Newsletter

Sam, an Equity Council member, spoke passionately about the need for subsidised theatre and the shortcomings of the American approach to the arts, he said: “Patronage has an inherent conservatism at its heart that sits badly with art’s main purpose”.

The speech by Jean Rogers, Equity Vice-President, dealt with the lack of roles for female performers, particularly for those past the age of forty. She said: “Our female membership says we want equality, with the portrayal of females to be as varied and insightful as it is for males.”

The conference and the Manifesto for Theatre consultations have culminated in the Respect for the Arts manifesto which proposes radical change in many areas – greater artistic leadership in decision-making on the arts, a genuine focus on local production that represents the whole community, less bureaucracy and more investment in production, secure funding and fair pay for performers.

To learn more about the Respect for the Arts manifesto and read the keynote conference speeches in full, follow the links below.

Respect for the Arts manifesto
Sam West
Jean Rogers

You can download all the conference documents by clicking on the links below:

Manifesto for Theatre Agenda
A full list of all the speakers and debates taking place on the day.

Towards a Manifesto for Theatre: Discussion Document
A short history of how the manifesto for theatre was born and where it might go.

Conference directions
How to find the Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith.

If you wish to attend the conference, you should write to Hannah Packham at Equity, Guild House, Upper St Martin’s Lane, London, WC2H 9EG, or telephone 020 7670 0238 or email hpackham@equity.org.uk

Equity Assistant General Secretary Stephen Spence commented: “In the face of a deep recession it has not been easy to persuade theatre managers to push up minimum rates, but we have done it. While I am pleased to have reached the £400 mark, we all know that performers are worth more. The campaign against low wages in theatre and for decent earnings for professional performers continues.”

Reaching £400 in both Commercial and Independent theatre is a significant success. It shows the strength of members working together, particularly in the Manifesto for Theatre campaign.

However, it does highlight the position in Subsidised Repertory Theatre where the TMA managers refused to reach Equity’s 2009 claim for £400. Equity Council have recently approved the 2010 claim for a significant increase in minimum salaries and allowances for actors and stage management in Subsidised Repertory Theatre. Through the Manifesto for Theatre Campaign members are demanding an end to low pay in subsidised theatre.

Alongside our industrial campaign, Equity is now gearing up for the General Election with the final of a nation-wide series of meetings under the banner of the Manifesto for Theatre. Out of the meetings around the country have crystallised six key demands:

• An end to low wages;
• Arts councils to set targets for levels of in-house production;
• Artistic personnel to be at the heart of theatre decision-making;
• A cut in theatre bureaucracy;
• Government funding to increase year-on-year at least by inflation;
• Renewed local focus.

The Manifesto for Theatre Conference aims to bring together the discussions that took place at meetings across the country over the last few months. The conference aims to construct a campaigning policy that will be the foundation of negotiations with employers and political parties during this election year.

MANIFESTO FOR THEATRE CONFERENCE

22 MARCH 2010

10.00-16.30

LYRIC THEATRE, HAMMERSMITH

If you would like to attend the Manifesto for Theatre conference please send us your details. The final date for receipt of expressions of interest is February 28, 2010.

Please note that places at the conference are limited to 250. Places will be allocated to ensure a representative spread of members.

Stephen Spence

ASSISTANT GENERAL SECRETARY

Live Performance

For more information on the conference and campaign please contact: Hannah Packham on hpackham@equity.org.uk or telephone 0207 670 0238.

The Manifesto for Theatre Conference aims to bring together the discussions that took place at meetings across the country over the last few months. The conference aims to construct a campaigning policy that will be the foundation of negotiations with employers and politicial parties during this election year.

MANIFESTO FOR THEATRE CONFERENCE
22 MARCH 2010
LYRIC THEATRE, HAMMERSMITH

If you would like to attend the Manifesto for Theatre conference please send us your details.

Please note that places at the conference are limited to 250. Places will be allocated to ensure a representative spread of members.

For more information, contact:
Hannah Packham
Guild House, Upper St Martin’s Lane,
London, WC2H 9EG
email: hpackham@equity.org.uk

Travel expenses are not normally paid to members attending an Equity Conference.

However the Manifesto for Theatre Conference is unusual and therefore on this occasion we are able to consider a contribution towards travel for any member travelling outside the London area and provided the travel is by the most cost efficient means. Therefore any member travelling from outside the London area who wishes to claim a contribution towards travel expenses must contact Hannah Packham at Guild House asap and give an indication of the costs involved. Proof of actual travel costs will be required before any reimbursement is given.’

