will publish details of their proposals in the draft Communications Bill which we expect to publish this spring.

Broadcast Revenues (Sport)

Vernon Coaker: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport what recent assessment she has made of the effectiveness of the voluntary code obliging governing bodies of major sports to invest at least 5 per cent. of broadcasting revenues in the grassroots development of their sports; and if he will make a statement. [31172]

Mr. Caborn: The Government believe that the Central Council of Physical Recreation's Voluntary Code on Broadcasting has been a great success since it was launched in 1996. Governing bodies in cricket, both codes of rugby, and other major sports have signed the code, and many invest rather more than the minimum of 5 per cent. of broadcasting income which it stipulates. Football's investments under the code have been successfully channelled through the Football Foundation since July 2000. The broadcasting provisions of the code apply to all signatories; these safeguard secondary, free- to-air television coverage of many major sports events.

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