The Home Office recently introduced new restrictions on international artists and academics visiting the UK for talks, temporary exhibitions, concerts or artists’ residencies. The Manifesto Club has launched a report, UK Arts and Culture: Cancelled, by Order of the Home Office, detailing the damaging effect that these regulations are having on UK cultural life, including: cancelled concerts and artists’ residencies, cancelled dance shows, the collapse of a Russian ballet company, cancelled academics visits and workshops.

These case studies have been submitted to us over the past few months, after the launch of our Visiting Artists Campaign in February 2009. We will send the report and petition to the UK Home Office, and call on it to reconsider these pointless and suspicious regulations – before more damage is done to UK cultural life. The report is launched at our Cabaret Without Borders, on Wednesday 3 June. See the report in The Times.

• Download the report: UK Arts and Culture: Cancelled, by Order of the Home Office