There have been LOTS and lots of articles like the one above, heralding a new pedestrian-centric management of cities. The crux of the arguments is generally that a) people are going to want more space post-pandemic, b) cities are going to need some way of coaxing people back outside.
Maybe it's true. Maybe your city will be come more welcoming of street performance than ever, with pitches sprouting up where once there were cars...or maybe the corona-inspired restrictions on activity allowed in public spaces will become permanent?
I was contacted by a street performer who's pretty worried about how new legislation in the UK is going to affect buskers. Here's a boiled-down summary of what she sent me:
"This new bill will make even single person demonstrations illegal, if people feel annoyed by their noise. It's not difficult to imagine how this might affect busking. Also, it's not just buskers demonstrating or protesting (the #SaveLondonBuskers movement e.g.), but about plain everyday busking. Buskers need to understand that — in combination with other measures (e.g. cashless payments, busking spots designated and assigned by councils) — they are on the brink of extinction. May sound exaggerated but not too far from reality, surely?"
So, here's what's going on in the UK right now. And a request for info: what's going on in your city right now? Where do you think things are headed?
Over the last week, there has been a national outcry in the UK after the metropolitan police clashed with mourners and protesters at a vigil for Sarah Everard.
Discussions have largely revolved around whether peaceful protest during a pandemic is justified in the face of a massive increase in violence against women over the last year (and how terrible the authorities are at prosecuting offenders). These protests have also shined a spotlight on the government's plans to make a ban on protesting permanent in the UK.
The law I'm talking about is the "Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts" bill, which has just passed its second reading in parliament. Put simply this means that the politicians have agreed that this bill is generally needed, although it's likely some parts of the bill will be watered down in the future.
As it's currently written, the bill will enable the police to set limits on the time protests can take place, limit the noise levels, and apply these rules to individuals, not just groups. But worst of all, they will criminalise acts that are "intentionally or recklessly causing public nuisance".
Isn't that the point of protest?
Incidentally, the crime and policing bill would also increase the maximum sentence for defacing a statue from three months to ten years. Compare that with Inflicting grievous bodily harm on a person (which includes permanent loss of sensory function, paralysis or other life-changing injury), where the maximum sentence is 5 years.
"What if the victim of crime is one of those living statues who busk in public spaces...do you prosecute the defendant as though he’s merely harmed a woman, or do you go for the fullest force of law and treat him as if he has defaced an inanimate object?"
The bill is written so vaguely that if it is passed, street performers who decide to peacefully protest the upcoming criminalisation of busking in Westminster could be arrested. All the police would have to show is that the protest was annoying literally anyone.
Of course, the government says these new powers will only be used against the most disruptive forms of nonviolent protest. This is bullshit on several levels, of course, but street performers should be reminded that the government also said that Public Space Protection Orders wouldn't be used to criminalise busking, and in just 5 years at least 15 PSPOs cropped up that did just that.
This is not an abstract concern. It is completely plausible that we will soon see at least some form of protest from street performers in London, be they individual noncompliance actions, marches, sit-ins or otherwise.
What choice do they have? Westminster's new anti-busking laws come into effect on April 5th, and will criminalise busking on over a thousand streets, limit it to a handful of mostly-unamplified pitches, cut the amount of time those pitches can be used and will cripple London's busking ecosystem. Put simply, a large number of artists are having dreams of getting back to work post-pandemic crushed.
Finally, I know I've been talking a lot about what's happening in London recently. It's my home town, and includes perhaps the most famous busking hotspot in the world, but we also have close to a thousand street performers registered on busk.co from London alone.
However, this is not just a local issue to the UK. Buskers from all over the world come to perform in Covent Garden, yes, but the new law in Westminster might also spread elsewhere. The multi-billion pound business improvement districts backing the bill have explicitly stated that they hope these new regulations will serve as a beacon to cities worldwide.
That all sounds a little bleak, to be sure. And the street performer who emailed me did admit her concerns "may sound exaggerated". So, I'd be very curious to hear your thoughts; is there hope out there for a brighter future?
I'm really interested to hear about is what post-covid is going to look like where you live. I know that a lot of commercial districts and shopping malls are absolutely desperate to get people back outside once the pandemic is over. I rather hopefully thought this might start some sort of global pro-busking atmosphere.
Was I wrong? What do you think will happen in your city over the next year? Are any BIDs or councils or plazas or malls talking publicly about opening up the streets to performers where you live?
Thanks, and good luck out there,
Nick