Welcome to the Women and Equalities Committee. Today we are holding an oral evidence session on the experiences of women in live comedy. Before I introduce the witnesses, I want to welcome Caroline Dinenage, the DCMS Committee Chair, back to Women and Equalities. We will hear from Ola Labib, comedian and writer, who is joining us virtually, Nina Gilligan, comedian and co-founder of Get Off Live Comedy, and Rachael Healy, journalist at The Guardian and The Observer. Welcome to you all. Obviously we will be talking about some really difficult content during this evidence session and some of it may be distressing and difficult to hear. I want to stress some caution for people who may be watching online and anybody in the room, including Committee members: if you feel that you need to step out, just do so and come back when you are ready. Thank you all for coming and welcome to our Committee.

Thank you to all three of you for being here today. I am going to apologise now because I have to leave at five minutes to 3, which I am gutted about because I am really interested in this topic. I will watch it later just to hear the rest of your answers. Ola, could you tell us what the current gender balance is among performers on the live comedy circuit, and do you think this has been improving?

I know a lot of work is being done to improve it but there are definitely still imbalances. There is a big difference between women in general and POC women on the circuit. A lot of the time you get promoters who, if they feel it is men-heavy, will literally say, “Oh, we need someone to step in and they have to be female.” They are working on it, but there are still a lot of improvements that need to be made.

What about women from ethnic and religious minorities? How well do you think they are represented across the circuit?

I do not think they are represented very well in that POC women are pocketed in groups. For example, there are a lot more Muslim women comedians coming out. It is usually, “Oh, we already have one Muslim woman; we don’t want any more in the line-up,” with the assumption that we all have similar material, backgrounds and jokes. There is always the issue that women, especially POC women, are all lumped into one category and you can only have one at a time.

What do you think is driving this lack of representation?

To be honest I do not know. I think it is a lack of awareness of diversity within different cultures. For example, there are no two Nigerian women who are the same; there are no two East African women who are the same. A lot of the time I am asked to do Asian line-ups, and I am Sudanese. They do not really care; as long as you fit that box, they put you in. How do I say this politely?

You do not have to be polite in this Committee.

I put it down to slight ignorance.

Nina, do you have any views on what drives the lack of representation?

Yes, there are a few things going on. There are some structural things that perhaps make it more difficult. There are perceptions of women in comedy that are not necessarily true or backed up by evidence, such as that women are not as funny. There are no statistics to prove that. In fact, one study found that audiences generally enjoy a mixed bill. There are environmental reasons. There are reasons around the actual environments that women are going to be working in that can be late at night, long distances away, and difficult to get to. Very early on in your career, you are expected to do things such as car share because you are not paid. There are a lot of factors. Motherhood would be another factor, things like that. If you need to take a career break or whatever it is there is no strong line of progression within the comedy industry where you can exit and then re-enter at a certain point. Some women either start and stop or they start much later. There is a myriad of reasons really.

I totally disagree with the perception that women are not funny because my favourite comedians are women, so there we go. As a comedy club founder and owner, to what extent are comedy clubs, bookers and promoters responsible for the lack of representation, or does it reflect audience preference?

I am not a comedy booker or venue owner. I come from an organisation called Get Off that was set up in response to sexual harassment in the industry. If you could just ask the question again, I think I can answer on their behalf.

Are comedy club owners, bookers and promoters responsible for the lack of representation, or to what extent are they? Or is it all down to audience preference?

It is a highly fragmented industry. When you say comedy bookers and promoters, you have people with brick-and-mortar clubs and then you have Johnny who sets up one night once a year in a pub. There is no consistency across the board. In general, the bigger comedy clubs that you will have heard of—The Glee, Frog and Bucket, The Comedy Store—will have more structural things in place and they are more conscientious about diversity in their bills. But from listening to what Ola had to say, that can sometimes be tokenism rather than backed up by anything structural underneath to make sure that people are protected and comfortable in those environments.

This links to the perception point about women being funny. Chortle has done an analysis of the gender representation and Comedy Carnival came out the worst at 87% men and 13% women, whereas Komedia Brighton had a 60:40 split, and there is quite a lot in between. Hot Water—the second worst in terms of gender equality with 86% men and 14% women—actually said, in response to criticism about diversity, that there were insufficient women who were good enough to be booked without compromising the “overall quality of the show”.

I have that written down because it is a perception. I have heard anecdotally in green rooms and from promoters that they feel there are no women of a high enough quality to headline, which are the spots that pay the most money.

There are quite a lot of mediocre men who get slots.

