Judging by the recent success of UK productions like Adolescence and Baby Reindeer , you might assume that the UK film and television industry is flourishing. And indeed, spending on production has risen dramatically in the last year, a boom which is expected to continue through to 2026.
Authors
- Andrew Philip
Lecturer in Filmmaking and Knowledge Exchange Fellow, University of Reading
- Lisa Purse
Professor of Film, University of Reading
Unfortunately, our new report highlights a workforce crisis that raises serious questions about the future of the UK screen industry. And Donald Trump's recent threat to impose tariffs on non-US films adds to the grim situation, throwing the industry's vulnerability into stark relief.
We carried out extensive interviews with 29 participants from across the sector who painted a bleak picture of overwork, financial instability, discrimination and barriers to career progression.
Charities supporting the sector have already noted that the industry has a longstanding retention problem - the so-called "leaky pipeline". But our report highlights that economic volatility in the UK and elsewhere is worsening financial and working conditions so much that the film and television industry risks a debilitating loss of its most valuable resource: freelancers.
This article is part of our State of the Arts series. These articles tackle the challenges of the arts and heritage industry - and celebrate the wins, too.
Long gaps between jobs are widening , and even experienced freelancers with long careers are struggling to make ends meet . Currently there is no publicly available data on numbers entering and leaving the industry, but companies have reported worsening skills shortages, not due to poor recruitment, but because people are leaving in response to worsening conditions.
As many as two thirds of screen freelancers are considering leaving the industry within the next five years . Since just under 50% of the film production workforce is freelance, such a large-scale exodus would seriously damage our domestic screen industry.
That industry contributes £13.48 billion to the UK economy, and its talent on-screen and behind the cameras is world-renowned, so why is this crisis happening at all?
Boom and bust
The key change has been a reduction in domestic investment by UK-based public service broadcasters in tandem with increased investment from US-based studios and streamers.
While a recent boom in international investment led to a rapid expansion in UK film and TV infrastructure and a corresponding acute shortage of workers , it also inflated the costs of production, which has proved unaffordable to traditional domestic commissioners. Without consistent local productions, the UK market is exposed to international disruptions like never before.
Since the deregulation of the TV sector in the 1990s, the UK's screen industry has relied on a high proportion of freelance workers. This model provided flexibility in a thriving domestic industry boasting some of the world's most skilled talent and specialist infrastructure to match.
A shift in the 2000s towards international workflows in production and post-production fuelled by competitive tax incentives transformed the UK film and TV industry into a global operation. Coupled with healthy domestic competition, the UK's film and TV industry soared.
But more recently, this globalised business model has been tested by an extended period of economic volatility that has left experienced talent out of work.
First came the COVID lockdowns. Then a post-pandemic boom as companies moved to refill their schedules, took UK film and TV production to a record high in 2021.
But then industrial action by US writers and actors in 2023 brought many UK productions to a halt . Once the strike was over, falling subscriptions numbers led to market volatility for streaming giants, who immediately tightened their budgets and slowed investment in UK-based productions.
High inflation - partly caused by the influx of international money - led many domestic companies to slash their commissioning budgets. By the middle of 2024, plans to build new studios in the UK were being put on hold and more than half the workforce were still unemployed .
As one worker told us: "I've got friends who've been out of work for a year … they're having to sell their houses and these are experienced, serious producers." Another contributor told us how: "So many people I know at the moment are looking elsewhere for work completely outside of the industry."
And another interviewee said: "There have been some unfortunate casualties along the way, some people simply haven't had the income or the interest to sustain a living and and they've got to do what comes first, which is earn a wage that lets them survive."
Until recently, a healthy domestic broadcasting industry helped provide consistent work opportunities for freelancers. But at the same time as production costs have risen, broadcasters' revenue from advertising - and for the BBC, from the licence fee - has fallen.
The effect has been a precipitous 22% drop in domestic high-end television commissions in 2024, alongside a 50% decrease in international co-productions. UK broadcasters no longer have the financial capacity to plug the gap in the periods when international investors cut back.
In effect, the domestic industry has become dominated by, and heavily reliant on, a handful of international players led by unpredictable economic interests and global market fluctuations. It's no coincidence that the two most notable recent British success stories, Adolescence and Baby Reindeer, are produced by Netflix, which has the financial resources British broadcasters lack.
And despite the presence of the streamers, inflated costs are making it harder for producers to make programmes with British subject matter. Patrick Spence, the executive producer of the hugely successful Mr Bates vs. the Post Office, has said he wouldn't even try to make the show today.
To make matters worse, productions funded by international finance (that might have been funded by UK broadcasters in the past) bring little subscription or licensing profits back to the domestic industry.
As our research shows, this constellation of issues means freelancers face extreme financial insecurity like never before, alongside increasingly poor working practices as production companies try to cut costs and, in some cases, promote too early where experienced staff are missing. It is little wonder that so many are considering leaving the sector.
If significant numbers do leave the sector, there will no longer be a supply of skilled workers to meet the demands of an uptick in productions - and the US firms will go elsewhere, leaving only a depleted domestic industry in financial crisis.
Netflix has already made a thinly veiled threat to seek out more competitive territories in the event of a levy on streamers. We could expect a similar decision if they find that the skilled talent they count on in the UK is no longer available.
The next bust may already be in sight thanks to President Trump's proposed tariffs on "foreign-made" films. Though such a levy would be difficult to implement and would cause as much harm to the US industry as it would its global partners, it's not hard to imagine it having a chilling effect on commissioning in the UK.
Structural change needed
So what can be done? The introduction of a new programme of tax breaks for productions made in the UK, initiated by the Conservatives and ratified by the Labour government, has been rightly celebrated. However, industry experts predict these will not solve the financial sustainability of a homegrown industry.
MPs have called on the government to go further in its support for the UK independent film and high-end television sectors, to provide a counterbalance to the fluctuations in investment in big budget fare, and to appoint a freelance commissioner to protect workers rights.
We wait to hear whether the government will take up its recommendations, and bring us closer to other countries, such as France, that have protected their domestic workforce by negotiating specific investment agreements with the major US streamers.
In our report, we argue that a minister for self-employed and precarious workers working across government departments is the only way to ensure that the appropriate measures can be achieved to address the challenges freelancers now face.
Better data on freelancer movements will help policy makers and industry to understand the effects of changes to the domestic industry, to help better secure that workforce for future growth as part of the government's Invest 2035 growth plans .
We also recommend better data for freelancers themselves: a central source of information on taxation, employment rights, training, funding and the other resources they need to thrive in this challenging landscape.
These are only the first steps to lessen the immediate risk of losing a substantial section of the skilled workforce that is the engine of the UK industry, preparing the ground for the much larger structural shifts that are needed. Participants in our research at different stages of their career repeatedly insisted that the industry needs root and branch care to overcome the extreme cycles of feast and famine.
Protecting the cultural value of the UK's screen industry goes far beyond making economic sense. The sector forms a major part of the country's diverse national identity and projects a global image that is literally priceless.
Andrew Philip receives funding for his screen industries research from the Arts & Humanities Research Council through the University of Reading's Impact Acceleration Account programme.
Lisa Purse receives funding for her screen industries research from the Arts & Humanities Research Council through the University of Reading's Impact Acceleration Account programme.
