UK–EU Trade and Co-operation Agreement: Meetings of Bodies Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateLord Jones of Cheltenham
Main Page: Lord Jones of Cheltenham (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Jones of Cheltenham's debates with the Cabinet Office
(3 years, 3 months ago)
Lords ChamberMy Lords, the TCA provides for a civil society forum. It has to be balanced between UK and EU business and civil society groups to discuss the implementation of the agreement. We are in touch with the EU about how this will work. We will work very much to facilitate its first meeting this year. We are engaging actively with business and civil society domestically, and I am happy to write to the noble Baroness about the detail of where that has got to.
Is the noble Lord making any progress on negotiating a new deal for the creative sector on touring in Europe? While he is thinking of a plausible answer to that, can he tell us whether, when he decided to reject the EU’s generous offer in the negotiations and throw touring musicians under a bus, he anticipated, is surprised by, or accepts any responsibility at all for the humiliation of our country scoring zero—nul points—in the Eurovision Song Contest?
My Lords, I am happy to accept responsibility for many things but I do not think I can reasonably accept that I affected the result on Saturday night. As regards creatives, of course we work to support all our creative industries in the situation that now prevails under the TCA. We made proposals in the negotiations that would have largely solved the difficulties faced by our great creative industries. The proposals made by the EU would not have done so, so we would be in this situation. We are now working as hard as we possibly can with the member states to establish the facts about visas and to support our industry in moving forward.