Council puts future of Pride Parade in doubt

The future of the Brighton Pride Community Parade in 2014 has been put in doubt by the Green administrations decision to withdraw the annual £25,000 grant to the organisers of Brighton Pride, a not for profit Community Interest Company (CIC).

Following reports in the Daily Mirror on Monday, September 30 about the proposed removal of the annual grant from the council’s main budget, the Brighton & Hove Gay Business Forum have extended an invitation to the leaders of the City’s three main political parties to attend their next Forum meeting and explain why they are prepared to put at risk Brighton’s biggest diversity event and largest pro rata generator of income from any city event, which benefits businesses both straight and gay in Brighton & Hove.

The £25,000 grant has been in the council’s main budget for some years and is essential to the cash flow of the annual parade and festival.

In 2011-12 organisers claim only £10,000 of the £25,000 grant was handed over to them. It is understood by Gscene that Pride organisers in 2012-2013 received non of this grant to fund the Pride Parade or Festival in Preston Park.

On November 29, 2012 the Leader of the Council, Jason Kitcat told the Argus that “a one off £25,000 grant would remain to support the annual celebration of the LGBT community for 2013/14”, adding that “In its current form we’re not sure it (Pride) needs it.”

Gscene has asked the council for a detailed statement of how the Pride grant was distributed in 2011-2012 and 2012-2013 and to whom. A response is awaited.

The chair of the council’s economic development and culture committee, Councillor Geoffrey Bowden, said:

“We are massive supporters of Pride and are particularly pleased that the ticketed format for the event is delivering a healthy surplus and allowing LGBT charities to benefit from grants administered by the Rainbow fund.

Indeed, in the face of the continuing squeeze on funds from central government to local authorities such as Brighton & Hove, it is essential that major events such as Pride become sustainable. Pride CIC has demonstrated that it has a financially sustainable model, which we applaud.

We continue to work closely with Pride organisers to ensure the longer term future of the event and are currently looking at proposals for 2015. 

The £25,000 we set aside this year was a ring-fenced contingency fund in case it was needed to ensure the viability of the event.

Some of this was used to ensure the safety of the Gay Village Party. The Pride event itself did not require any support from the contingency fund beyond some assistance around managing cash-flow.

Other support we give Pride includes:

• not charging a fee for the use of Preston Park, as we do for other events

• not charging a fee for Madeira Drive nor for the suspension of parking bays incurred by the Parade route

• additional cleaning on the Parade route at no cost to the organisers

• many hours of officer time devoted to ensuring the safe delivery of the event.

We also still provide grants to small scale LGBT organisations wishing to take part in the Parade as we have done for many years”

Before being elected to office in May 2011 Councillor Bowden was a former volunteer press officer and board member of Pride (South East). He was involved with Pride during the stormy period in 2009-2010 when decisions made by the Pride board including the employment of a Chief Executive they could not afford and engagement of a new production company to run Preston Park eventually led Pride to crease trading in March 2012 with debts of over £200,000 caused through rising production costs and general mis-management.

Charity Commission records indicate that Cllr Bowden resigned from the charity in October 2010 well before Pride ceased trading, however, the Pride board at the time, which was chaired by Robert Clothier aka Lady James secured a £20,000 crisis loan from Brighton Council which remained unpaid when Pride (South East) ceased trading in March 2012.

Local community groups including Lunch Positive, Calabash, the Women’s Performance Tent Organisers and University student organisations boycotted the Park event that year in protest at the actions of the Pride board, while behind the scenes the Pride organisers maintained the full support of the city council and senior council officers despite vocal warnings from all sections of the LGBT community as to the ongoing problems.

In 2012 the owners of Revenge organised Pride 2012 which raised £31,000 for distribution to deserving LGBT organisations. It was the first time that Pride had raised and handed over any money to LGBT organisations for some years.

In 2013 a new grouping of Paul Kemp from Aeon Events, David Hill from The E3 Group and local promoter Dulcie Danger emerged and formed a ‘not for profit’ CIC company to run Pride in 2013. They delivered the first Pride for 10 years organised for LGBT people exclusively by LGBT people and raised a record £43,000 for distribution to deserving LGBT organisations. As in the previous year this was achieved by allocating £1 from each ticket sold for entry to Preston Park to the Rainbow Fund, a independent grant giving panel administered for the LGBT community by the Sussex Community Foundation. This was not paid out of a surplus of funds as suggested in Cllr Bowden’s statement, it was allocated in the main Pride budget as an expense right from the start of planning. The money was ring fenced to ensure it would guarantee being paid to deserving LGBT groups after years of this not happening. The £1 on each ticket arrangement put LGBT organisations at the front of the queue post Pride rather than at the back when it came to being paid.

