Dear Councillors, My name is Jonny Walker and I am the Founding Director of ASAP! (The Association of Street Artists and Performers) and one of the leaders of the campaign against compulsory licenses for street musicians currently being considered by the Council. I started the petition calling on Camden to rethink its plans to licence busking, which has so far been signed by 3500 people and the facebook group ‘Keep Streets Live in Camden’ which has now got 300 members. Tonight I will be making a deputation to the Licensing Committee on behalf of street artists and perfromers. Ive met and spoken personally to several of you over the past few weeks, but I wanted to send you all an email both by way of a personal introduction, and as a means of directly communicating the concerns of the many people who have joined the campaign against this new policy proposal. Although Im writing to you as the Director of a national association for street artists and performers, many of the people who are supporting our campaign live and work in Camden, indeed we have been delighted at the depth and breadth of the support we have so far attracted. My wife Philippa and I spent the first 18 months of our married life living in Camden, firstly on Chalk Farm Rd and then in Hampstead where I performed music on the streets and was invited by the local business association to play at summer and Christmas festivals (on street and stage alike). Along with many Camden residents, we were caught up in the riots in 2011 which took place literally outside our front door. We received a letter of thanks from Camdens Borough Commander after we served tea to exhausted police officers using a riot shield as an improvised tray. We were featured in this TIME magazine article as one of Ten heroes of the London Riots and felt that we saw Camden at its best and its worst over those days. I feel privileged to have lived and worked in a place like Camden, and, no doubt in common with all of you, I care very deeply about its present and its future well-being. I mention my personal background because I am concerned that this whole debate is being framed in oppositional and divisive terms with buskers’ pitted against ‘residents which overlooks the fact that we all have a shared interest in the community of Camden whether we live, work, or visit there. In her letter to Councillors asking for the proposed Licence Scheme to be introduced, the concerned resident said that, ‘Busking like any other public activity in a complex multi-use area like Camden Town – busking had to share the same social and legal obligations as the rest of us here’ In his recent blog post justifying Camden’s plans to licence busking Cabinet Member for Finance Theo Blackwell frames the issues in these simplistic terms Ultimately greed took over busking in Camden, and it couldnt self-regulate itself anymore He also claimed that the Council are only introducing A few rules where there were none before. Clearly a minority of buskers have behaved irresponsibly and without due consideration towards other people. I am not writing to you to defend their actions. However to suggest that buskers are not subject to the same legal and social obligations as other people already is highly misleading. It is a widely accepted principle of good governance that all alternatives should be properly explored before a piece of new legislation is introduced. This is not the case in Camden. There is already an enormous range of national legislation in place that covers behaviour in shared public spaces. If properly enforced these existing laws would deal with the examples of bad practice that are being used as a justification for the introduction of a policy that radically redefines the nature of shared public space. Under the Environmental Protection Act 1990 anybody making loud noise in the street and causing a statutory nuisance can be subject to enforcement action, noise abatement notices, and, as a last resort, the seizure of instruments. These powers already exist and could be used in Camden even now. They require a threshold of proof to be met and for officers to attend complaints in person but they are available to the Council without the need for a new law. If any busker used insulting language towards told a Council Official or Resident then they would be committing an offence under the Public Order Act and could be prosecuted. Likewise, any dangerous obstructions are unlawful under the Highways Act 1990 and the police have the power to move people on if they are causing a genuine problem. In other words, buskers already do, in the words of your eloquent resident, share the same social and legal obligations as the rest of us here. Camden may indeed be a ‘complex and multi-use area’ but none more so then the many other cities in the UK and beyond in which busking is an established part of the local culture and is not subject to the restrictions that Camden Council now propose to adopt. Cities and towns as diverse in nature as Cambridge, Glasgow, Canterbury, Edinburgh, Norwich, Bournemouth, Manchester, Newcastle, Chester, Bath, Winchester and Leeds, amongst many others, all operate ‘voluntary best practice guides’ which spell out the standard expected of buskers and the actions that can be taken against them under existing legislation should these standards not be met. Complaints about buskers are dealt with on their individual merit and are balanced against the undoubted contributions that street performers make to the enjoyment of the shared public spaces of cities across the country each day. I have no doubt that the Proposal to Licence Busking in Camden is well-intentioned and that there are issues around busking that need to be addressed. I met with Tony Hawkes the Senior Licensing Officer behind the busking report and I have found him to be a fair minded individual even though I profoundly disagreed with the approach he was advocating. However, if adopted ,the proposals will do long term damage to Camden’s cultural and visitor economy and create a damaging precedent for other local authorities. Busking is, in essence, an impromptu and spontaneous activity characterized by informality. The introduction of mandatory licenses will mean that anybody who wishes to play an instrument in the street faces a 20 working day wait, an application process costing £49 per year, and the prospect of a panel of council officers determining whether or not they are ‘a fit and proper person’ to hold a licence. For the many musicians who travel to London to perform but stay for under a week Camden will be placing a ‘Not Welcome’ sign. Some might say this is intentional. Our eloquent resident stated that the absence of busking controls meant that in Camden: ‘We have people from Spain, Mexico, Germany and France to name some that we have personally talked to’ Is this not a cause for celebration rather than lament and a sign of Camden’s deserved and hard won international reputation as a center for Live Music and the Arts? The same resident goes on to oppose what she characterizes as ‘free busking’ in the following strong terms, ‘But specifically, we as citizens and taxpayers and residents do not respond well to the call for “free” busking, if free in this formulation means not having to pay, not having to contribute to the cost of maintaining, caring for, cleaning Camden Town. So if “free” busking means conducting street performances without licences, without fees, without paying taxes, we oppose that sense of “free”.’ As a self-employed musician and professional street performer I pay tax on my earnings and so do many of my colleagues. We regret that this resident would speculate about the tax affairs of individuals she doesn’t know anything about. She also overlooks a vitally significant aspect of the word ‘free’. Street musicians in shared public spaces are performing for ‘free’. The vibrancy and colour with which they animate the streets are provided for ‘free’. If people enjoy what they do they are ‘free’ to make a contribution which means that the more accomplished performers are ‘free’ to enjoy a contribution towards their craft but this comes at no cost to local rate-payers whose streets would still need to be cleaned and lit whether or not they were graced by a busker. Buskers are a therefore a cost-free addition to the visitor and cultural economy sustained by, and alongside, the visitors and residents who give Camden its unique character. In this light charging street musicians to play for ‘free’ can be clearly seen as counter-productive. Street entertainment provides ‘free’ enjoyment to the crowds of visitors, tourists and shoppers in Camden none of whom pay directly for amenities of the street, but all of whom make a long term indirect contribution by making Camden the vibrant and colourful place it is. A misleading picture has been painted of buskers as atomized profiteering mercenaries when the truth is more prosaic. People busk for a wide variety of reasons. For some it is a hobby, for others it is a vital forum for self expression and social interaction. Other buskers are music students, learning their craft on the streets, still others are marginalized individuals for whom busking is the difference between eating and going hungry. Others, like myself, are professional musicians who have grown to love the streets as a forum for self-expression, performance and meeting people. We care deeply about the streets as a unique melting pot where people from all backgrounds interact and opportunities for serendipitous encounters between strangers and the building of urban community are all facilitated by a culture of street performance. Under Camden’s proposals, unlicensed buskers face fines of up to £1000, the seizure of instruments in the streets, and the forced sale of instruments to pay fines if they are unpaid after 28 days. These are powers that are not even available to Baliffs who, when collecting debts are forbidden from confiscating the tool of a person’s trade for the very good reason that this will prevent such a person from working in the future. The irony of a Labour-led Council advocating such enforcement measures as necessary against self-employed musicians is not lost on me, nor is it lost upon the Musician’s Union a craft-based Union representing 30,000 working musicians in this country. These powers are contentious, divisive and excessive. They open the Council up to challenge under the Human Rights Act specifically under the right to Freedom of Expression and the Freedom to the Enjoyment of Property. Camden Council have an obligation to use public money wisely and sparsely at a time of austerity when cuts are being made to essential services. Camden have not given due consideration to the many alternative options available to them short of introducing a compulsory license for anybody wishing to play a musical instrument in the street. Camden could, and should have investigated the development of a Best Practise Guide for busking, in consultation with performers, residents, the police, businesses and other stakeholders, based around a framework of existing legislation and with building of good relationship in the community as a priority. In her letter to the Council the concerned resident made the following point, ‘It is important to remember the fact there had been an enormous escalation since Westminster Council effectively evicted its buskers in September 2012’ Westminster’s stance towards its street performers has long been recognized as contentious by members of our community. One of our members Mat Boden recently won a High Court victory against the Council who had prosecuted him for ‘noise nuisance’ in Trafalgar Square. Indeed it was Westminster Council who lobbied for the powers under the London Local Authorities Act 2000 to use against buskers only to complain that they did not go far enough. I would suggest in the strongest terms possible that the example of Westminster Council is not the one to follow when deciding how to frame policies around street culture. Nor should Westminster’s failure to establish an equitable framework for busking be used by Camden as a reason to introduce busking controls that are much more restrictive even than Westminster. Councillors, I ask you to take a step back from proposed course of action that lies before you? The shared public spaces of Camden are a vital forum for community well-being. As the local authority, YOU are the custodians and stewards of these public spaces and are charged with upholding the common good. The restrictions contained in the Proposal to Licence Busking are nothing less then a tax on the use of shared public space, a tax on spontaneity and an attack on the very nature of busking. If the restrictions advocated by Camden were adopted by other Councils it would have a profoundly damaging effect on our national shared culture of street entertainment. There have been 105 complaints in the last year about buskers. 55 of these complaints were made by nine people. Clearly their concerns need to be addressed, but the measures that stand before you now are an over-reaction of several orders of magnitude. There are better ways of dealing with the issues that arise when people share space and they need to be fully explored. I give you my personal assurance that I will do everything in my power to help you and I hope that this process of consultation will result in Camden adopting a policy that works for everybody. I have attached an example of a best practice guide from Bournemouth Council who recently set a precedent by abandoning a compulsory licence scheme and bringing in a code of best practice similar to the ones I have been advocating. I am also attaching a draft ‘best practice’ guide from Liverpool which has been worked out with the Musician’s Union and awaits final approval. Both policies are based around conceptions of neighbourliness and urban community and could be implemented at minimal cost to the local authority, unlike the proposals which stand before you now.
Posted on: Tue, 29 Oct 2013 17:34:59 +0000
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