Fwd: tash just received this: - Travellers at Glastonbury

Wed Oct 25 22:59:19 BST 2000

>From: Alan Lodge <tash at gn.apc.org>
>Reply-To: "tash at gn.apc.org" <tash at gn.apc.org>
>To: "Alan Lodge (E-mail)" <tash at gn.apc.org>
>Subject: tash just received this: - Travellers at Glastonbury
>Date: Wed, 25 Oct 2000 17:22:59 +0100
>Organization: One Eye on the Road
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>
>ALAN LODGE
>photographer - media: One Eye on the Road.
>Nottingham.  UK
>tash at gn.apc.org
>http://www.gn.apc.org/tash
>________________________________________________
>
>25/10/00 17:06
>
>hello all
>
>
>Report by environmental health and the no fun brigade on Glastonbury 2000.
>
>With the post beanfield / stoney cross / and the general stress that
>travellers were under at the time in the mid '80's, I was quite involved
>with the politics of the situation. Now, because of the trouble around the
>stonehenge festival, and the influence that that had on gbury,  it meant
>that to keep licence / maintain the public  liability insurance, and hence
>be able to keep the event, they had to start to exclude the travelling
>population.  Ie, the regulation 'scapegoats' , to be thrown to the lions,
>to appease business eh?
>
>Its been on ongoing situation with hundred of thousands, having a nice
>time, but a few thousand of us have felt / been excluded for years now.
>
>Right, this is what is happening now ............
>
>Report by environmental health and the no fun brigade on Glastonbury 2000.
>
>http://www.mendip.gov.uk/mendip/minutes.nsf/12354601e165685b802568e4005f
>8eb8/dc8a40c6955123a88025697300566711/$FILE/MASTER+DOCUMENT.doc
>
>Guys like me have been shouting about some of the tools and powers
>(licences can be just another way of saying no, rather than the safety
>implied) that THEY have been taking onto themselves, to control gatherings.
>
>Well, we've been here before.  but it appears to be Glastonbury's go next.
>
>Just too many want to go, and there are no other 'proper' festivals left.
>  So, what you do is whack up the ticket price, in proportion to demand.
>Police it, keep out the riff-raff.  Simple really. If they don't, they
>haven't got a festival.
>
>This of course is going to put one against another on the issues that will
>arise.
>
>Who is a greenfield person, an eco-warrior with truck doing a stall, new
>age traveller, site worker wots' paid to be there.  Tons of stress coming!
>The objective, of course,  of those raising these objections, to attempt a
>cultural / ethnic cleansing of the festivals that remain ...
>
>Have just been sent the following by a concerned citizen.  The incredibly
>long link in the letter below, is the 52 page report, that recommends no
>licence for next year, since, they say, there was so much abuse this year.
>
>
>
>
>+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++=
>Hello Tash
>
>Not sure how clued you are at the minute about the latest position on
>Travellers at the Glastonbury Festival. BIG CHANGES AFOOT right now. Just
>in case you've not yet seen it, the following document is WELL worth a
>look.
>
>http://www.mendip.gov.uk/mendip/minutes.nsf/12354601e165685b802568e4005f
>8eb8/dc8a40c6955123a88025697300566711/$FILE/MASTER+DOCUMENT.doc
>
>The document is the full post-Glastonbury 2000 report delivered by Steve
>Anderson (Head of Environmental Safety at Mendip District Council) to the
>Glastonbury and Street Area Board (the licensing authority for the
>Glastonbury Festival).
>
>Main points of the report :
>
>A. The 2000 Festival was seriously overcrowded with unauthorised entrants
>(fencejumpers) and for this reason a prosecution of Michael Eavis is
>recommended.
>
>B. Of chief interest to you I think : There were a large number of local
>complaints about the noise and so called nuisance coming from the New Age
>Travellers encampment at Pipplers Field (Field E2) at the eastern fringe of
>the main site.
>
>I am a regular at Glastonbury (this year was my seventh) and as I'm sure
>you know, the Travellers have been there in numbers for the past few years.
>Michael Eavis has I believe kept open lines of communication with them and
>there has been room for reasonability and compromise as far as their
>setting up camp and partying is concerned. They have turned up, they
>haven't exactly been invited but they have been left space to stay for the
>duration. In fact a lot of non-Travelling festival goers have welcomed the
>Travellers presence and sound systems as an excellent part of the festival
>vibe.
>
>They may have gone somewhat OTT this year though -- they were partying hard
>in that field til the Tuesday after the end of the festival -- most of the
>complaints (84 of them, but how many from the same people?) came after the
>festival had officially closed.
>Because of that, it now seems that the local authorities have become
>determined to put a stop to the so-far chilled set up. You will notice from
>the report that they applied a Noise Abatement Order to the area where the
>Travellers were camped, and have served a breach of order notice on (I
>believe) the owner of Field E2 (from whom Michael Eavis was subletting it
>for carparking space). There is currently a counter appeal, probably from
>the same farmer, against the breach of order notice -- I guess he wants to
>test the grey area of who's legally responsible for the noise etc.
>
>Whatever the outcome, Steve Anderson is recommending in the report that NO
>LICENSE IS ISSUED for a future festival unless the Council is reassured
>that reliable and enforceable measures are taken to exclude the Travellers
>altogether.
>
>So Micheal Eavis is now in a very difficult position. His festival license
>is in jeopardy anyway because of the extra numbers of non ticket holders
>(there have been disputes about the exact numbers, but tents were certainly
>more cramped together this year than I have ever seen them). He has
>promised a new 20 foot perimeter fence costing ?1 m, and no doubt the
>council and Police will insist further on a comprehensive set of new
>security measures.
>
>So he will not be in a position any more to compromise with the Travellers
>as in the recent past -- or at least I see that as one of the sanitising
>sacrifices he will be forced to make in order to keep the Festival going at
>all. Even if he makes all sorts of promises re new fence, extra security,
>no Travellers, etc. etc., my own belief is that he will either be forced or
>will choose to make 2001 a gap year, then come back in 2002 with a much
>changed event. Some of my more pessimistic friends see it as the end of
>Glastonbury as we've known it -- there are certainly more potential threats
>to the festival's future  than there have been for a long time.
>
>There is some interesting debate on these and related issues going on on
>the Glastonbury Festival chat board at
>http://www.efestivals.co.uk
>I have contributed myself under various pseudonyms.
>
>Your thoughts here, particularly on the Travellers, would be very welcome
>either on the chat board or just email me. I am concerned that excluding
>the Travellers would be a cleaning up measure too far, OK the Festival has
>changed vastly since the early days but the compromises up til now have
>still left it to be one of the best of the big festivals. Excluding the
>Travellers would be a major change for the worse in terms of vibe and
>ambience.
>
>Do you have current contacts with the Travellers, and have you had any at
>all up til now with Michael Eavis? It may be too late but I did wonder
>whether your intervention as an honest broker might yet save something from
>this depressing scenario.
>
>All the best
>
>William
>+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++=
>
>
>whatever next?
>
>We help make this bloody festival, the success it has become.  Where do
>they think that this expertise cam from.
>
>Love
>
>tash
>________________________________________________
>http://www.gn.apc.org/tash
>tash at gn.apc.org
>alanlodge01 at sms.genie.co.uk     for SMS messages via e-mail
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>ICQ                     #24654598
>photographer - One Eye on the Road.
>________________________________________________
>"It is not enough to curse the darkness.
>                                               It is also necessary to light
>a lamp!!"
>________________________________________________
><ends>
>
>
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