Why UK musicians protested in 2020?
Why UK musicians protested in 2020?
Most musicians in the UK are freelance (72%), which means they are self-employed and only get paid if they work. When the Covid-19 crisis happened in March 2020 many UK music venues had to shut because of social distancing and that meant many musicians lost their income.
The government put schemes in play to help most working people over the crisis. People employed by organisations received 80% of their wages, many employers made up the remaining 20%. But 10% of UK workers, which is 3 million taxpayers, were excluded from the government schemes. Most self-employed people, like musicians, were left out. Most musicians do not earn a lot of money, so they do not have a lot of savings to live on when they are not working. The Musicians Union did a survey in 2012 and found half of the musicians in the survey earned less than £20,000 per year. Only 5% earned over £50,000. But the music industry in the UK contributes £5.2bn to the economy and £2.7bn in exports and employs 190,935 jobs. The corona virus has wiped out the majority of the contribution the live music was expected bring the UK economy in 2020. If we do not support musicians and the music industry, many jobs will be lost and Britain will lose its reputation as a world leader in culture, music, and the arts. We will also lose something many of us enjoy; live music!
The government realised they had to do something for the self-employed and set up the Self-employment income support scheme (SEISS), which was meant to help people like freelance musicians. But to qualify for the fund people had to meet strict criteria. Newly self-employed without the required tax forms did not qualify. Anyone who was less than 50% self-employed, such as musicians with part-time jobs, did not qualify. Anyone who is director of a limited company, such as their own music company, no matter how much they earned, did not qualify. Anyone on parental leave whose income was lower than normal did not qualify, and so on.
A survey by the Incorporated Society of Musicians found that 44% of its 2000 members have been unable to claim relief from the government self-employed scheme, and that 41% of those who could access SEISS said it was not enough to cover their living costs. A recent Music Union survey revealed that 88% of musicians do not think the government has done enough to support the industry during the pandemic, and 33% are considering abandoning the profession because lack of earnings during the pandemic because venues were closed. Almost half have already found work outside their industry, and 70% are unable to do more than a quarter of their usual work. 87% of musicians covered by furlough and self-employment support schemes say they will still face financial hardship when the schemes end.
The UK government said it has supported arts and culture during the crisis with a £1.57bn Cultural Recovery package in July, but funds from were manly given the museums and art galleries. In comparison, Germany gave €50bn payout to their industry). In August, after the government were told that many grass roots venues were to become bankrupt they diverted £3.36 million to these smaller venues. However, for some venues, this was too late, and these funds would not help freelancers that the industry depended on. So although the venues and their staff may survive this crisis due to the cultural recovery package, by the time the venues open for business there may be enough musicians to actually perform in them.
Even though the government were saying that they understood the problem the funds were not reaching freelance musicians and other individuals in the industry. Rishi Sunak, the Chancellor, was asked how musicians will survive, and he suggested their should go and find other jobs! By October 2020, 400,000 jobs had been lost in the creative industries and musicians knew they had to do something to highlight their problem and many musicians became activists and started protests outside parliament, at the same time funding websites began appearing asking for donations to help musicians survive the crisis (Let the music Play, Let Music Live, Help the Musicians).
In early October, 400 freelance musicians played outside Parliament by performer part of Mars, from Holst's The Planets, before holding a two-minute silence to put pressure on the government to give more support to self-employed musicians. At the same time, a protest took place outside Birmingham's Symphony Hall. High profile musicians, such as Violinists Nicola Benedetti and Tasmin Little, and the organiser of Glastonbury, Emily Eavis, attended the event. The protests were splashed over social media. These protests were having an effect. In a survey of the general public I set up in November, 2020 99% people said they thought musicians have found lockdown difficult, 98% thought musicians were right to protest. 82% said they would be willing to donate smalls sums of money to help musicians over this crisis.
Links to websites and newspaper stories
https://www.helpmusicians.org.uk/
https://www.ukmusic.org/policy/let-the-music-play/
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-53867585
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-54437872
https://www.theguardian.com/money/2020/nov/06/covid-help-self-employed-uk-government
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jul/05/boris-johnson-uk-lifeline-arts-heritage-sector-afloat
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