£500M Scheme Announced

Great news for the film and TV industry as the Government announces new £500 million scheme to kickstart film and television productions struggling to secure insurance for Covid-related costs.

The new UK-wide £500 million Film and TV Production Restart Scheme will help TV and film productions across the country that have been halted or delayed by a lack of insurance to get back up and running.

It will fill the gap left by the lack of available insurance and cover coronavirus-related losses for cast member and crew illnesses and filming delays or disruptions caused by the ongoing battle against the virus.

The important information to note is:

• The funding will be available to all productions made by companies where at least half of the production budget is spent in the UK
• The Film & TV Production Restart Scheme will be available to compensate productions after they have restarted, and only where costs are then incurred due to delays or abandonment as a result of Coronavirus.
•  It will be possible to back date any future claims for eligible losses to today’s date.
• The intention is that eligible productions will receive compensation for costs caused by coronavirus delays up to a value of 20% of the production budget, with abandonment of productions due to coronavirus to be covered up to 70% of the production budget, upon agreement with the Government that abandonment was necessary.
• There will be a total cap on claims per production of £5m, and productions will need to pay an appropriate excess when seeking to claim under the scheme, as well as an appropriate fee when joining the scheme.
• Productions will need to provide evidence that they cannot return to work because of a lack of insurance.

More details on the eligibility will be released in the coming weeks.