Safeguarding and Anti-Harassment Resources for Festivals

We value our multigenerational folk festivals and we believe that everyone has a right to feel safe when attending them. We are calling on festivals across the UK to display and implement proper safeguarding and anti-harassment policies and measures.

In the UK, nearly half of female festival goers (43%) under 40 years old say they have faced unwanted sexual behaviour at a music festival.

Last year, Friendly Festivals in Scotland (FFS) launched their campaign to ask festivals to clearly display anti-harassment policies as a first step in ensuring attendees, staff and volunteers at festivals can easily find out how to report an incident, and how this will be dealt with. This followed research which Popgirlz Scotland, Fanny Riot and POWA conducted in January 2022 on the Scottish festival scene. They found that only 2 out of 60 festivals in Scotland have formal anti-harassment policies visible on their website (HebCelt and Piping Live!).

Therefore, we are asking festivals to urgently take measures to show and properly implement safeguarding and anti-harassment policies to help ensure the safety and well-being of attendees, including children and young people, performers, volunteers, and staff.

Festivals! Here’s what you can do:

• Check out our list of resources below for creating and implementing your policies, and for examples of good practice.

• Get in touch with us or Esperance, our sister organisation in England. We are happy to point you towards further resources for creating your safeguarding and anti-harassment policies.

• Speak out! Be proactive in letting people know where to go for help at your festival. You can display information across your site, including in food & drinks areas and toilets.

Are you attending a festival this year? Does the festival you’re going to have a safeguarding policy? If not, ask them to do better by sharing these resources!

Resources:

• Friendly Festivals in Scotland - find out more about their campaign, and access their safer space policy examples.

• Fair Plé created an anti-harassment policy template which you can access here.

• Need extra on-site support? FANNY RIOT’s FLAPS scheme (Scotland) can offer welfare support in addition to your festival’s existing measures.

• Association of Independent Festivals’ (AIF) Safer Spaces at Festivals Campaign - through this you can access resources and your festival can sign the Charter of Best Practice, alongside a long list of festivals across the UK.

• Esperance have a wide variety of resources available on their website, including on safeguarding and guidance for comperes.

• Incorporated Society of Musicians (ISM) and the Musicians’ Union (MU) have an Industry Code of Practice which organisations can implement to tackle and prevent bullying, harassment and discrimination.

• The Good Night Out Campaign offers specialist training and accreditation which can provide staff and organisations with the tools and confidence to deal with harassment appropriately.

• Working with children, young people or vulnerable adults? The National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC) offer safeguarding training appropriate for your needs.

• The English Folk Dance and Song Society have a great list of resources and tools available here.

• Check out our blog post from last year for further information and resources.