By Peter Bowes BBC News, Los Angeles

UK Culture Secretary Tessa Jowell has been on a mission to Hollywood to persuade movie executives to make more films in Britain.

Tessa Jowell is talking up British tax breaks, talent and locations

Ms Jowell has been in Los Angeles this week, talking up the UK's latest tax incentives for film-makers.

"I am unashamedly here to argue for the UK and the new tax regime," she tells the BBC News website.

Accompanied by British film commissioner Steve Norris, the culture secretary has been meeting almost all of the major movie studios - including Warner Bros, Disney and Universal.

The UK is offering a tax break to production companies that choose to film in Britain.

"It encourages UK films to be made in the UK, and those films can of course be made by American production companies," Ms Jowell explains.

Mr Norris adds: "If you make a tax-qualifying film in the UK, it's worth about 15% of the budget. A lot of other countries compete for these very large films and that can often make the difference."

Competition between countries vying for Hollywood business has never been more intense.

'Fantastic scenery'

Offers of tax relief are common, but the UK is also emphasising an all-round package of incentives to woo film-makers.

The new Harry Potter film will be filmed in the UK this year

"This is one of the most tax-sympathetic places to make films," says Ms Jowell. "The technical support is better than any other and we have fantastic locations.

"London is perhaps the film centre, but if you look beyond Hollywood to Bollywood movies, Leicester, the East Midlands are all trying to develop a base for the production and post-production of those Bollywood films.

"Take the West Country, take Yorkshire, take the diversity of Birmingham, take Liverpool. Quite honestly, you're spoilt for choice."

Hollywood developed as the movie-making capital of the world largely because of its picture-perfect climate. The same is unlikely to be said of Britain.

But Tessa Jowell argues that "most stories are not written against a background of continuous sunshine".

"What we can offer is a range of climates and a fantastic range of scenery," she says.

The UK has become a player again in terms of the international marketplace for film production Paul Steinke Walt Disney Pictures

Mr Norris adds: "The package is the actors in front of the camera, our technicians, our visual effects, our designers. It's all those things together in a package that is cost-effective."

According to Paul Steinke, senior vice president of production finance at Walt Disney Pictures, the UK has "always been a premiere location".

In recent years, though, "it has become a player again in terms of the international marketplace for film production".

'Level playing field'

Ms Jowell is also focusing on the video game and music businesses during her trip to California.

The culture secretary says she is concerned that the British video games industry is losing post-production work to the US and plans to travel to San Francisco to speak to gaming executives.

Dido is one of the few British artists to achieve success in the US

Ms Jowell says she also wants to get to the bottom of why British musicians so rarely achieve success in the US charts.

"It's not through lack of talent," she says. "After all, we are the country of Dido and Coldplay.

"What we want to understand is more about the practical obstacles for artists coming to perform here, and one seems to be the restrictions on visas and the length of time it takes to get them.

"It's much easier for sportsmen and women to get visas than it is musicians. It's not exactly a level playing field.