You can download this information as a leaflet if you wish to circulate it to colleagues or to encourage others to attend. Click here

For theatre companies covered by Equity’s agreement with the Independent Theatre Council the weekly minimum will go up from the current level of £375 to £385 from April 2010 and will reach £400 in April 2011. Travel and subsistence allowances increase by 1 per cent from next April.

In commercial theatres using the Theatrical Management Association agreement with Equity, the weekly minimum will go up from the current level of £350 to £365, back-dated to November last year, It will increased again to £380 in April 2010 and will reach £400 in April 2011. All other payments in the contract go up by 1 per cent.

Equity Assistant General Secretary Stephen Spence commented: “In the face of a deep recession it has not been easy to persuade theatre managers to push up minimum rates, but we have done it. While I am pleased to have reached the £400 mark, we all know that performers are worth more. The campaign against low wages in theatre and for decent earnings for professional performers continues.”

At the same meeting the Equity Council approved a claim for a significant increase in minimum salaries and allowances for actors and ASMs in subsidised repertory theatres.

Equity is now gearing up for the General Election with the final of a nation-wide series of meetings under the banner of the Manifesto for Theatre. Out of the meetings around the country have crystallised six key demands:

• an end to low wages;
• Arts councils to set targets for levels of in-house production;
• Artistic personnel to be at the heart of theatre decision-making;
• a cut in theatre bureaucracy;
• Government funding to increase year-on-year at least by inflation;
• renewed local focus.

The Manifesto for Theatre Conference, which will take place at the end of March, will draw together a manifesto for Equity based on what members across the country have said and will prepare the union for a major campaign on theatre in the run up to the General Election.

Recent negotiations have demonstrated a significant gap between the expectations of employers (TMA/ITC) and Equity members on the role and future of subsidised theatre in Britain. We have posed a number of key questions that we believe need answers. These include: What members think of pay in theatre? Why subsidised theatre is important? And, what it should be delivering in a modern society?

Manifesto for Theatre aims to deliver a coherent and coordinated response to these questions that will represent the views of members from across the whole country. Equity will use the manifesto in our negotiations and political lobbying.

The most significant meeting of the Manifesto for Theatre campaign so far was in London on November 23, 2009.

More than 200 members filled the Actors’ Church in Covent Garden to hear Samuel West address members on behalf of the Equity council and to take part in a debate that included contributions from Patrick Malahide, Prunella Scales and Malcolm Sinclair, amongst others.

This meeting, along with other open meetings and the individual cast and stage management consultations, allowed members up and down the country to have their say on the future of UK subsidised theatre. They have also been able to give their views through the Equity website www.manifestofortheatre.co.uk

This national debate has produced some initial ideas for this conference to consider. These include:

An end to low wages

• All funded companies to pay at least industry standard wages.

Increased production

• Arts Councils to set minimum levels of in-house production.

Artistic leadership

• Artistic and creative personnel to be at the heart of theatre decision-making.

Less bureaucracy

• Arts Councils to set maximum levels for proportion of grant spent on administration.

Secure funding

• Government arts funding to increase year-on-year at least in
  line with inflation.

Local focus

• Local authorities to be given a duty to fund performing arts.
• Every major town to have a funded theatre company.

The message from members in the Manifesto for Theatre meetings has been clear. They are very unhappy about the low levels of pay and clear that they are prepared to act together to change this.

They are keen to take part in a campaign to raise public awareness and willing to put pressure on the employers, Arts Councils and current/future governments.

A research project is in the process of being commissioned to look at where theatres have actually spent the increased levels of subsidy they received from government over the last decade – because Equity’s existing research shows that it has not been significantly spent on improving the pay of performers or stage management.

The response on the political questions will also, once the meetings are complete, be fed back into the Manifesto for Theatre Working Group who will use the feedback received from members to develop a position paper to frame the agenda for our major conference to be held in March 2010.

Stephen Spence

ASSISTANT GENERAL SECRETARY

Live Performance

Equity has expressed serious concern to both the Arts Council England and the Theatrical Management Association, which represents theatre managers, and is planning a major campaign in the run-up to the general election to highlight low wages and falling employment in regional subsidised theatre productions.

Equity Assistant General Secretary Martin Brown commented: “What this research shows is that while Arts Council funding has risen, activity on the Equity/TMA sub rep contract has fallen. We believe this must mean that there has been a fairly serious collapse in in-house production. What we don’t know is what has replaced it. Is there less activity over-all? Is there the same amount of activity but in-house production has been replaced by bought-in commercial shows or collaborations with small-scale theatre operation on the ITC contract? We don’t know.

