Speeches by Bryant.

“I do not want any small music venues to close, and that is why we are working as fast as we possibly can on the levy. I think in the end that is going to make the single biggest difference. As I say, we are looking at whether or not the agent of change principle, which we think should be part of the equation now, shoul…”

“My reading of how we responded to your report is slightly different. Yes, we disagreed about the fan-led review because I feel I am the fan-led review. I am a fan and also parts of the sector had already done their own fan-led review, which fed into the work that you produced. We wanted to proceed at pace rather than w…”

“This has been a trajectory over the last few years, obviously. Certainly, if we had had the cliff edge that was threatened in relation to business rates, I think you would have seen considerably more businesses close. I am also the Tourism Minister, and there is a whole series of issues and challenges that face a lot o…”

“I do not know what you mean precisely by “pushed under”. Do you mean a company that has already closed? Obviously what happens in the future is not going to deal with something that has already closed.”

“That is one way of explaining what happened. Another version is that everybody was going to be facing 100%, and that is not what they are now facing because we brought in something that we hope will be more permanent in relation to business rates. The point is well made. I know lots of people who work in hospitality, a…”

“Saying that we took it down from 70% to 40% is one way of putting it. Another way of putting it is that there was going to be a complete cliff edge, which was that it was coming to an end, and we were able to say, “No, we are coming in with a new rate” and that that is protected. I hope that we will be able to say some…”

“If we had not been able to write to you jointly yesterday to say where we had got to, I would have been very cross and I would be saying, “Right, I am looking at legislation, can we start drafting it?” But we have not got there, and I am very optimistic that this is going to work. I think it has been a good idea. There…”

“As I said earlier, I hope that some money might be going out before the end of the year, but I do not want to hurry them so fast that the trust ends up losing trust, if you see what I mean, because I think that that would be counterproductive in the long term. Festina lente is my Latin tag, which would be hasten slowly…”

“No, I would prefer to see more than a million by the end of the year partly because I want to see more tours happening in the UK, and this is not the only part of the equation for that. Also, I want to see more money going into the funds because some of this is urgent. We cannot hang around. There are several areas whe…”

“Stop in the name of love.”

“Those are obviously decisions for mayors rather than for us. I know both of them obviously and I think both of them had done an extraordinary job, although some of the media criticised them quite aggressively. The night-time economy is an important part of what people come to the UK for. One of the great delights as a …”

“Yes, although how they make people feel is part of the firepower, if you like. But yes, of course. The number of £124 billion of GVA is repeated by everybody, and quite rightly so, and there will probably be new numbers as well soon, which will probably be higher because this is a sector that is growing faster than any…”

“Sorry, can I just go back on one other point? Sorry, Dame Caroline, there is one other point I should perhaps make, which is that—again I have said this in the Chamber, but I will say this again here—I do not think for an instant that the creative industries are opposed to technological innovation or innovation of any …”

“That might be a debate for tomorrow afternoon, I am afraid.”

“Number one, if the data Bill remains as the data Bill entered the House of Lords, without any reference to copyright, British copyright law will not have changed at all and will be as robust as it ever was, and the protections for copyright holders will be as robust as they ever were. You have heard me many times, both…”

“We are a very small Department. I think when you do the total budget and you do a pie chart, we normally come in the “other” category. There is not much fat in DCMS. I think it is a great Department, and people work extremely hard to be able to deliver on very tiny budgets extraordinary differences to people’s lives. O…”

“With a Minister for the Arts in it.”

“My general principle about things that I read in newspapers is that some of them might be true and some of them might not be true, and my working assumption is that this is in the latter category. But, if I am honest, I have not investigated it very much, and it certainly is not for me to decide. This is one of those m…”

“I do not think the big issue is money. I think the big issue is bureaucracy and legal constraints. No, is the direct answer to your question, but we will think about it. There is some money that is provided through the Arts Council to artists who are touring, but I think the specific set of issues are more to do with f…”

“It is one of two Departments that I work in.”