Fair Ticketing Alliance campaign welcomes Parliamentary debate on secondary ticketing

[LONDON, 02 May 2018] The Fair Ticketing Alliance campaign today congratulated Pete Wishart MP on securing a Parliamentary Debate on the key issue of secondary ticketing. The Alliance was set up by a group of responsible UK ticket traders representing a cross section of the industry. It comes in the wake of increasing market uncertainty which threatens the future of their mainly small, often family-run, businesses and the valuable service they provide to fans.

Fair Ticketing Alliance chairman, Stephen Lee said:

“Issues around secondary ticketing are critical for all live music and entertainment fans across the UK and Pete Wishart deserves support for raising them in Parliament. It may come as a surprise, but we agree with him that there is a lot wrong with the current ticketing market. It is failing to meet the demands of live entertainment fans in the UK and we want to see change so consumers get the best deal. We’re happy to work with anyone who shares those ends.

“The Government deserves praise for introducing reforms into the secondary market that have led to some positive results to protect consumers. We strongly welcomed recent moves to outlaw bots, although we remain way behind where the US is on this issue. We also strongly support action by the Competition and Markets Authority against secondary website platforms that do not provide sufficient transparency to allow re-sellers to comply with the law. We urge all such sites to do so immediately.

“However, the Fair Ticketing Alliance believes more needs to be done to reform the market as a whole by licensing responsible, secondary operators and granting them the right to re-sell tickets, as happens in the US. The authorities should also act against vertical integration where it’s detrimental to consumers, and introduce more transparency into the primary market. This will improve fans’ experience, whilst protecting jobs and tax revenues for the Government.”

The Fair Ticketing Alliance has three core objectives which it is campaigning for:

1. Greater legal and regulatory clarity about existing UK laws on secondary ticketing;
2. Government and regulatory bodies to ensure that secondary website platforms allow traders to comply fully with the law;
3. Changes in UK laws to give responsible, secondary operators the right to re-sell tickets whilst protecting consumer interests.

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NOTES TO EDITORS

More information about the Fair Ticketing Alliance can be found on its website: www.fairticketing.co.uk or by following us on Twitter: @FairTicketing

Media contact:
Pete Bowyer
press@fairticketing.co.uk
07740 913886