My Lords, I thank the Minister for explaining so clearly how this will work. The Government launched this SI with much fanfare early last month—fanfare and the obligatory swipe at the unacceptable nature of EU bureaucracy that necessitated the SI. That is called Brexit, and those of us who opposed Brexit pointed out that if you do not belong to the club, you cannot benefit from the rules and, unfortunately, that lesson is becoming all too clear. Hence, we have this measure, which is one of a long line of complex, awkward fixes that we have discussed here in this Committee, over the months and years, to try to defray the damage that we are suffering from as a result of no longer being a member of the EU.
Of course, this order is very welcome as far as it goes, but it has taken a long time to get to this point. Since we left the EU, our specialist hauliers have been limited to, I think, three EU stops per tour, and many of them have already established bases in the EU to overcome this, with a resulting loss to the UK economy. It is not as if the firms in this sector did not warn us that this would happen. I was a member of the EU Internal Market Sub-Committee, and back in 2018, we took evidence from an organiser of major exhibitions who predicted exactly these problems.
One of the phrases the Government like to use frequently is “world-beating”. Often, it is a sad exaggeration, but in relation to the cultural sector it is very accurate. I would prefer to say “world-leading”, but the point is that our soft power through the cultural sector has been immense and is sadly diminished as a result of the constraints on touring in Europe. I have a number of questions for the Minister. It is 18 months since we left the EU. Can she perhaps explain why it has taken this long to get to this important measure? Ideally, it should have come in smoothly and immediately after we left the EU.
Paragraph 7.6 of the Explanatory Memorandum refers to a maximum period of transfer for a vehicle to a British operator licence as being
“six months in a twelve month period.”
I understand the concept of “temporary”, but why is six months the definition of “temporary”? Why not eight months or any other number of months within 12 months? Is there a legal basis, or is this something that was just added on?
Paragraph 7.4 says:
“This Instrument does not permit transportation of any item of goods for the intention of being sold on (such as merchandise).”
That is actually a very prescriptive limitation. I was part of a music group many years ago touring in Europe, and we took CDs with us. There would not be CDs now, but we also took t-shirts and souvenir programmes to be sold. It would appear that we would not be allowed to do that now. Such items are, very often, marginal. They are just part of giving that little extra edge to the operator. They are an important part of spreading our soft power, getting the name of the group known abroad.
So why is it that they are excluded? It seems it could incur considerable or disproportionate expense to carry them separately—a whole separate vehicle or separate haulage charges in some other way. It does not, to my mind, seem necessary. Was any consideration given to allowing goods of that type to a certain limited amount—maybe limited in total value or limited as a proportion of the total?
The net result of this SI is that some foreign-registered vehicles will be operating in the UK on British operator licences. This in itself presents enforcement challenges, which I am sure the Minister will have gone through, but could she give us some idea of the numbers expected to be affected by this? Is it hundreds, tens or thousands? What estimate has been given? There is a lack of impact assessment once again. The words used are that there is no significant impact on business. I had hoped that there will be a significant impact on business and therefore I am surprised that an assessment was not made.
Of course, I welcome this hope it does the trick, although the Minister has reminded us that it might not work for everyone. Sadly, we have heard of a number of artists who have stopped touring already and, unfortunately, they will not all return as a result of this. We have lost stature as a result of this situation.