Entertainers: Work Permits

(asked on 1st February 2021) - View Source

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

To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, if he will publish correspondence between the (a) Government and the EU and (b) his Department and other Government departments on work-permit free travel for musicians and other performers.


Answered by
Caroline Dinenage Portrait
Caroline Dinenage
This question was answered on 9th February 2021

This Government recognises the importance of the UK’s thriving cultural industries, and that is why it pushed for ambitious arrangements to make it easier for performers and artists to perform across Europe as part of the negotiations on our future relationship with the EU.

This Government proposed to the EU that UK cultural professionals, and their technical staff, be added to the list of permitted activities for short-term business visitors in the entry and temporary stay chapter of the Trade and Cooperation Agreement. This would have allowed UK cultural professionals and their staff to travel and perform in the EU more easily, without needing work-permits. These proposals were rejected by the EU.

Whilst both sides published their draft proposals for the future relationship, with the UK’s available here, neither side published their draft schedules for the services and investment title – which included the list of permitted activities for short-term business visitors – prior to the agreement’s conclusion. Publishing correspondence and details exchanged between parties related to the development of legal text for trade agreements during the course of the negotiation would not be appropriate, as both parties exchanged this information in confidence.

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