Who Pays for the Bristol Harbour Festival? Answer: We Pay £208,000
bristol |
corporations |
feature
Friday September 12, 2008 09:53
by imcvol
As Energy Bills Rocket, Tough Questions Are Asked...Updated!
The Bristol Blogger adds; Answers in! [from a Freedom of Information Request] Note how the overall cost of the festival has more than doubled since 2004, when council taxpayers were putting in less than £80k. Now in 2008 we're paying £208,000, two and a half times more. Amazing what they can find money for isn't it? ...
As the huge rises in energy bills makes the headlines, Skint wrote; On the face of it we Bristolians get 3 nights/2 days of free entertainment at a number of locations around the city centre. Much is made of the fact this is the largest ‘free’ city centre festival across the south west, with the accent on ‘free’, and the implication that ‘we’ are getting something for nothing. Oh yeah? But we all know that these days nothing really comes for free, don’t we? The event is sponsored by a number of commercial operations, the most ‘generous’ being EDF, the French owned power company, who pump so much money into it that its now called ‘The EDF Energy Bristol Harbour Festival 2008’. What a kind and caring bunch eh? But then they can afford it, after all in 2007 they made $8.27billion net profit. And to ensure they keep making a profit, they have just announced price rises for gas & electric use to be paid by you, dear reader – 17% for electricity & 22% for gas. So really EDF aren’t paying for the festival at all, we are, through our fuel bills, but we don’t see our names up on the banner headline do we? Full article & comments.
| EDF - profiting from you | EDF customers face higher bills (BBC) | Cost of EDF Energy Harbour Festival (whatdotheyknow.com) | thebristolblogger.wordpress.com/ | Our response to EDF Energy's announcement of gas and electricity price rises (Age Concern) | The Permanent Energy Crisis Hits Home (tomdispatch.com) |
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Comments (5 of 5)
Jump To Comment: 1 2 3 4 5I see this as rather a bitter rant. Energy companies can and will continue to rip all of us off until worldwide economic and political systems make big changes. I think the link that our bills are paying for the harbourside festival is rather tenuous, for starters not all of us are edf customers, not all edf profits are from household energy supply and so on and like you said the cost of the festival pales in comparison with that of their profits and so theres little argument to be made that anything but a minute portion of our collective bills plays any part if funding it.
Events that bond communities in society are very very important and should not be viewed as money squandered in any way. The transition towns movement has alot to say about the power of community to make peoples lives richer, happier, and more secure. The harbourside festival is a great event for the bristol community and to take this negative pessimistic tone is unnecessary and unhelpful.
Also please not I dont like edf any more than you and will be at climate camp this week.
Sam
So what are YOU going to do about it, organise an alternative festival?
I doubt that.
Why the miserable bitching? at least they are giving a lot of workers a better weekend, much more than you will be doing I bet!
If only people like you could understand some of the basic facts of everyday life for the workers you might actually achieve something one day, please excuse me if I dont hold my breath while waiting.
Stop whinging and do something for positive for a CHANGE!
It is not good enough merely to criticise that which you do not like, where are your ideas for a sustainable alternative?
As far as i'm aware the article isn't a complaint about money being spent on a festival, not in a 'what a waste of taxpayers money' sort of way. It's a complaint that energy corporations are passing on the cost of the recent fuel price rises onto individuals, rather than absorbing the cost themselves. A substantial proportion of these individuals are going to feel the effect of the price rises more severely than others. Viewed in isolation you might think - oh well, they'll cope - but if you look at the fact that in the UK, income is more polarised between rich and poor than any time since the 60s this is worrying.Thinking about actually exisiting fuel poverty is not whinging or being negative or pessemistic.
The article is not against festivals or having a good time. It is against the fact that energy corporations are profiting from poverty, and that they are making pathetic and tokenistic moves towards renewable energies, whilst milking this effort for all its worth by associating themselves with other peoples good work like the harbourside festival. It is fantastic and cheap marketing for them.
To criticise this doesn't mean that you can't also be involved in positive stuff like transition, sustainable alternatives. Its just to acknowledge that their are some pretty entrenched and fundamental forces at work here, and that wishing they weren't there doesn't mean they will go away.
For what its worth the Centre for Alternative Technology has designed a pretty good plan for renewable alternatives called 'Zero Carbon Britain'. But the problem is that an economic system based around private profit cannot make the transition as renewable energy will never make profit like hydrocarbons.
Festyluvver: its precisely because of understanding what life is like for everyday workers, that the impact of the fuel price rises being passed on to them rather than the profit rate of corporations is happening, that this material was produced.
stuffit
ps here is an article with the hows, whys and whens of energy privatisation and the effect this has had on the Uks ability to make an energy transition, the profits and deaths involved and the cost to individuals:
http://www.variant.randomstate.org/28texts/poverty28.html
Cold Death by Neoliberalism:
The Political Economy of Fuel Poverty
Variant Magazine
Good to see voices that are questioning the mainstream -t he rest of the Bristol's media is cosying up to EDF and giving them great press, so this is a breath of fresh air!