The value of the UK arts Industry is a whopping £111 billion. This includes crafts, design, fashion, film, TV, video, radio and photography, museums, galleries, Music, performing and visual arts, exhibitions and theatre. Germany has paid 1 billion into an emergency arts fund, France 7 billion. England has contributed nothing. Zero. The event industry was the first to be hit by the Pandemic and it will be the last to recover yet the industry is yet to receive any government assistance.  #letthemusicplay  is an initiative to raise awareness and hopefully pressure the government into addressing this problem.

Steve Hogan of William Morris has spearheaded the campaign, his Social Media reads “Today we start a campaign #letthemusicplay because we need to be heard. We need the government to acknowledge that the live music industry is on its knees. Without assistance businesses will go bankrupt, jobs will be lost, venues will close and some festivals will never come back again. Plus there are 1000’s of self-employed workers, bands and musicians that rely on the live industry for their work. This is an industry that in 2019 employed over 210,000 people and added £4.5 billion to the UK economy. It’s a business that rarely asks for assistance. It’s a business that is known throughout the world for producing some of the best festivals, live bands, skilled workers etc. We are truly world class at what we do. We need the Government to acknowledge that it is not financially viable for venues and festivals to reopen with social distancing in place. We need to see financial assistance or these businesses will not be there when we can finally reopen. We need a reduction on VAT as other countries have given their cultural sectors. We need these measures and more to survive.

Please make some noise for live music. Share the hashtag of #letthemusicplay and please post as many pictures as you can of either the last show you went to or your favourite gigs of all time. We need everyone’s support at this time.”

You can download the social media assets here. Please add your stories and post the images and hashtags in support.

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