Always, yes. Ola Labib: I used to gig at Hot Water quite a bit when I lived in the north-west, and this is not blowing smoke up my own bum, but out of the people who started, I would say that career-wise I escalated out of all of them. But it is that calibre. If you watch the Hot Water podcast it is that same kind of narrative of lads, lads, lads talking. Some are misogynistic and it is that whole thing about talking about your knob and talking about this and that. That is the kind of thing they like booking. I used to gig there quite regularly; I never headlined by the way. They would always only put me on the middle spot. They would always ask me to come back and they would only put me on the middle spot. I have had this conversation with them: “Why don’t you let me headline? Why don’t you let me open? I’m doing TV stuff now.” Their excuse is that the kind of audiences who come to these clubs come for certain comedians and the certain comedians they tend to go for are males who are quite gobby and more laddy. I have had people come up after the show and say, “I really enjoyed your set.” If you did not enjoy my set, why would you ask me to come back? But that is the kind of mentality that they have: because the audience is predominantly men they want to see a man perform. Would you agree with that, Nina?

Yes, to an extent. I feel as if I am slightly betraying them because I won Liverpool Hot Water Comedian of the Year many years back. At that point there was no access issue. Anybody could enter the competition and it was based on Hot Water and the audience voting. I think Hot Water tried an initiative where they had a women-only night.

I have never heard of a women-only night but maybe I was not there for it.

They did; they did a women-only night. I might be wrong and I might need to send you a note on this. I do not know whether it is still up and running but I understand they tried an initiative along those lines.

I do not want you to feel that you get up and walk away from here and kick yourself thinking, “Oh, I should have said this,” or “I wanted to add this bit of information.” You can always send an email afterwards and it will be included in written evidence.

Nina, there is a perception that women are not funny and audiences enjoy male comedians more. Briefly, what impact does that have on female comedians or even aspiring female comedians?

It has a few effects. There is the effect of feeling you have less time to prove yourself on stage. Where a man might get a bigger length of time when you believe he is going to be funny, a woman has the pressure of having to be funny immediately. It is difficult to say. Whether we like it or not that belief exists in the world. Any woman who has done any kind of online content will have had those sorts of comments from the general public, but it is not necessarily the public who are going to sit in front of live comedy. Once the audience is in there, it becomes more of a level playing field, but they exist.

Ola, would you say it is pushing women away from wanting to get into the comedy field?

Yes and no.

Go on, Nina. Nina Gilligan: Sorry, Ola.

No, go for it, Nina. Go on. I want to know what you have to say.

I think yes and no. Things have improved over time. We definitely have, “If you can see it, you can be it.” You definitely have more women represented in media and maybe at TV and radio level where conscious efforts are made on equality and diversity. The BBC did the 50:50 project and it thinks about that while it is programming, but it might not necessarily be reflected on the live circuit itself.

Ola, do you have anything to add to that?

Sorry, what was the question again?

Is it pushing women out of wanting to get into comedy?

I do not think it pushes them out. They know they have to work a lot harder to make it; it puts on a lot of pressure. Nina hit the nail on the head when she said that if a guy bombs—not just at open mic but circuit gigs—he will eventually be asked to come back. If a woman bombs she is probably not coming back again. There is that kind of mentality in the live circuit, but I do not think it puts women off because we are really lucky that there are women-only comedy clubs and comedy clubs that book predominantly women. There are opportunities out there but unfortunately it is only in specific places rather than the general circuit.

Rachael, what steps are being taken to encourage more women to get into the live comedy sector?

Ola mentioned it a little there, but there are more gigs now, often set up by women and non-binary people, for a greater range of people to participate and create an environment where they might feel more supported and there is guaranteed work. There are certain gigs, promoters and producers who do a better job of welcoming people in. As Nina said, probably in TV and radio we might have seen some more conscious, not legislated but official efforts to have a bit more gender balance. Over time we have seen that offer people opportunities, allow them to develop, and just broaden out the range of talent, which is a positive kind of circle. From talking to people on the live circuit things have improved from 20 years ago but the issues have not completely disappeared.

Just to add to that, one of the things I did not mention was that a lot of booking is very informal. If you have a heavily male-skewed environment those men will inevitably become friends, get into WhatsApp groups or whatever it is and they then tend to start booking each other. That can be a barrier that is maybe something we have not mentioned.

Ola, how do you think we can improve representation of women and other ethnic minorities within the live comedy circuit?

To be honest I actually do not know the answer to that because it comes down to the bookers. Nina, do you remember when those stats came up about all those comedy gigs and the percentages of women they book as opposed to men?

Yes, I think it was Chortle.