“If we are right in our analysis that there is a collapse of in-house production what it marks is a major shift away from the sub rep model of plays in a playhouse produced locally with the local audience in mind to something else. We fear that less in-house productions could mean a “lack of coherent artistic vision” in regional theatre.

“This may also have a detrimental impact on the west End. The West End relies on sub rep for a significant proportion of its in-coming productions, principally but not exclusively straight plays. If sub rep original production is in decline, what does that mean for the West End into the future?”

This Autumn, Equity staff and council members have been travelling around the country consulting with members – actors, stage managers and creative team members – on what they want from subsidised theatre. Under the banner of Manifesto for Theatre, Equity members have been articulating their vision of a subsidised theatre sector that is artistically strong and that treats the actors and stage managers it employes with respect.

Out of the Manifesto For Theatre meetings have emerged six key themes: bring an end to low wages, increase in-house production, put creatives back at the heart of theatre decision making, cut bureaucracy, increase funding and increase theatres’ local focus.

A major conference in the Spring of next year will formulate these themes into a manifesto which Equity and its members will campaign around in the run up to the General Election.

The graph below shows the rise in Arts Councils’ investment and the fall in employment on in-house productions (click on image below for full-size image).

Funding increases but employment falls

POSSIBLE POINTS FOR A THEATRE MANIFESTO

1) The performing arts have value in three main ways:

• intrinsic creative value to the whole community: most directly human of Art-forms, living record of our history and civilisation; enlighten, challenge, entertain, provoke change in both participants, audiences, and society; explore human experience in ways factual, non-fiction material cannot – through senses, emotion, will, imagination, as well as mind; enable us to get our bearings in the world: understand self, our relationships, place in society. More of a necessity in current time of crisis – sustenance and support in a changing and difficult world.
•  Social responsibility role: dealing directly with social/political issues, and relating to specific audiences and participants, their social and cultural identities, aspirations and rights – e.g. TIE, forum theatre, outreach work, workshops and community projects – embracing participation, diversity, inclusion, social understanding, empowerment and tolerance.
• economic: the creation of benefits to local communities and business and the economy as a whole from initial  subsidy/investment – £121m public investment in UK theatre produced £2.6b (2004 – Economic impact study of UK theatre); subsidy feeds the commercial theatre sector.

 2) Increase in public funding to compare with the level of that in France and Germany, where the per capita funding level is twice that of the UK, or in Austria where it is four times the UK’s (from Canada Council for the Arts figures, 2005). No more cuts due to the Olympics: £2.25b cut from ‘good causes’, of which £137m from theatre. No reliance on business sector funding: declining since 2002, fell 7% on 2006/7. Total private investment only 13% of total funding for surveyed organisations (Arts and Business, 2009).

3) Theatre as a statutory service (not non-statutory as at present) offered by Local Authorities, and funding increased in real terms – currently arts services are in decline despite rises in Council Tax (NALGAO local authority budget settlement assessment report 2008/9)

 4) Performers are the only group without whom theatre cannot take place. Other practitioners – directors, designers, choreographers, stage management, etc – are integrally important for the modern theatre experience. Funding is essentially given to finance theatre. So, theatre funding should go primarily to the creation of theatre productions, and not be syphoned off into excessive administration and marketing. We want to see management records of how they distribute their grants.

 5) Practitioners must be properly rewarded for their years of training, commitment, and ability, and our wages should increasingly approach the national average wage (currently £577).

 6) AC and other funding bodies must insist their clients adopt Equity wages and conditions, and provide funding levels to accommodate this.

 7) Regional repertory theatres are an important pillar of UK theatre and must be defended from cuts and closures, while being open to explore new forms of operating and connecting with other theatre companies and practitioners.

� Ensemble theatre companies should be established in every ‘major population centre’ (Ensemble Theatre Conference organised by Equity/Directors’ Guild, 2004), with practitioners on longer contracts and with a shared vision of working.

 9) Recognition of the importance of other and new areas of work – small-scale, forum, TIE, workshops, community – serving valuable social roles and involving increasing numbers of members and non-members, who should be unionised. Adequate proportion of increased overall funding should guarantee development. All areas to be brought onto Equity contract.

 10) Companies of proven worth, in whatever area of theatre, to go onto long-term and secure funding (10 years?).

 11) AC and other funding bodies must be accountable and consult practitioners:

• peer groups, including Equity members, on advisory bodies consulted by funders before funding decisions are taken (OR, which I don’t agree with, Equity members on AC decision-making bodies).
• clear criteria for funding relating to concrete experience of audiences and communities and not elitist abstractions and target-setting: ‘excellence’ must relate to effect on audience and society as a whole, whether large or small companies, national or community-based; ‘innovation’ needs a wider definition not confined to current fads.
• Coherent, comprehensive view of all elements within the whole national picture.

 12) Practitioners sitting on each publicly funded theatre management Board (of which 2 should be Equity members?).

 13) Benefits for Equity members and student practitioners: free tickets for all funded and commercial theatre company performances: most practitioners can’t afford to see work in their own fields. Lower admission prices for all audiences periodically throughout the year. (Great Art for Everyone!).

New minimums were established in the West End for performers and assistant stage managers at £450, £500 and £550 depending on size of theatre.

In Commercial Theatre outside the West End negotiations continue to establish a new ordinary minimum of £400.

However in subsidised theatre, negotiations alone have failed to move the employers towards agreement on £400 as a new minimum for performers and assistant stage managers.

The ITC would not move beyond £375.

In Subsidised Repertory the initial TMA response was in these tough economic times, and with negative (RPI) inflation for much of the year, that nothing was possible if Equity persisted with the claim. The minimum would remain at £350. A pay freeze in other words.

Despite Equity presenting to the employers research that showed that subsidised repertory had done well in funding settlements, fears for the future seemed to dominate manager thinking.

After most of the year spent negotiating the employers did finally make an offer in August 2009. That offer was 0.5% in exchange for significant changes to the terms and conditions in the Agreement.

Equity negotiators could not see how such a low offer could be worked into a decent outcome. It was put to TMA that the offer to BECTU of 2% from April 2009 and 1% from October 2009 should be extended to Equity members. TMA negotiators indicated that the BECTU deal had been subject to changes to their agreement.

Equity negotiators assessed that to consider the kind of changes the TMA were seeking to the Subsidised Repertory Agreement much more money would need to be on the table than that offered to BECTU.

In the SOLT deal for example there were a number of changes made to the West End Agreement but, in exchange for those changes, the minimum rates of pay increased between 12.5% and 50% depending on the size of theatre and whether a Sunday performance was involved. In Commercial Theatre if £400 is achieved that will be a 14% increase on the minimum. Changes to the body of the agreement can be examined in those circumstances.

Changes for between 0.5% and 2.5% in Subsidised Repertory was beyond the pale!

Equity concluded that returning to you the members was the next step in our campaign to ask your view on the deadlock. Accordingly the ‘Manifesto for Theatre’ meetings have been launched. Open meetings of members from Brighton to Belfast have been organised between October and December to ask your views not just on the industrial issues but on the state of theatre more broadly.

An Equity conference in March 2010 will consider your comments and answer the question; what kind of theatre do we want from 2010 onwards? That conference will determine the message Equity members have for those seeking to form a new Government from May 2010.

In the meantime the financial year April 2009-April 2010 has been slipping away and your negotiators were not satisfied at all with the idea there should be no increase for this period while we canvassed your views. With negative inflation (RPI) peaking at -1.6% during the year and with negotiations based on RPI there was little space for negotiators to work.

Discussions were opened with the TMA on whether they would be prepared to consider an interim settlement for the year 2009-10 without changes to the agreement. Eventually TMA indicated that they would offer the 0.5% in exchange for one minor clarification relating to final dress rehearsals, dropping other proposals for now.

The Equity Working Party and Council were faced with a dilemma. Half a percent is not a decent increase. However the ‘Manifesto for Theatre’ process will take time. The choices available were to accept the 0.5% on an interim basis or simply walk away from negotiations with the TMA until that process was complete and risk losing any increase for 2009/10.

The former option provided a very small increase even on an interim basis but we were not prepared to change the terms of the agreement to achieve a little more. The latter option meant 2009/10 was likely to result in a pay freeze as the judgement was the TMA would not backdate to April 2009 if discussions went on longer.

The Equity Council debated the issue on 6 October 2009 and did contemplate simply walking away from the negotiations until next year but reluctantly decided that Equity should accept the 0.5% for 2009/10 to allow us the time to consult with members in order to determine the next step in relation to the Equity claim.

Accordingly 0.5% will be applied to all minimum payments in the Subsidised Repertory Agreement backdated to April 2009. The Agreement will come up for renewal in April 2010.

Details of the ‘Manifesto for Theatre’ meetings can be found on the Equity websites www.equity.org.uk and www.manifestofortheatre.co.uk

Please come along and let us know your views on the next step.

Stephen Spence
ASSISTANT GENERAL SECRETARY
Live Performance

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