• Brexit-induced increases in costs and processes are hindering UK music's export business.
• A short-term transition fund is needed to mitigate immediate issues and prevent long-term damage by enabling touring to go ahead post-Covid.
• The world-class standing of UK music is at risk.

The UK Council of Music Makers (CMM) - comprising FAC, The Ivors Academy, MMF, MPG and the MU - call on Government to urgently implement a specific European touring transition fund to combat drastically increased costs and bureaucracy posed by Brexit, faced by those looking to tour Europe later in 2021 and into 2022 as Covid guidelines allow.

While the CMM welcomes recent support from the Chancellor for music makers and their teams in relation to the devastating impact of the pandemic - with extension of the Self-Employment Income Support Scheme, furlough and Culture Recovery Fund - there is a further, immediate crisis for these workers now facing another blow due to Brexit disarray. This is killing UK music export opportunities and stifling UK music's global standing, culturally and economically. The UK's reputation as one of the greatest homes of musical talent, that has toured the world, bringing income to the UK and exerting soft power, is at significant risk.

While the UK Government must urgently come to terms in negotiating bilateral agreements with individual EU member states, music makers; songwriters, artists, musicians, producers and their managers, face turning down, cancelling and simply not embarking on European touring opportunities due to new visa, work permit and carnet costs, extended processes with time, checks and paperwork, plus restrictions on concert haulage, making usual business endeavours in this area simply unviable.

British artists played over 20,000 dates touring Europe (in 2019, pre-Covid), in turn employing more than 30,000 people (including musicians and crew), cementing our international reputation as leading the world in creating great music. Not only does live performance create critical revenue for performers and their teams, it also acts to fuel the creation of the music that sits at the core of our recorded industry. We need urgent help now to ensure British talent is not blocked from growing their audiences internationally in the short term which brings long term implications on loss of future revenue.

Music Makers are being forced to turn down opportunities to tour in Europe because of changes posed by Brexit as it stands due to those additional costs. If they cannot work in person in Europe, this has a knock on effect on radio play, streams, merchandise, festival bookings, future earnings - they are not being seen, nor heard, and it is negatively impacting the business across the board.

Will the next Adele, Dua Lipa, Ed Sheeran or Stormzy not come to light because of these restrictions? Let's not allow the momentum of this success to diminish. An urgent transition fund is needed for European touring as part of the bigger picture of an industry that has proven growth year-on-year and is worth billions of pounds to the UK economy.

The fishing industry recently received further support to deal with post-Brexit export issues, expanding on a £23m support package. UK music touring employs more than double that of fishing yet has received no equivalent support. None of the other support schemes deal with these issues, we need a new dedicated fund.

For UK music to retain its leading global standing, a post-Brexit European tour support fund is needed now before irreparable damage is done and we lose our talent and economic value in this area of business.

CMM is working with individual memberships to gather case studies on touring business lost to Brexit. This research will be issued in due course.

Initial data from new research on UK artists touring Europe* suggests:

• UK music artists performed at least 20,500 shows in the EU27 in 2019. This is four times the number of shows in the next biggest territory (USA)
• The top markets were Germany (20%); Spain, Ireland, France, Netherlands (all around 10% of total each); Italy, Belgium (5%); Austria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Poland (2-3% each).
• This indicates that at a minimum 1,867 UK artists were touring in 2019 (each artist averaging 11 dates across the year) and engaging 18 people (artists, musicians, crew) per tour, in total employing around 33,000 people (more than double that of the fishing industry).

*Based on Booking Agent Survey cross-referenced with PRS For Music number of live performance claims received via the online reporting tool from PRS members in 2019.

Notes:

• The above figures are preliminary and research is ongoing.
• Not all artists report their setlists to PRS For Music.
• Not all UK-based performing artists are members of PRS For Music.
• The above figures do not include US artists who often start their tours in the UK and employ UK crew (sometimes hundreds of people) to tour Europe with them.
• There are 5.5k shows registered on Resident Advisor (mostly electronic music and DJs).
• Those undertaking recorded music work abroad will not report setlists but will be getting paid as UK performers.
  
  

Case studies - EU touring 2021 onwards

1. Elder Island - EU tour 2022 (postponed from 2020)

British musical group from Bristol. Genre alt-pop, house. Debut music 2014, airplay on BBC Radio 1, 6, Introducing; Amazing Radio + more. Full-length debut album and North America and Europe tour in 2019. November 2020 follow up album.

Key facts for Elder Island 2022 EU tour

• EU tour routing already pushed back from 2020.
• Spain is absolutely a key market because of both Festivals and hard ticket fans.
• Band/team has invested thousands of pounds in building the fanbase / audience in the market.
• Spain currently the most expensive work visa at £323-£350 per person
• Touring with skeleton crew + the band is seven people x £350 = £2450
• Our guarantee for the two hard ticket shows in Spain is £4k combined. Every penny of which contributes to the expense of the tour bus, per diems, accommodation etc.
• This particular tour is unlikely to turn a profit in any case. The additional £2450 would be potentially removing the Spain shows from the tour altogether and rerouting the entire run.
• Band and team invested thousands of pounds into building global fanbases and audiences - mostly EU and US - to support their small entrepreneurial business. e.g. Spain - the band have seen a 75% increase in fee since the previous tour in Dec 2019 and added Madrid to the routing which already included Barcelona.
• 2022 headline tour was previously due to take place in 2020 and has the routing and fees agreed with many of the promoters. The £4000 in guaranteed fees covers the direct costs of touring for the artists and crew - seven people. Due to Covid postponement and Brexit changes, now facing significant additional costs for work permits and carnets, estimated at over £2500 which did not exist before and cannot be factored in as the deals have been negotiated. These additional costs might mean removing the Spanish shows altogether.

Knock on effects

• Loss of future earnings.
  Inability to employ the small business entrepreneurial crew that tour with the band.
• Loss of momentum in a competitive market which could mean losing out on festival offers which we were expecting to come in 2021 (£10k-£20k per booking) and would expect to see this increase year on year.
• May also have to cut other dates to ensure the routing makes sense, losing more earnings and momentum in other markets like Germany and Poland as the revenue from one show contributes to the overall tour costs.
• We would likely see a drop in streaming revenue from the markets we don't perform in.
  There would be no merchandise retail and possibly no festival bookings which play a huge part in sustaining the income.