Alert: 76% of UK Festivals Could Cancel If the Government Doesn’t Step in

On the 20th of April, 2021, Prime Minister Boris Johnson threatened to “drop a legislative bomb” to stop the European Super League and protect “the great glories of [Britain’s] cultural heritage”. That same morning, another touchstone of British culture, the 60,000 strong Boomtown festival, announced they would be cancelling for a second year, due to a lack of government-backed insurance. 

Over in Europe, in the Netherlands and Germany, governments have created cancellation insurance funds that grant festivals the secure backing they need to be able to go ahead. In some ways, it’s a tricky situation. COVID-19 means events can be scrapped with a moment’s notice. But it’s also incredibly simple: the UK government has to protect festivals or they won’t happen.

Right now, over a quarter of UK festivals over 5,000 capacity have been dropped due to the government refusing to pull their finger out and offer insurance. This is according to insights from The Association of Independent Festivals (AIF), who have issued a Red Alert warning to the government. 

Depressingly, over three quarters (76 percent) of the remaining festivals could also cancel if action is not taken.

Building a festival site takes time and organisers need to be sure they will be able to go ahead when they commit to setting up their events, which often takes place for months before. Dangers centre on festivals risking losing thousands – if not hundreds of thousands, or millions – of pounds in non-refundable set-up costs if they are asked to cancel at the last minute. It sucks.

Paul Reed, Chief Executive of AIF, tells VICE the government lacks confidence about their own road map, which states that all COVID restrictions will be lifted when nightclubs open on June 21st.

“If the road map progresses as planned, an insurance scheme won’t cost the government anything,” he said, pointing to the fact that if everything is ok then there will be no cancelled events to insure. “It feels like the ask is for the government to back their own road map by sharing some of the risks.”

If no insurance plans are offered by the end of May, Reed predicts that the festival cancellation floodgates will open. “A lot of festivals are gonna hit a cutoff point. We know there are festivals unfortunately having crisis meetings at the moment. It’s just a question of when they announce this.”

Tim Thornhill, Director of insurance firm Tysers, has been involved in the campaign to bring government backed insurance to UK music festivals since July 2020. His firm protected the film and TV industry from the same cancellation issue affecting festivals by helping to bring the Film and TV Production Restart Scheme into place, which the government backed with a £500 million fund.

Crunching the numbers, Thornhill tells VICE that for a year of live music and festivals from July 2021 to June 2022, there could be £9.1 billion of value to local and national economies. In order to back these events going ahead, the government would need to insure £1.1 billion worth of costs.

Spending that much seems like loads of money when you’re a normal person. But to a government, £1.1 billion worth of costs isn’t an insane amount. To put that figure into context, Germany’s festival insurance fund cost €2.5 billion and The Netherlands’ is priced at €300 million. 

Ella Nosworthy – who is behind the family-run Nozstock festival set to go ahead this July – says that without government backed insurance, the future of many UK festivals are under threat. 

“What we can’t forget is that if a festival can’t go ahead, it’s not just a summer or a week of lost income – it’s the entire year,” she tells VICE. “How many businesses can go two years without operating? I’m concerned that there will be some amazing events that sadly we will not see again.”

From her point of view, Nosworthy is hoping the outcome from the government’s Events Research Programme prompts those in power to move their money forward.

The scheme examines COVID transmission risks at events like The Brit Awards and The FA Cup. If all goes well and transmission rates aren’t affected, then the trial will lay the groundwork for future events.

At the end of the day, the issue comes down to whether or not the government cares enough about music festivals to insure them against cancellations, and whether or not they believe in their road map. When the government cannot give assurance on either of these issues, it’s a sad fact that more festivals will cancel and Britain’s diverse festival landscape will be changed forever.

“The government has all this rhetoric about having a great summer,” says Reed. “But in fact, what you might end up with is a very, very selective one, because it may well come down to who can hold on for long enough.”

@ryanbassil