FREELANCERS MAKE THEATRE WORK MEETING: FRIDAY 10 SEPTEMBER
Chair: EJ
Minutes: Al Cope
Attending: Paul Carey Jones, Emma Jayne Park, Mimi Doulton, Alistair Cope, Paule Constable, Peter McKintosh
Apologies: Vicki M, Peter M, Susan K, Sunita H,
- Welcome & introductions (9.30-35)
Very small meeting today so EJ has offered to ‘loosely chair.’ Al will take over if EJ has to pop out. Intros today are talking about jobs we did that people might not know. Al was a perfume sprayer in Harrods, Paul was a Physics Teacher, EJ worked in Ralph Lauren, Mimi had an internship at the ROH and was placed in ‘IT Support’, Jake worked in his local Chinese Takeaway in the kitchen as a teenager (he was a prawn cracker connoisseur – but allergic to prawns), Paule has done too many ‘stupid jobs’ to mention but was a kissagram and a forklift truck driver!
- Updates & reports: (9.35-9.45)
- BAC (EJ) – Assessor meetings have been attending and it has been emotionally hard. Lots of learnings to log, especially about what our capacity is in terms of ‘We are not there to ‘fix it’ but to advise.’
- Funding (Jake) – We have applied for funding from the Maria Bjornson Foundation to cover all our core costs for the next 12 months. Meeting also in place next week (Tuesday) with the Jerwood Foundation.
- Projects (9.45-11.25)
- Small Acts (of change) (Paule) – Paule has drafted a letter about what the project could be and is going to send it round the group. In light of today’s ‘bat signal’ Mimi would like to make sure that we as FMTW place care for each other as a priority. How do we support each other in times of need?
- Brexit – Mimi attending a meeting with Trevor McFarlane and he would like to be involved in our next moves regarding Brexit. The FMTW Brexit group has been quite quiet over the last weeks so will get together for a meeting soon and bring in Trevor. Al to put something in slack.
- NI rise (Mimi) – The Government will increase National Insurance contributions rather than the upper income bracket. Should there be an FMTW response?
EJ- Looking at the recently released Creative Industries report on social mobility (https://www.pec.ac.uk/research-reports/social-mobility-in-the-creative-economy-rebuilding-and-levelling-up) this is a huge amount of work for FMTW to take.
Al – that shouldn’t put us off at least acknowledging what has happened and what it means. There has been no response from within the industry.
Paul – All these things are yet another barrier for many to enter and stay within the profession.
Mimi – We could put out a statement acknowledging what this means for freelancers. Longer term, we could partner with someone to do more work on this (Excluded UK?)
EJ – Interesting that no-one within the industry has called this out. Why? What does that mean?
- Action point
Organise a Brexit Catch Up – Al.
Ni Rise – Paul and EJ to draft a response (Newsletter perhaps)
Email Tax people about offering some free tax advice -Al
- AOB
-Dawn Chorus continuing into September
– Zip car partnership was very successful. Will continue for another few weeks.
-Mimi – In the future, perhaps we could partner with some Tax people etc to provide free/reduced rate advice.