Society of London Theatre & UK Theatre are calling on members of the public to write to their MP, to ask the UK Government to use the Autumn Budget to ensure greater access to theatre for communities across the nation.
From pantomime to Shakespeare, from major musicals to community-led productions, theatre brings culture, creativity and shared experiences to communities across the country, but many theatre companies are being forced to cut towns and venues from tour routes due to rising production costs.
Touring is essential to making theatre accessible to everyone, everywhere. Audiences broadly mirror the national population due to the variety of work that can reach towns and cities across the country. Yet sharply rising travel, freight, energy and business rates costs, alongside higher National Insurance contributions, are now making visits to smaller and medium-sized towns increasingly unviable, resulting in fewer routes and less choice for audiences.
SOLT & UK Theatre are therefore calling on the Chancellor to use the Autumn Budget to keep theatre touring, protect venues and support access to culture across the UK, and you can help by writing to your local MP to support our three key asks:
- Keep tours on the road: Make unavoidable touring transfer costs such as freight eligible for Theatre Tax Relief.
- Fix the opera and ballet gap: Reduce the touring-rate threshold for opera and ballet to reflect the reality of large-scale national touring.
- Protect live performance venues: Extend the relief for pubs and live music venues to theatres and other live performance venues, protecting them from business rates shocks.
We’ve made writing to your MP as easy as possible to do, with a template letter available to download here.
If you are a SOLT or UK Theatre member, or work for a theatre, you can find an industry-specific template letter here.
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