Events industry: Ensuring crowd safety 'increasingly difficult'

More needs to be done to keep audiences safe at live events and prevent further incidents like last year’s fatal crush at Brixton Academy, figures in the sector have said.

Speaking to Arts Professional following the first meeting of a new roundtable forum aimed at driving improvements, Eric Stuart, Chair of the United Kingdom Crowd Management Association (UKCMA), said keeping people safe is becoming increasingly difficult due to changes in crowd behaviour and cutbacks in security.

He added that a lack of government support and funding to develop comprehensive guidance are hampering efforts to address the situation and warned people in the sector are concerned further major incidents could occur unless action is taken.

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As part of efforts to address the situation, the National Events Safety Roundtable, convened by the Greater London Authority (GLA), met for the first time earlier this month to review the safety of live events.

It consists of representatives from the National Police Chiefs' Council, UKCMA, LIVE events, the Security Industry Authority and others from the live music and events sector. It is chaired by London’s Night Czar, Amy Lamé.

Ahead of the roundtable, the Mayor’s Office said events across the country are facing a wide range of challenges including the cost-of-living crisis, spiralling operational costs, changing crowd behaviours and the recruitment and retention of staff, especially in the security sector, since Brexit.

Lamé said while the live events industry has a proud history of safely staging world-leading events, “it is clear that nationally we are all facing exceptional challenges”. 

“That’s why we are bringing together music and events industry leaders from across the country to discuss how we can work together. This will be a first step in progressing a coordinated approach that works across the whole sector and country to ensure that live events are delivered safely in all forms,” she added.

Speaking after the first meeting, Stuart told Arts Professional the UK’s live events industry is facing distinct challenges.

“You’ve got difficult crowds, on sites not as well equipped as they used to be, being staffed by people with a lot less experience. So it’s hardly surprising we are seeing so many issues,” he said.

He added these factors mean it is becoming harder to keep audiences safe.

“The biggest difference between us and sport is we’ve never had [an incident causing] mass fatalities, but you can’t help feel at the moment that we are edging in that direction.”

“A lot of us in the industry are really nervous one is coming.”

Guidance for smaller venues

Chief Executive of LIVE, Jon Collins, told Arts Professional the roundtable discussed if the right safety guidance is in place to suit all types of venues that fall under the live events umbrella.

Different factions of the live events industry have official guidance available on safety measures. But while outdoor events follow The Purple Guide, sports The Green Guide, and arenas of more than 10,000 seated capacity The A Guide, there is currently no official safety guidance for smaller and medium sized venues.

Stuart told Arts Professional that he, alongside a group of sector leader from across the live events industry, have begun work on writing guidance for small and medium live events in the aftermath of the Brixton crush, with a working title of The V Guide.

He added it will likely take months to finish as contributors are volunteering their free time while working through the busiest part of the year for the live events industry.

“There’s no funding here, we are doing it all in our own time as a response to people dying, to try prevent others dying,” Stuart said.

“We are writing this guidance for specific venues, but there’s no government minister standing up and offering help.”

Stuart said the response at government level since the events at Brixton has been “zero”.

“The Mayor’s office and industry are trying to take action, but we are not feeling a lot of support from government,” he explained.

“There’s a lot going on in the world, but you would have thought the death of two people at Brixton might have triggered something else at government level to say, ‘we need to do something, and we need to do it now’.”

Government legislation

Collins told Arts Professional the roundtable plans to share its outcomes with government, including discussions over the role of Safety Advisory Groups and the impact of proposed legislation on live events.

The roundtable discussed the Terrorism (Protection of premises) draft bill, a new piece of legislation also known as Martyn’s Law, currently being considered by the Home Affairs Select Committee.

The sector has been critical of government for not conducting a comprehensive impact assessment on the draft bill, Collins said, raising concerns parts of the bill could contradict the Licensing Act 2003 which live events and venues are bound to.

“There is the potential under this terrorism legislation, that to make an event safe you get people into the event as quickly as possible. But you might have a licence requirement that says everyone that comes into the venue needs to be searched, which creates a queue in an outside space,” Collins explained.

The draft bill also suggests maximum penalty notices of £10,000 for venues of up to 800 people. For events with capacity above 801, the penalties increase to a maximum of £18m, or 5% of global turnover, whichever is greater.

Collins said LIVE “cannot see what the logical step is between the two penalties”.

“If you’re a global festival organiser, would you go to the UK where there’s potentially an £18m sanction, 20% VAT on tickets and complexities of bringing artists to the country post Brexit?”

“For a government concerned about the competitiveness of the creative industries, the financial sanctions in this particular piece of legislation are out of step with wider objectives,” he added.

Collins also confirmed the National Events Safety Roundtable will convene again soon, when it is expected to discuss more tailored actions to take to different sub sectors of the industry.