News from Dublin, Ireland where the city council are introducing a strict busking by law which effectively bans busking in the Irish equivalent of Covent Garden, namely, Temple Bar apparently following the failure of a voluntary code to reduce complaints about buskers and in response to the business community. What implications does this have for the code of conduct model that we are advocating for London? On closer inspection it is the Dublin Business Improvement Districts that have lobbied for this reactionary measure (as they previously lobbied for a code of conduct which itself was so strict and prescriptive that no busker who followed it to the letter would make a living, no wonder it failed). Who has more political clout? Powerful business lobbying groups or itinerant street musicians? Hence this political football is placed onto the high tables of Dublins council halls despite there being many other competing priorities for the increasingly scarce resources of local government. Dublins actions need to be seen through several interpretative lenses. Firstly, as Nick Broad has rightly pointed out before, local authorities are often under the mis-apprehension that placing restrictions on busking, bringing in permits and licensing and charging performers for animating the streets free of charge, will actually improve or somehow promote responsible busking. This assumption is not backed up by any evidence, all that happens is a group of buskers, usually local to the area and not solely dependent on busking for a living will submit to the regulations, monopolise the space with increasing mundanity and conformity and their only competition will come from hardy types who are less averse to the risk of prosecution and territorial regulated buskers. The rest of us, the travelling minstrels, the music students, the young band making a name for themselves, the spontaneous music maker, the established performer needing to supplement teaching and gig income will just not bother. We either wont busk at all, or we will avoid the area all together in favour of more busker friendly jurisdictions. Problematically, despite political sophistry to the contrary, this outcome is usually actually desired by the architects of this kind of legislation and policy. The democratic openness of busking with its intrinsic informality and spontaneity is something they philosophically object to. Coupled with a wholly mistaken belief that busking somehow impoverishes the commercial atmosphere of a city centre and that they can banish the untidiness of buskers (and the assortment of vagrants and wayfarers they associate and conflate with buskers) from cityscapes and replace them with orderly and well kept civic spaces with no un programmed activity (hence the claims that there is a link between crime and busking). When coupled with the natural bureaucratic preference for policies that prioritise administrative convenience above freedom of expression and the investment of time and thought it takes to put together a well thought out set of guidance (5 months in Liverpool, 15 meetings, a petition and months of protests backed up by legal action) it appears easier to a local authority to bow to the wishes of the BIDs as if they were the only stakeholder worthy of consideration in the discussion. However, they underestimate how politically contentious these intrusions into civic life in public space actually are. Tonight a rally of over 300 people will take place in Dublin to save their performance space in Temple Bar (here is a link to the protest: https://facebook/events/291313234401327/) Has the adverse publicity been costed into the equation? Has the scarce time and resources of the police who would actually be needed to enforce anything as coercive and contentious as this been costed in? Have the time and schedules of the magistrates who would be needed to pass sentence on the unlicensed transgressors been costed in? Has a positive vision of 21st century city life and what it looks like even been considered by policy makers? People associate Dublin and London with high and low culture. They rightly expect to see music makers on the streets, they (the general public) enjoy the free music and entertainment and the interventions that they create in an often routinised and mundane urban life. They are part of the Invisible glue that binds cities together and make them feel more liveable. It is risible to argue that requiring people to pay for a license that comes with many unworkable restrictions is a way of supporting and encouraging busking. It is about pushing the informal aspects of culture and civic life behind the margins of legal permissibility and it leads to the impoverishment of life in the polis. If the aim is of reducing complaints it will succeed. There will be much less busking and so there will me many fewer complaints, but it will do so at the cost of the cultural well-being of the city and have countless intangible effects upon the lives of people who live in, visit and work in Dublin, not least a vulnerable group of musicians whose very livelihood is under threat. Londons Mayor has said he wants to turn our capital into the worlds most busker friendly city. If he is serious about this then his response to Dublin would be to politely invite them to reconsider their approach. Have they worked with the musicians union and buskers groups in Dublin to draw up polices that are fair and workable as you are doing in London? Have they targeted existing legislation in robust enforcement against problem buskers who behave antisocially to the detriment of all (including, even especially, other buskers)? Have they considered what this action communicates to the outside world about Dublin and the value it places on culture makers (both formally and informally)? I believe we have to make and win the argument that if the price of freedom and open busking policies is an increase in complaints about noise and inconvenience then this is a price worth paying if the alternative is criminalising people for playing music in the streets and blanket bans on live performance. We have to have a more holistic worldview and move beyond seeing busking purely as a problem and an inconvenience but as part of what makes living in a city so great! I know Im preaching to the converted here but I feel so strongly about this. Id be on the next ferry to Dublin if I could be ! Cheers, Jonny
Posted on: Mon, 03 Nov 2014 16:48:13 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015