It was Chortle. A lot of people were sharing it but then there were a lot of comments saying, “Well, why does it matter? As long as they’re funny, they’re funny. The bookers are booking funny people; it does not matter if they are men or women.” It comes down to the bookers but you cannot really put a gun to their head and say, “Oh, you have to book women.” They would have to want to. The question is how to get promoters to want to book more women in comedy and to be honest I genuinely do not know the answer to that.

How does somebody become a booker?

That is a great question.

Anyone can do it.

Anyone can do it. You could go home tonight and set yourself up. There is no vetting, no procedure, nothing that you have to go through to prove that you are responsible or even able to do it. You can just set yourself up and with that comes quite a lot of power, especially early on in the industry for the open spots.

Are the majority of bookers men?

It depends on the night. I do an East African night so I book people for that. I rent Top Secret Comedy Club; it gives us a segment and I am technically a booker where I then get people on. Literally anyone can do it. Does that mean we should have more female comedy bookers?

It is always great if we have women in higher places; that always improves women’s representation. There are some notable, really good female comedy bookers and there are some initiatives that do the women-only kind of stuff. However, we probably need more women in higher positions of power within the live circuit. I think this is a thing: we also need to talk about when women put on a night or try to put on a night. They often cannot command the same budgets, which is interesting.

That is something we heard in our female entrepreneur inquiries regardless of sector.

That leads nicely to my questions. In the interests of time I am going to ask each question to one person, but if any of you want to add to it please just indicate. Ola, digging into the gender pay gap a little, do you think there is a gender pay gap in the live comedy sector?

It is interesting that you do not know if there is or is not until someone airs it on social media. Recently there was a comedian who came out. She was sat in a green room and she was headlining a show. She was talking to one of the comedians who was middling and found that the middling comedian with less experience than her was getting paid more than her. She had to put that on social media before the promoter came out and said, “Oh, you know what, I apologise. I will send you more money,” or whatever. I do not know if it is just a comedy cultural thing but from my experience comedians do not talk about how much they get paid. Unless people talk about set payments it is harder to know if there is a gender pay gap. Before you knew it; it was obvious there was going be a gender pay gap between men and women. I feel they are a lot more secretive now and I think it is to make it harder for us to investigate and discover whether there is a gender pay gap.

Women are not represented as much in headline spots, where most of the money is, because then you have the opportunity to what they call double. You can start at one gig and finish at another so you can make two payments on one night. Even where there is transparency of fees—some clubs have that—if you are not in that higher-paid spot just structurally it means there is a gender pay gap.

Interesting, thank you. Nina, have you seen any other wage gaps around ethnicity, disability or anything like that?

Ola absolutely nailed it. I have not heard that spoken about. I have heard things anecdotally where people say they have been paid less for the same job. It is going to be compounded if you have a disability or you are a performer of colour. All those kinds of things are going to add up to mean that you are perhaps not in those higher-paid slots.

So, it is likely there.

Yes, it is likely.

Given this culture of secrecy, how can we start to address this?

The good practice is to have fee transparency. A lot of clubs will do that but when you are advertising for a job in a normal workplace you tell everybody what the pay is going to be, right?

Yes. How could that be encouraged and brought in?

We have to be careful because a lot of these venues are not clubs; they are just one night or whatever and they do not want any more administration than they already have. I do not know if it is to do with codes of conduct, having clear expectations, and things being written down but many bookers are not widely aware that we are actually workers. That is a real fundamental issue. Maybe it is because it is a hobbyist kind of thing or a little job they do on the side to top up their income. Even though they are freelance they do not realise that once that person is within your club or your night they have the same equalities and responsibilities that exist elsewhere in the workplace. There are a lot of good faith people who are responsible and want to do that but there are others who do not know or willingly do not know.

Potentially, does a national body or something like that need to be set up?

We have some national bodies. There is the Live Comedy Association and other adjacent associations. They have an informal code of conduct but how do you make sure that that is taken up?

Interesting, thank you. Rachael, do you think the comedy sector is accessible to people from working-class backgrounds?

Theoretically, it should be one of the easier areas of the creative industries to access because you can go to an open mic night; you just need yourself and some time to write. In reality, we see there is still quite a big class divide because it often comes down to who has the time to do gigs where they are unpaid or to spend time writing. We find that people who have to do this on the side of a full-time job obviously cannot always progress as quickly because they have to spend time earning money. That immediately sets people up differently. We also have things such as the Edinburgh Fringe, which costs a lot of money to attend. People sometimes describe it as a pay-to-play model because a lot of people break even or lose money. Often people who maybe have parents or some other independent source of income who can send them to the festival to showcase themselves to the industry might find their career is accelerated from that point but some people simply cannot afford to do that.

