this weekend's The Last Jubilee Festival is cancelled

Bath punk festival The Last Jubilee Festival due to happen over this coming Jubilee Bank Holiday weekend from Saturday 2nd until Monday 4th June 2012 at Bath Racecourse, Lansdown, Bath, in Somerset has been cancelled by the Racecourse who have revealed they have pulled the plug after organisers failed to fulfil their contractual obligations.

A statement issued from Bath Racecourse, (here), says:

"This weekend's Last Jubilee music festival has been cancelled We regret to inform customers that the three-day music festival that was due to take place at Bath Racecourse from 2nd to 4th June has been cancelled.

The racecourse had agreed to provide the venue for the event, entitled The Last Jubilee. The Last Jubilee was an external event, organised and managed by a company in no way affiliated to the racecourse. Unfortunately, the organisers have failed to fulfil their contractual obligations and the racecourse has taken the difficult decision to withdraw the use of the venue due to breach of contract and health and safety concerns.

The event promised to be an exciting addition to the Bath calendar and it is deeply regrettable that we have had to cancel it at such short notice. We apologise wholeheartedly to those people who will be affected by the cancellation of this event.

The racecourse has not been involved with ticket sales but we will urge the organisers to reimburse ticket holders in full. We advise ticket holders to contact the outlet or agent at which they purchased tickets to discuss refunds.

Bath Racecourse will not compromise on the quality of the events it stages or on the safety of its customers. Whilst this has been a difficult decision, we believe it was the only responsible option."

Organisers have also issued a statement in reply, (here):

"Dark Establishment Figures put brakes on alternative Jubilee Event.

The spirit of 1977 has shown it's ugly side with Bath Council putting a cancellation notice on the Last Jubilee event being held at Bath racecourse 2,3,4 June 2012.

Using spurious health & safety legislation and by delaying their decision until today (31-5-2012) has meant that their ridiculous claims and pathetic demands could not be countered in time for this event to go ahead.

The minuscule issues that the venue and the local council had could easily have been dealt with if their notice of cancellation had been delivered in time. They chose to wait until today to do this, giving the organisers no time to put right the minor issues that were raised.

It has become obvious that the venue and the local council did not want this event to go ahead, on what grounds is not clear. One of the 'concerns' they had was that this was a 'Punk' festival, and the 'undesirable' element that this would attract! There is no point even dignifying that with a response, except to say that The Last Jubilee had sold almost as many family tickets as individual adult tickets.

Another issue is the 'Royal' Bath didn't want it's proud name associated with an Anti-Jubilee occasion. Firstly this was in no way an anti-jubilee event, it was a celebration of the music of 1977, the silver jubilee year. It was entirely, and only, a music festival with no political content whatsoever.

Secondly amongst the 4 children's charities that this event was intended to support was one who's patron is The Princess Royal! An anti-monarchy event wouldn't really want to be involved with a senior member of the Royal Family.
On the subject of the charities, 4 local and national childrenÂ’s charities stood to benefit from donations of thousands of pounds from the organisers and attendees as well as much needed publicity and raised awareness from the event programme and from having a presence at the event itself. That will now not happen!

The promoters and organisers of The Last Jubilee have asked for patience and understanding from the ticket holders and performers as they try and rearrange this event as soon as possible.

However it is with great regret and massive annoyance that we have to confirm that the event in it's current form due to be held at Bath Racecourse over the Jubilee Weekend has been cancelled.

This is not over by a long way, watch this space!

With a line-up of the Great and the Good of the Punk World the Last Jubilee was to be a celebration of the Spirit of '77 with Buzzcocks, The Damned, Eddie And The Hot Rods, Glen Matlock (The Sex Pistols), Anti-Nowhere League, UK Subs, 999, The Selecter, The Rezillos, The Vibrators, Bad Manners, The Lurkers, Misty in Roots, Chelsea, Ruts DC, Menace, Goldblade, The Beat, Open Sore, Ed Tudor Pole, TV Smith, Brutal Regime, Death Pop, Spizzenergi, Sicknote, The Physicists, Clay Statues, Chinese Burn, 2 Sick Monkeys, Operation 77, The Transients, Cosmo, and more.

The festival organisers have not yet made a statement. Ticket holders are asked to contact their point of sale for more information.

Latest Updates