Government is accused of discrimination over number of pilot arts and sporting events

Gavin James and Denise Chaila were among the headlining acts at the largest of the 22 pilot arts events, a concert at the Royal Hospital Kilmainham hosted by the Irish Museum of Modern Art. Picture: Leon Farrell

The Government has been accused of discrimination after 185 pilot sporting events were approved this summer, while just 22 arts events got the green light.

After the Government moved to loosen Covid-19 restrictions on attendances at outdoor events in recent months, 170 sporting events were approved by Statutory Instrument. Some of those events involved double-headers or triple-headers, which meant 185 sporting fixtures were specifically allowed to have spectators in attendance. 

Some further sporting events with lower attendances than 200 / 500 did not need specific approval and may also have been organised in outdoor venues.

Only 22 arts events were held

Just 22 arts or culture pilot events were staged in the same period "in order to evaluate and build confidence in the Covid guidance and event management protocols developed by the arts/culture and live entertainment sectors," according to the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media.

The largest cultural pilot event allowed to be staged was a music festival for 3,500 in the Royal Hospital Kilmainham, hosted by IMMA in July. 

A spokesperson for the department defended the variation in numbers, stating: "It is worth noting that sporting and live entertainment events are very different in both nature and economics. 

"Sport events were also testing our guidelines which provide for the safe return of spectators in different scenarios and at different scales. In preparing the guidance for the safe return of spectators to sportsgrounds input was received from international sporting governing bodies like UEFA and World Rugby. In addition, the experience of European neighbours and others such as college football and the NFL in the USA was drawn upon."

 

The statement continued: "Most of the sporting events were proceeding regardless of the attendance of fans or not. This is not the case in the arts/culture and live entertainment sector. Instead sufficient scalable pilots were held to test the guidance documents which underpin the safe reopening of the sector.

Minister's 'roadmap for resumption'

"Following on from these pilots the minister focussed on a roadmap for the resumption of viable live performance. This didn’t happen as quickly as the Government wanted due to the emergence of the delta variant but with the announcement of the Government's Reframing the Challenge plan, the Minister was delighted to be in a position to provide a roadmap for the full return of arts/culture and live entertainment."

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Live music consultant for MCD Productions, Justin Green, says Government assurances that the live events sector is not being discriminated against are "rubbish".

“After 18 months of mandated closure, enough is enough for 35,000 workers," he said: 

"With 89% of the country already vaccinated, we again call on the Government to stop discriminating against the non-funded live entertainment events industry who receive no taxpayer’s money.

"Allow the sector to immediately reopen at 100% capacity for the ‘fully vaccinated’ to enable the sector to trade viability and end this nightmare for workers, their health, well-being and financial burden that this unjustified prolonged closure continues to cause everyday.

"‘In this together’ — we now stand alone and isolated while ministers attend weekly sporting events and UK music festivals.”