Speeches by Smith.

“That is good and fine, but I want us to deliver these 1.5 million new homes as well; it seems that this is another lever to do that. Do you know if the Cabinet Office has had any conversations on this issue?”

“We can probably provide you with the evidence. I remember the MOD saying to us that it would make a huge difference. The director general at Historic Houses suggested “If such a rebate scheme existed, that would cost about £6 million,” which is not a lot of money in Government terms, and “It would generate benefits in …”

“Can I go back to the issue of VAT? We have a situation where if you are building new homes you do not pay VAT; you have VAT reliefs and exemptions. But if you want to reuse and repair these 670,000 potential homes in potentially beautiful buildings with all the embedded carbon, you have to pay VAT. It just seems to mak…”

“Yes, loads of people have said it is an important change.”

“Those figures I quoted were from Historic Houses and they were about publicly accessible historic knowledge, but lots of people have told us that the reform would make a big difference.”

“It was to do with the football ground, was it not?”

“Is it mainly about investment rather than streamlining processes?”

“In terms of the scheduling, some big orchestras have their own trucks to carry their musicians’ equipment. How does that work? Is there a lengthy process for inspecting those trucks that you then have to build into the schedule?”

“Naomi, you said earlier that the issue of carnets could be resolved by the Government without a whole new negotiation. Why have we not done that? Why are we not doing that?”

“Have you tried and they have not wanted to?”

“I was actually going to ask about the dreaded carnets, which is my topic. I will start with you, Hanna, because you talked about how carnets and CITES are maybe the biggest problems for orchestras. We are just trying to get a picture of how these problems affect tour budgets and scheduling. How does it work for a big o…”

“I have some questions I want to move on to, but that is really interesting. You mentioned Live Nation and Spotify, which are very different parts of the industry. Who could co-ordinate that? Could you get the three big record companies to try to pull everybody together to give advice and support to artists?”

“In terms of the scheduling, some big orchestras have their own trucks to carry their musicians’ equipment. How does that work? Is there a lengthy process for inspecting those trucks that you then have to build into the schedule?”

“Kate and Naomi, you both mentioned the issue of border checks and delays. Could you give us an indication of how big that problem is?”

“How often do those delays and issues happen?”

“Kate, you mentioned that you now source merchandise in Europe for your tours, is that right? Is that something that a lot of musicians are doing? We just want to get an indication of the problems that the merch rules cause for musicians.”

“That plays into the idea that some artists are now just not touring the EU because of these problems.”

“Naomi, you said earlier that the issue of carnets could be resolved by the Government without a whole new negotiation. Why have we not done that? Why are we not doing that?”

“Are you confident the Government are engaging properly on this and trying to make the changes that you are proposing?”

“I was just going to come on to cabotage. I do not know if there is anything more you want to say about the problems it causes; you have already touched on that, but you talked about temporary solutions. Are there workarounds that can be put in place to make that happen?”