Pride 2013 has been universally recognised as the most inclusive Pride for many years. One of the Pride organisers, Paul Kemp was nominated as ‘Achiever of the year’ in the recent Argus Achievement Awards and the citation read out on the night of the awards reflected the view that Pride 2013 was the best and most inclusive event ever in the eyes of Argus readers.

Warren Morgan, leader of the Labour and Cooperative Group, said:

“The Conservative-led Coalition Government is cutting around £25 million from the council’s funding every year for the next four years. This has fundamental implications for what our council does in terms of providing public services and support for local communities.”

 

Geoffrey Theobald, leader of the Conservative Group on the City Council, said:

“I am a great supporter of the Pride festival and have always tried to do what I can to help if difficulties arise. Therefore, I would be more than happy to meet with the organisers, as I did last year, to discuss matters around funding if it would be helpful.”

 

To compare the Greens financial commitment to other events in the city, Gscene asked Brighton Council how much support the Brighton Festival and Brighton Fringe received annually from the Council.

A council spokesperson said:

“We give £10,000 a year to the Brighton Fringe through our three-year discretionary grant programme.

“Funding for the Brighton Festival is not arranged through our discretionary grant programme.

“Our Festival funding of £611, 554 a year is part of the total funding that goes to the Brighton Dome and Festival Ltd linked to a legal agreement we have with that organisation. 

“The Festival’s economic impact on the city is around £20m per year. It makes a massive and vital contribution to our tourism sector as well as the wider cultural life of the city. So we believe this represents extremely good value for money.”

In their response the Council also took the opportunity to deny wide spread suggestions that any financial package was offered to attract the World Dance Cup event, which was staged at the Brighton Dome, to the city in July this year, adding: “We did support the event through providing help and advice in accommodation bookings as we do with other similar events. From a city-wide perspective the event attracted 3,000 attendees generating in excess of £2.5m in revenue.”

Brighton Council ‘s own figures indicate that pro rata, the Brighton Festival receives £26,589 a day in grant funding for their 23 day Festival which by the council’s figures brings in £869.000. a day to the local economy.

Estimates of the value of the Pride spend to the city vary between £7-11 million for the Pride weekend which is spent in both straight and gay hotels, bars, shops, clubs and restaurants.

In a separate development the City Council have revealed to Gscene that for the last two years the Council’s grant to the Brighton Festival has been index linked at 3.72% in 2012/13 and 2% for 2013.14. They have also confirmed that funding to the Brighton Festival was not index linked in 2011-2012. The Greens took control of the city council in May 2011.

Official police estimates of attendance at Brighton Pride this year was 160,000.

Official online Pride ticket sales show that 90.8% of online ticket sales came from outside a BN postcode indicating the percentage of visitors coming to the city from outside of Brighton.

When pressed by Gscene, the present Pride organisers, Brighton Pride CIC denied they have a surplus of funds in their account to seed fund next years event pointing out that the £1 a head donated to the Rainbow Fund was ring fenced in their overall budget as an expense and was not paid out of any surplus as suggested by Cllr Bowden in his statement.

Brighton & Hove Council have confirmed to Gscene that both The Brighton Marathon and Sussex Half Marathon do not get charged for their use of Madeira Drive as these fees are part of their ‘in kind’ support for the two events.

Brighton Pride CIC is a not for profit Community Interest Company and donated £43,000 to deserving LGBT causes this year.

A spokesperson for Pride, said:

“The directors of Brighton Pride Community Interest Company (BPCIC) are disappointed that the annual grant previously awarded by Brighton and Hove City Council (BHCC) to the organisers of Pride was withdrawn in 2013.  However, we recognise the financial support that BHCC continue to provide to LGBT community organisations through the three year Strategic Grants and Pride Day Grants Schemes.”

“In 2014 and beyond we look forward to working with the council to explore alternative funding sources that secure the success of the LGBT Community Parade in 2014.  With the continued support of BHCC we will also be bringing forward exciting new proposals for the further development of Pride weekend.”

A spokesperson for the Gay Business Forum, said:

“It will be very interesting to hear the reasons why the leaders of the political parties feel this grant can be removed without any consultation with the LGBT community at large. The Pride Parade is essential to the international visibility of the city, the well being of the LGBT Community in Brighton & Hove and our LGBT business community. We must do everything in our power to convince the politicians that the grant remains in place so that the Pride Parade continues next year and we continue to give the city its biggest spectacle and pay day.”

Last month Stonewall, the LGB equality charity publish a new report ‘Gay In Britain’ which identifies how politicians and public service providers continue to fail LGB people in Britain today.

To read the report, CLICK HERE: