Gala Festival extension for 2023 - area of park proposed to be closed from May 16 to June 10

[Lollipop]

Just received a letter from Southwark re the Gala consultation. There is a Zoom meeting tomorrow night at 6pm (Wed 25th). You need to contact [email protected] to get a link to participate.

Southwark also have a consultation site - it is at https://www.southwark.gov.uk/events-culture-and-heritage/events/major-commercial-events/stakeholder-engagement?chapter=5

Reminder that consultation closes Tues 7 Feb at midnight. Postal problems may mean that lots of people did not get any letter.

[legalalien]

Have been watching the recent Overview and Scrutiny committee meeting on this year’s budget. Really interesting watch (for the small minority who like this kind of thing). I testing discussion from 1:23 on Part 2

about the Kpop festival in Bermondsey - Cllr Rose does appear to say that without commercial events there won’t be grant money for community events.

[first mate]

LA, thanks for posting and, sadly, agree with you.

CR is a complete advocate of commercialisation of parks and makes the point that use is not statutory but strategic and therefore discretionary, in short no protection. She also smugly uses her son's alleged love of KPOP and now Metallica as justification and demonstration of a 'need' for her Park-for-hire agenda.

Terrifying and this is a Labour Council.

[hpsaucey]

Just received a letter from Southwark re the Gala consultation. There is a Zoom meeting tomorrow night at 6pm (Wed 25th). You need to contact [email protected] to get a link to participate.

Southwark also have a consultation site - it is at https://www.southwark.gov.uk/events-culture-and-heritage/events/major-commercial-events/stakeholder-engagement?chapter=5

Reminder that consultation closes Tues 7 Feb at midnight. Postal problems may mean that lots of people did not get any letter.

 

Thanks for posting. Southwark sent out a link to the proposed licensing agreement to Friends of Peckham Rye Park. Unfortunately the link didn't work with Southwark suggesting they'd need a couple of weeks for changes.

Will this will delay the consultation end date(?)

Also - fwiw from the southwark page the email link is [email protected] using subject title ‘GALA Stakeholder meeting’.

[lbsmith73]

Just been on the meeting with the Gala representatives. Had to sit through a hard sell of all the noble and admirable benefits for the people who will attend the festival. No acknowledgement that they will take a public space away from local people for 25 days in the summer months. This is purely a money making scheme for both Gala and Southwark Council. Southwark have a responsibility to ensure council tax payers can access the council facilities that they pay for. The noise, impact on the environment and the removal of a much needed and loved facility will have a big impact on local residents.

The Gala representative just apologised for all the failures of last year’s festival (poor waste management, failure to return the land back as agreed, having to send litter pickers back several times, failure to remove road signs)

I have no issue with the festival being over one weekend. But we must take a stand over the proposed expansion. If agreed where will end? The park is a public space not a private enterprise. Please express your concerns through the council by objecting to the proposed licence

[Wil]

It's 3 1/2 weeks. Blank ugly hoardings all round exclusion area. Two gates shut. Obviously unacceptable. Growing arrogance!

There have always been fairs, circuses, fetes, festivals, rallies on the common where there is plenty of room and no problems caused.

The park belongs to all.

We need to see this lot off now.

[first mate]

Precisely. No issue with a few weekends in the summer but this is different. If we let this happen they will keep asking for more and more and then one day that fenced off section could even become permanent.

[jerryc]

What's up with this two-weekend festival business ? Even Glastonbury and Reading don't get to churn up *their* fields for two weekends.

Some big brass ones on the organisers by wanting to expand after last years post-festival clean-up failures.

Am not against that one weekend - go nuts. But come on Southwark council - if you want the money that much, at least move it to the common where the circus and funfairs go. Shorter walk from the train station too ;)

Suggest y'all go mail the events team to give them your 10 cents.

[email protected] with the subject title ‘GALA consultation’ by the closing date.

[Comoj]

So that whole part of the park is closed for the whole mid-week bit with nothing going on at all between the weekends ?

[satsuma]

I think it's great, especially given that there's a family day. Bring it on!

[first mate]

Every day is a family day in the park. A chance to enjoy green space, the open air and nature.

Why risk losing that to pay only commercial ventures that actually damage a community asset?

We have always had the odd weekend event involving music, food and drink and those are great but this is a very different proposition.

There are lots of places people can go and listen to music and drink, if they wish. There are also all sorts of bespoke activities for children and parents to enjoy. But why can't we just leave the park be? It is not as though we have more green space than we need in London. We need to protect it.

[turtledove]

I went to that meeting too and feel so strongly that we must take a stand to stop the doubling of this festival.

Please, everyone, email [email protected], quoting GALA consultation SWKEVE000569, to make your objections. We have until 7th February to do so.

For what it's worth, these are some of the points I raised.

- I enjoy music festivals, in the appropriate setting. But I've never been to one which is fewer than 30 metres from many people's bedroom windows, across six nights, two weekends in a row. That experience is genuinely torturous to inflict on a community.

- Gala's event is entirely unsuitable for a residential neighbourhood which is predominantly populated by families with young children. During a Zoom call on the evening of 25th January, the organisers admitted that only 12 per cent of festival goers came from SE15 and SE22 postcodes. Of course, Southwark should be a welcoming borough, but it is effectively being asked to host a party for 42,000 people (up from 27,000 last year), aimed primarily at 20-30-year-olds from other boroughs but impacting hugely on 0-10-year olds and people aged 40+ living in SE22

- The roads closest to the park are populated by many families with young children. 10.30pm might seem like an early finish, but that's three hours after most young children's bedtimes - three hours in which the music is so loud in our house that we can't even hear each other speak. It might be possible to go away for one weekend, as we have sometimes tried to do in the past, but two weekends in a row is unaffordable and unreasonable. Every child in the vicinity is therefore looking at 18 hours of broken sleep in a week

- Gala's application describes it as 'an increase of 3 days of event activity'. In reality, there would be at least 25 days where access to our local park would be ruined. These are often some of the best days of the calendar, straddling the June half-term and the beginning of warm weather. This will have a hugely negative impact on all local residents. The organisers say that it's only 12.5 per cent of the park, but it's 100 per cent of the park that we use. It also ruins the enjoyment of the rest of the space, which is very difficult to access for the thousands of families who live on the west side of the park

- To make matters worse, Gala has a poor track record of clearing up their damage afterwards. It has taken months for repairs to be carried out, with the result that the park is less enjoyable throughout the rest of the summer and early autumn as well. Gala leaves, with their profits; we live through the results of their negligence

- In Southwark's Notice of Decision of 19th May 2022, the committee heard from "the applicant's legal representative who advised that the application was amended to read the maximum capacity would be 9,999 and would take place for a maximum of three days for each calendar year".

- I would probably support a weekend festival on the main part of the Rye, where the circus and the fair appear each year; I will just about tolerate one weekend a year in its current spot; but two consecutive weekends... never!

[Sazzle30]

I think it’s only going to be on the one weekend as they have released more tickets and have only referenced the May weekend

https://thisisgala.co.uk/

[first mate]

To clarify, that is for the Gala festival. They want to mount another event, with a different name, immediately afterwards, hence needing a rather large section of the park for a month.

Last year there were moves by the organisers to secure a permanent licence for part of the park for a chunk of the summer- or to put it another way, to own part of the park for the summer.

I believe even Cllr Hamvas was not keen.

If they get a whole month this time then that will be just the beginning. I really hope people object to this.

[McMurphy]

thanks all for highlighting need to register our feedback.

I registered my view that partial privatisation of the park for 25 days of summer is not a good thing.

And listed back at southwark the benefits they claim from park usage, which they are intending to restrict.

https://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/documents/s51656/Public%20Health%20presentation%20-%20parks%20open%20spaces.pdf

[zerkalo]

This is the proposed schedule for the extended event with the dates the area of the park will be unavailable (as per the title of this thread). I have registered my objections even if I think the lineup for the first weekend of the festival that has been already announced is really good. Such a long period of time with restricted access to a vital public space is not really of any benefit to the local community.

 

[jerryc]

Final weekend to register your happiness with the council that they'll be boarding the best sitting spot on the Rye off for 25 days.

email [email protected], quoting GALA consultation SWKEVE000569, to make your objections.

1 weekend Fiiiine. 2 Weekends, come on Gala you're having a larf.

[fishboy]

There is now a link on the Southwark site to the recording of the Gala zoom presentation / meeting which took place on Weds Jan 25th -

http://www.southwark.gov.uk/PeckhamRyeParkEvents

A shame it wasn't available before the deadline for the consultation period, but there you go.

Apparently it is still possible to make representations for or against the granting of a premises licence, which is for permission to sell alcohol, performance of dance and playing of live & recorded music. The application had to be restarted due to errors with the initial application, so any representations made prior to this will need to be resubmitted. The new application reference is 879391. Probably worth the effort to try to make your voices heard with this too...

[first mate]

Thanks for posting and I have started to watch.

Already we learn that the ugly metal fencing all around the area will

be much higher this year to prevent 'jumpers' getting in for free...giving some sense of where the real priorities lie.

They keep calling it 6 days but it isn't, it's 25 days.

Please object or we will lose parkland in the summer for good.

I removed a section on licensing as I believe I had misunderstood the difference between an event licence and a premises licence. Gala have been granted a 3 day premises licence in perpetuity. They now wish to extend that.

At the meeting Cllr Mills of Nunhead said she objected to the 25 days. However, Cllr Rose is driving all this and seems to have form in totally ignoring resident objections to her pet projects.

[first mate]

Southwark News is quoting Cllr Catherine Rose and all the indications are the 25 day privatisation of a large section of Peckham Rye, this coming summer, is already a done deal.

So another illusion of consultation by this Council.

https://southwarknews.co.uk/news/community/gala-festival-set-to-hold-mammoth-six-day-event-on-peckham-rye-park/

[Rockets]

Two weekends in a row is a bit much, got to feel for anyone who lives nearby - clearly Southwark putting money before residents.

And I don't buy for one minute the line of "inviting local traders etc".

Has the size of the event got bigger as well in these proposals - does their licence allow them to sell more tickets this year - is that the 1,750 tickets Cllr Rose refers to?

Interesting that GALA and the council claim benefits for the park but FoPRP don't seem convinced the park sees much, if any, of it.

Cllr Rose doesn't seem sure what the benefits are either (not sure how a broader range of free and subsidised tickets can be claimed to be a benefit to the park):

But Southwark Council has said the event’s profits would be used to improve the park and support FoPRP.

The council’s parks and leisure chief, Cllr Catherine Rose, said: “A number of benefits are proposed, including a broader range of free and subsidised tickets, as well as 1,750 more tickets for local people.

“They [GALA] are also suggesting: opportunities for local businesses to provide services, for local traders to trade, local artists and creatives to showcase and local people to be employed, at the event, subject to planning and licensing approvals.”

[first mate]

We also need to be really clear it is not just two precious weekends at the height of summer; it is 25 days straight a large chunk of our local park is totally out of bounds and effectively becomes a building site.

[kiera]

I'm resting my hopes on our local councillors. Although the site of the Festival is in Peckham Rye ward, Dulwich Hill residents are among those who live closest and are most affected. A number of us have contacted our councillors and Maggie Browning has responded by informing us that she agrees with our objections. She has now formally objected to the extension of the Gala Festival.

Her support should be influential in representing us and possibly even more so, as she is the Labour whip.

[first mate]

I so hope you are right. But, she'll be up against Cllr Rose who is very much in favour of all this and who some view as an expert in making consultations 'work' to seem to support (unpopular) proposals...see https://www.35percent.org/revolving-doors/

We should be aware of what is happening next door in Brockwell Park where large sections are now going to be fenced off for 49 days of summer. Events are being expanded to include things like wrestling. Residents feel they have been ignored and deceived by the Council.

[Rockets]

Cllr Browning will, of course, also need to be careful to not be accused of "man-splaining" as she makes her case to Cllr Rose.....