I was recently asked for an update on where we are regarding post Brexit creative touring, so I thought I would share the briefing with you also.
CarryOnTouring have been campaigning for a resolution surrounding the issues facing creative personnel wishing to tour the EU / UK post Brexit.
The issues we face are:
Work permits / visas, there are 27 countries that each have their own rules that need to be followed, some are fairly relaxed others not so.
90/180 days access to the Schengen area, this is causing problems to creatives that are simply running out of time and therefore losing opportunities to earn a living and has the knock on effect that we also lose the initial contact that can lead to work elsewhere around the globe.
Carnets, a carnet is a complex document that allows for the temporary importation of equipment to be used on an event. The cost of a carnet is around £350-£550 but you also have to deposit a bond which is returnable on completion of the carnet and the return of the equipment to the home country. The bond value is a high percentage of the value of the equipment included therein.
A lot of bands find that the added red tape of a carnet is too much and so don’t bother touring the EU or UK for EU based bands.
Merchandise for sale at gigs, there is a small EU allowance of €1000 per person that they can carry to sell at gigs, which differs from the UK of £1500. This leads to confusion as to what can be taken. There are also issues surrounding the country of origin, you may have t-shirts printed in the UK but made in China which adds to the paperwork involved, then there is the vat issues where bands may need to be vat registered in the country they are trying to sell t shirts etc in.
Cites, this is the rules around the movement of rare species, some instruments contain rare woods etc that need to have special documentation to move across borders.
Cabotage, this affects trucking equipment around the EU, a truck may only make 3 “moves” before having to return to the home country.
This could be for instance 3 dates in Paris, Berlin & Amsterdam or if there is no empty case storage at the venue and the truck as to leave the venue with the empty cases and park in a truck park, that move is classed as move 2 and the return to collect the equipment is move 3, meaning after that first event they would need to return home.
You can see how this would affect a tour.
So where have we got to since finally leaving the EU, in short no-where. There has been some concessions in Spain and Greece regarding the need for work permits, but I believe that these are only temporary.
The campaign has been involved in various meetings with parliamentarians over the last two years, as a result we have a lot of support from most parties apart from the Tories.
We have as a campaign written several letters to the DCMS, we have also had MPs and Lords do the same on our behalf, the last of which “got lost and slipped through the cracks” during the recent split of the DCMS.
But the replies are always the same, that the govt put in a generous offer to the EU, but the EU refused, but won’t tell us what this offer was, even refusing to release it under the freedom of information act request submitted by Lord Clement Jones.
They also say that the EU’s offer didn’t fit in with the manifesto pledge to take back control of our borders.
Essentially the government seem to be burying their heads in the sand and hoping we go away.
We are now waiting on a date for a meeting with the CMS as they are now called, after they falsely told us that they had met us before.
The mess continues as does our campaign.
There were two recent articles in the Guardian about 1/ a German punk band being refused entry and 2/ the Ukrainian national orchestra also being refused.
This is due to the extremely poor information available from the government as to what is required to enter the UK to perform.
You can read the articles here.
German punk band ‘humiliated’ after being refused UK entry due to post-Brexit rules
Ukrainian orchestra’s key members refused visas to play in UK
There is lots of info and blogs on our website, but please feel free to contact us should you need more info.