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7 July 2009 : Column 652W—continued
Local Press: Finance
Mr. Stewart Jackson: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport what timetable has been set for the Audit Commission's review of council funding for local newspapers. [284005]
Mr. Bradshaw: Councils are not responsible for the funding of local newspapers. Councils may however take paid advertising to support local authority information sheets. As the Office of Fair Trading noted in its review, this practice may have an adverse impact on local newspapers.
In line with the recommendation in Chapter 5 of the Digital Britain Report, the Government have invited the Audit Commission to undertake a review of the impact of loss of advertising revenue on local newspapers. Their response is expected shortly.
Public Libraries
Stephen Hesford: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport when he expects to make a final ruling in the Wirral Library Review; when he plans to publish the new National Strategy for Libraries; and if he will make a statement. [284736]
Barbara Follett: The Secretary of State expects to announce his decision on the library service provided by Wirral metropolitan borough council as soon as possible after he has considered the conclusions of the independent inquiry. This is expected to report in the summer.
In respect of the Library Service Modernisation Review, I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave him on 19 June 2009, Official Report, column 510W.
Sport England
Hugh Robertson: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport when he expects to receive the report of the inquiry into the World Class Payments Bureau at Sport England; and whether the full report will be published. [284235]
Mr. Sutcliffe [holding answer 3 July 2009]: I expect to receive the report of the inquiry into the World Class Payments Bureau this autumn and the full report to be published.
Sports Coach: Executives
Hugh Robertson: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport what the employment status is of the Chief Executive of Sports Coach UK; and if he will make a statement. [284236]
Mr. Sutcliffe [holding answer 3 July 2009]: Sports Coach UK is an independent organization which is not one of my Department's non-departmental public bodies. Therefore I am not in a position to comment on the employment status of its Chief Executive.
Tourism: Entry Clearances
Mr. Ellwood: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport how many tourist visitors there were to each region in the first quarter of (a) 2008 and (b) 2009. [284241]
Barbara Follett [holding answer 3 July 2009]: The numbers of visits to the English regions in the first quarter of 2008 and 2009 are contained in the following table:
| Table 1: First quarter 2008 | |
| Region | Million( 1) |
| Table 2: First quarter, 3 July 2009 | |
| Region | Million( 1) |
| (1) UK-resident domestic overnight trips in English regions, all purposes. | |
Tourism: Expenditure
Mr. Ellwood: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport what estimate he has made of the amount spent on tourism by local authorities in the latest period for which figures are available. [284307]
Barbara Follett [holding answer 3 July 2009]: Figures for local authority tourism spending in England are drawn from returns made by individual authorities to the Department for Communities and Local Government. The most recent data available are for 2007-08, in which net current expenditure on tourism amounted to £123.3 million.
Tourism: Transport
Mr. Sanders: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport if he will make it his policy to produce with the Secretary of State for Transport a draft strategy to develop transport networks in order to encourage growth in the tourism industry. [280995]
Barbara Follett: We currently have no plans to produce such a strategy, but my Department is already working with the Department for Transport on a number of tourism transport issues. For example, ministerial colleagues from the Department for Transport are members of the recently established Cross-Government Ministerial Group on Tourism, which was set up to promote and support the industry in Westminster and Whitehall.
In addition, our recently published sustainable tourism framework takes account of the Department for Transport's “Delivering a Sustainable Transport System” which sets out the Government's aim of building up a transport system which supports quality of life and a healthy natural environment. This is one of the Department for Transport's five strategic goals and is underpinned by a number of challenges which will be used to inform future transport spending priorities and could be used by transport planners for transport schemes that would support tourism.
UK School Games: Finance
Mr. Hunt: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport how much each funding stream contributed to the UK School Games in (a) 2006, (b) 2007 and (c) 2008; and how much each stream is contributing to the 2009 UK School Games. [284788]
Mr. Sutcliffe: A breakdown of the funding streams from the Exchequer, the National Lottery, private sponsorship and the host city for the UK School Games between 2006 and 2009 is displayed as follows:
Exchequer—£0
Lottery—£1,484,000 (Millennium Commission)
Private sector—£343,000
Host city—£209,000
Exchequer—£0
Lottery—£2.3 million (BIG Lottery)
Private sector—£540,000
Host city—£50,000
Exchequer—£2.7 million
Lottery—£0
Private sector—£160,000
Host city—£400,000
Exchequer—£2.7 million
Lottery—£0
Private sector—£200,000 (estimated)
Host city—£500,000
Hugh Robertson: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport pursuant to the answer of 22 June 2009, Official Report, column 615W, on the UK School Games: finance, how much funding the UK School Games received from (a) the Exchequer, (b) the National Lottery, (c) private sponsorship and (d) the host city money between 2006 and 2009; and how much funding from each source he expects to be provided in (i) 2010 and (ii) 2011. [284239]
Mr. Sutcliffe [holding answer 3 July 2009]: A breakdown of funding from the Exchequer, the National Lottery, private sponsorship and the host city for the UK School Games between 2006 and 2009 is displayed in the following list:
Exchequer—£0
Lottery—£1,484,000 (Millennium Commission)
Private sector—£343,000
Host city—£209,000
Exchequer—£0
Lottery—£2.3 million (BIG Lottery)
Private sector—£540,000
Host city—£50,000
Exchequer—£2.7 million
Lottery—£0
Private sector—£160,000
Host city—£400,000
Exchequer—£2.7 million
Lottery—£0
Private sector—£200,000 (estimated)
Host city—£500,000
The exact nature of distribution of funding for the games in 2010 and 2011 is currently under discussion.
Northern Ireland
Translation Services: Northern Ireland
Mark Durkan: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland whether the National Framework Agreement on arrangements for the use of interpreters, translators and language service professionals within the criminal justice system applies to Northern Ireland. [283694]
Paul Goggins: The “National Agreement on Arrangements for the Use of Interpreters and Translators in the Criminal Justice System” only applies to provision within England and Wales. In Northern Ireland, a joint contract has been established between relevant criminal justice organisations and the Northern Ireland Council for Ethnic Minorities (for face-to-face interpretation) and the Royal National Institute for Deaf People (for sign language). This aims to enhance consistency in how interpretation is used across the criminal justice system by setting out the specific requirements of each partner organisation which is underpinned by individual organisational guidance. The contract provides flexibility for the use of interpreters registered with the National Register of Public Service Interpreters (England and Wales), where particular requirements cannot be met locally.
Defence
Afghanistan: Peacekeeping Operations
Nick Harvey: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many members of the armed forces deployed in each region of Afghanistan (a) have been trained in each year since 2001 and (b) are being trained in each local Afghan language. [283554]
Bill Rammell: Records for Farsi are available from 2001. Very little training in Pashto and Dari was conducted before 2005. This information is not held centrally and could be provided only at disproportionate cost. Farsi and Dari are very similar languages and many personnel trained in Farsi have also received some training in Dari.
The following tables provide the available figures for each of the three relevant languages.
| Pashto | |||||
| SLP1 | SLP2 | SLP3 | SLP4 | Total | |
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