I’ve sent over 700 emails to achieve parity for the excluded and I won’t stop

It is now close to 120 days since I have been excluded from government support because of the pandemic and still no sign of being able to return to work.

After 11 years in the live events and festival industry it seems that my tax history has no meaning and I have been left to fend for myself.

Along with tens of thousands of other PAYE freelancers who move contract to contract we have been totally left out of the government support package schemes.

When the pandemic hit the shores of the UK, I thought it was just another flu outbreak, and was looking forward to another very busy season in the field up and down the UK.

I realised the situation was serious when I found out through the media that all my work for the year had been cancelled. I was panicking I had no idea how I was going to support myself.

Then on 27 March I sat down to watch Rishi Sunak announce a raft of unprecedented economic support for the country – the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme.

I was so happy that I would be supported in the coming months as I was already certain that I wouldn’t be working again until 2021. Rishi Sunak’s words: “To you I say this: “You have not been forgotten. You have not been left behind. We are all in this together””, was exactly the reassurance I was looking for as a Conservative voter.

However, my hopes were crushed as I contacted former employers to ask to be furloughed. Each one of them kept coming back to me and saying we can’t do that as you are only under contract when on assignment, and as you are not on assignment you are not contracted, so therefore you cannot be furloughed.

It dawned on me that it is not just me who will be deeply affected by no means of government support, but the many thousands of other freelancers I work with directly every year in the events world.

I did not want to just see us be left hung and dry by the government, and made it my mission to try my hardest for our industries to be noticed and supported through the worst pandemic ever to hit this country.

My campaigning has included sending over 729 emails to politicians from all parties to highlight the situation. I’ve set up petitions, talked to the media including ITV News, formed alliances with others in the same situation. And I won’t stop.

When I first started this over 100 days ago, I thought it would only take a couple of weeks for the government to realise they have made a mistake excluding PAYE freelancers, as we are taxed at source, so all they have to do is go on the last 3 years PAYE earnings, to calculate an average monthly grant.

I have been asking them to set up a freelancers’ income support scheme, as the creative industries are disproportionately impacted by the crisis. This hasn’t happened.

Now the government has announced a rescue package for the arts, but once again I know I won’t benefit. An All-Party Parliamentary Group for the three million people who have been excluded from government support met for the first time last week. I know they will keep working on our behalf, and, I will too. I have no idea whether it will result in the government providing the parity and closure we so desperately need. But, what I know for certain is that I’m not going to stop campaigning and nor will the rest of Excluded UK – we have nothing to lose.