Music Venue Trust Annual Report
Enough words. Time for Action.
The Music Venue Trust Annual Report 2024 is now live and available to read and download HERE
The report details the work of the Charity and provides data and evidence about the Grassroots Music Venue network. It is essential reading for anyone who cares about live music in our towns and cities, and I'm asking every single one of you reading this to take 2 minutes of your time to download it, read it, and then send the link to your local policy makers; your MP, councilor, Mayor, everyone. It's incredibly easy to do and if you care about live music and want to see it flourish and grow then it's the most important action you can take to truly support it.
All the policies required to stop the closure of Grassroots Music Venues are now well known and fully documented. If you want to read a summary of them, the Culture Media and Sport Select Committee Report not only lists them all out but provides all the reasons why they are needed and why they would work. They aren't part of a pie-in-the-sky wish list, they are deliverable things that the people who represent us can choose at any time to act on. Cut VAT on tickets, eliminate Business Rates, place Agent of Change into statutory legislation, provide a Statutory Right of Consultation on planning applications, review the distribution of public funding so that music venues have access to the support they need to deliver not-for-profit creative activities.
Their is huge will in parliament to get those things done. That support goes across party allegiances, because everyone involved in the decision making that impacts on our daily lives now has a clear understanding that a healthy, thriving, sustainable music scene is an essential part of our community life.
I know there's a lot of cynicism about politics and politicians, but in ten years of campaigning on this issue I have learned that the one surefire way to ensure that they do nothing to help is to not actually ask for that help. Yes, politicians can sometimes seem disconnected from the rest of us and unaware of the things we care about. But if you don't ask you don't get, and too frequently we let the attention of our representatives be dominated by minority views that don't have anything to do with what we actually want.
Write to your representatives, tell them to read this report, tell them to act on it and deliver the policies laid out for them that will actually make a difference.
Write to the people who represent your interests in your local area. Tell them you want them to read the report and take action to deliver policies that will protect, secure and improve Grassroots Music Venues. Use this link: https://bit.ly/MVT2024
Use Write to Them to find your local representatives. Just enter your postcode and everyone you can write to will come up on the next page. It literally takes no more than a few minutes.
Enough words. Time for Action.