Glasto: the way forward?

Following the problems at this years Festival, which they deemed unsafe as a direct result of excessive numbers, the Regulatory Board of Mendip District Council (who deal with licensing issues) formed a group to look at some of the issues with aim of suggesting a way forward for Glastonbury 2001.

The group, which comprised of local councillors plus a county councillor who is also a member of the Police Authority, discussed the major issues with the Police. They have now written to Mr Eavis detailing issues that they feel need to be addressed.

To help ensure the numbers attending stays within the license they felt that the following were of the utmost importance:

-	A marketing strategy to convince potential attendees of the integrity of the site security.
-	Contingency plans to deal with those who turn up without tickets and find themselves unable to gain access.
-	Preventing non-ticket holders from using transfer buses and the car parks.
-	A consistent satisfactory level of quality security.
-	Earlier erection of the fence to enable thorough checking.
-	Stricter control of tickets to staff, traders, etc.

As part of a plan to increase security, Mr Eavis has already shown the new huge fence that could be used to ensure that access can only be gained via entrances with a ticket. However, the group believed that whilst the new fence is impressive, security personnel is equally important, and believe that the existing problems with numbers would be much less if more effort had been made with the fence and related security in the past.

They also felt that the Festival has outgrown its current organisational structure, and a new full plan needs to be provided detailing full roles and responsibilities, etc.

The other main issue of concern for the group was that of travellers who attend without a ticket and park up on land nearby. Although their numbers are few, they cause the greatest annoyance to the Pilton villagers, and as such will affect any license decision. The action the Police could take to lessen this nuisance to those living near Worthy Farm is currently unclear because of uncertainties regarding the impact of the new Human Rights legislation in relation to travellers.

With the council now pro-actively seeking ways to move forward, the ball is very much back with the Festival. The impression given is that were the Festival to properly deal with all the legal and regulatory issues that surround an event of its size the granting of a license for a Festival in 2001 is possible.

A spokesman for the Festival said that getting a licence for 2001 was expected to be a long hard haul, and not guaranteed. He said that they realised if numbers were again exceeded it could be the last Festival.

Latest Updates