UK government position on touring musicians increasingly untenable

The revelation in the Independent that the European Union had been expecting and willing to include visa and work-permit free travel for musicians and others in the arts but that the UK negotiators turned down the offer suggests that there is no interest within the main decision centres of the government.

While ministers in DCMS spent the autumn assuring those lobbying for an exemption that they should not worry and a deal was almost certain to be done, it seems the real battle was interdepartmental. There was a decision early on that negotiators would not work sector by sector, whether it was for financial services or anybody else - except fishing.That disastrous line was maintained.

All the assurances were merely palliative. The government instead suggested an exemption for all business travellers. Once that was rejected, inevitably, by the EU, as being too broad, the government stood back and refused to support a more limited exemption. Effectively ministries like the Depts. for Business and for International Trade, which are far more powerful around the cabinet table, did not see musicians as special. The platitudes about music crossing boundaries and the importance of cultural contact turn out to be meaningless compared the real ideology of hard Brexit.

It is instructive that Jamie Njoku-Goodwin has moved recently from being special adviser in DCMS to chief executive of UK music. His love of music is not in question. However his influence on government strategy clearly is. The Royal Opera House, the BBC and UK Music now all have supporters of the current government at the helm and it might be hoped that they have some traction with the Cabinet Office. Sadly, 'the usual channels' seem to be clogged at one end.

At the moment musicians in the UK are under a more punitive regime than those of any country that the EU has trade deals with. It will be ironic if, as is predicted, the EU signs a trade deal with China, that nation's citizens have greater access to European concert halls and festivals. The Labour Party's assertion this week that it does not intend to honour its commitment to regain our freedom of movement risks artists from Britain being locked out of the rest of Europe for at least the next decade, with disastrous consequences for young musicians.

There are questions that need to be answered on all sides. Will the UK reciprocate if the EU offers a more generous and arts specific exemption from visa and work permit requirements? Will the European Commission respond to pressure from European cultural networks to stand up for the principle of shared and free culture by reopening the paths for British musicians to take part? Will those networks stand up for their British members and for their European ones who value the contribution of our music making? Most of all, is there any appetite amongst senior politicians to push for flexibility?

I will be following these issues through the coming months.