Visa proposals split industry: 'US-style' immigration shake-up could make it harder for overseas acts to tour in the UK.(Work Permits)

As a new year begins, many people fear that a new era is also dawning for those looking to help talent cross borders.

Proposed changes to the UK's work permit system for acts coming in from overseas have prompted contrasting reactions from across the business.

Some argue that the proposals will prevent many overseas acts from touring the UK; others believe the UK music industry needs to tighten barriers to overseas competition to bring it into line with other countries' visa rules --the US's in particular--and thus protect domestic acts.

Until recently, the Government's proposals have been largely overlooked, partly because they were initially buried in a dry consultation document issued earlier in 2005, entitled Selective Admission: Making Migration Work For Britain.

The purpose of the document is to explore means of simplifying the system for processing foreign workers in the UK. But, if its proposals are taken up, it will massively complicate the way overseas acts and their entourages obtain the legal approval necessary to tour the UK.

The proposals involve scrapping the current system, through which British-based record companies can apply for work permits from a centre in Sheffield on behalf of the whole touring party, to a new system in which each individual member of a band as well as their road crew is responsible for making their own application at a British consulate in their own country.

To complicate matters, each member must supply details of a sponsor from an approved list and each case is assessed individually. By common consent, this will make the work permit process more expensive and time consuming, with acts whose members fail to sort out relevant paperwork in time--or who are invited to play shows that come about at the last minute--prevented from visiting, and therefore playing in, the UK.