In light of the current debate on the Commission proposal of revision of the directive on the conditions of entry and residence of third-country nationals for the purpose of highly skilled employment, the members of Pearle*-Live Performance Europe agreed on a common position at their general assembly meeting in Zurich on 25-26 November.

Pearle* sees clear improvements made by the Commission compared to the Directive on highly qualified persons from 2008. In the attached position paper, Pearle* highlights a number of areas where further improvement could be made in order to increase the functioning and use of the system of employment of highly skilled third-country nationals.

These include, 
- Change to the duration starting from employment contracts of minimum 3 months (instead of 6 months)
- Derogate highly skilled (young) talents with artistic background from the condition to proof 3 years of higher education or equivalent professional experience, as they form a specific exceptional category of recognised top talents at a young age 
- Need to be able to employ the third-country nationals under the same applicable sectoral conditions as nationals, instead of introducing other employment conditions which may differ from those applicable in the respective sector.
- Reduce the application procedure, as in highly competitive labour markets for top talents and highly skilled a period of two months is too long for both employer and applicant to start the work in a European based company 

More detailed information can be found in the paper