From:Paul McManusTo:Scottish Live Events Network Branch
Date:17 March 2023
Doune The Rabbit Hole Festival.
Dear BECTU Member Doune the Rabbit Hole Festival update On Monday 6 March, Caroline Sewell from the Musicians Union, and I met Craig and Jamie Murray for a discussion about the money they owe from last years DTRH Festival and about their plans for a 2023 festival. Essentially they explained that they tried to run a significantly bigger festival in 2022 in order to try and recoup money they had lost through the festivals in 2020 and 2021 that were cancelled due to COVID. They recognise that this was an overly ambitious plan which only succeeded in running up more debt. They say that they are scaling back the 2023 festival to four stages with a capacity of around 5000 tickets. On their projected figures they have apparently sold just under half the tickets they need to break even in 2023 and committed to feed back to the MU and BECTU on how ticket sales go over the coming months. If they manage to sell all 5000 tickets they expect to be able to pay back around £200, 000 of their existing debt to suppliers artists and crews and aim to clear all the debt within three years. We also raised a number of concerns around catering, safety and wellbeing and made it clear to them what we expect in regard to this. For their part DTRH agreed that it would be helpful to agree to our request that reps from our Live Events branch can do safety and wellbeing visits to the festival site. For this year they say that they are guaranteeing that anyone who agrees to work on the 2023 festival is being given a guarantee of full 100% payment in advance of the festival. Obviously the only chance for anyone to get their money back from last year is if the 2023 festival makes a profit which I know many of you will have your doubts about. However overall, having discussed matters in detail with them , Caroline and I feel that at this stage it would not benefit our members if we tried to stop the festival particularly as they are guaranteeing 100% payment in advance. Therefore if you choose to work on DTRH 2023 please make sure you have a very clear agreement in writing setting out exactly what you will be paid and when that will be paid. If any agreed payments are late or they miss any agreed deadline with you then we would advise you to stop work immediately and contact BECTU immediately. Please feel free to contact me if you have any queries on this. Regards Paul McManus Negotiations Officer Scotland
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