That is interesting, thank you. Are there any other barriers or difficulties that different groups might find that we have not covered in this section?

It might be worth mentioning regional inequalities as well.

Yes, we are coming on to that in a bit. Rachael Healy: Although there are really strong scenes in pretty much every region of the country I hear time and again from people that they feel the pressure to move to London or they constantly have to come to London for meetings to get opportunities that they think would progress their career. It depends on what you want to get out of your career but that is a pressure people face.

Thank you so much for joining us; it is great to see you all. As my declaration of interest, I should say that I am a political patron of CRAFT and I am the Chair of the Culture, Media and Sport Committee. We did a bit of work on live comedy around May last year. Some of the evidence we heard talked a lot about the financial risks in live comedy. Nina, I know you have performed at Edinburgh. Someone told us that you could potentially have a sell-out show at the Fringe and still make a loss. To what extent are those kinds of pressures particularly acute, or not, for women?

It is difficult to say because I do not know whether they are particularly acute. If you have other responsibilities it is a precarious profession. If you are a mother or you have other caring responsibilities it is going to make it much more difficult to justify putting that money to one side to attend something such as Edinburgh.

I think that is probably right.

There are some circumstances where the lack of pay can create safety issues for women as well. We are talking about night-time work a lot of the time. Often when you take a gig you are not given money to get a cab home or to pay for accommodation that you might need if you are travelling around the country for gigs. That can lead to quite dangerous situations for people, which have led to really unpleasant outcomes.

That is interesting. Rachael, we have been banging on in my Committee about having a freelance champion. We first raised it well over a year ago when we did a report into film and high-end TV. We then reiterated it when we did our work on live comedy. Do you think it would make any difference to have someone like that in the Government’s ear? Would that make any difference to women in live comedy?

I think so. That is something that has come up in a lot of my conversations with comics and people who work in the more behind-the-scenes roles such as stage and venue managers, producers and promoters who are women. They talk about the fact that—as Nina was saying—you are often not treated as though you have any employment rights and people do not necessarily know what they can pursue in terms of their employment rights. There is a feeling that you are only seen or vaguely looked after once you are in the building. What happens before, getting home, and things such as this are not considered. Being clear about the employment rights of freelancers and how they can be enforced without people always having to individually advocate and fear they will put opportunities at risk for themselves would be helpful.

Maybe by taking on some of the battles that Ola mentioned around the transparency of pay and the gender pay gap.

Yes.

The Live Comedy Association recommended that Arts Council England considers reviewing its definition of the sector as a commercialised art form so that it can fund underrepresented performers in the industry and support them. How do you feel about that? Is that something you would welcome and do you think it would be welcome?

Being recognised as a sector would really help us have the opportunity to go for things such as Arts Council funding.

Yes, I guess it would help; I genuinely do not know.

That is okay.

I swear there has been a mention of that happening before anyway but literally the only way to find out is to initiate it I guess.

Nina, I will come to you first on this one because of your regional accent. To what extent does where you grow up or where you live affect your chances of working in the comedy sector?

From a working-class perspective it completely affects it. As Rachael touched upon, it is one of the only art forms that is not professionalised, which in some ways means that you should be able to do it from any background. However, it does not come without risks and costs. I do not want to blame the middle classes but maybe they are more at ease and have more cultural capital than a young working-class person who may not feel as comfortable with networking in those kinds of circles or understand the networking that goes alongside it. However, I still believe that we have to protect it as a real, accessible working-class art form—linking to what we said about making it an independent sector—to show that it is actually a craft and an art form and not art’s rubbish brother that is only for working-class kids who can get up and tell a joke, if that makes sense.

Yes, it makes sense. Rachael, you might want to come in here. It is much more anonymised if you are in a big city such as London to perform in a comedy gig. The people you were at school with and grew up with, the people who your parents know, and their parents are not going to be there. Do you think that is harder in a rural area or small town?

Yes, if there are less comedy gigs going on it will undoubtedly be more difficult to access.

That is a good point. I had not thought about that as a particular issue but I can see that it might put some people off. I have even heard people say when they are creating comedy online for social media, “Oh, people I know are going to watch this and I’m just going to have to be okay with that.” Maybe that is just a hurdle that people get over starting comedy in general anyway.

Ola, is the growth of comedy clubs and festivals across the UK challenging the dominance of London and the south in the comedy sector? If not, why not?

I think it is. I am only trying to speak posh because I know I am speaking in Parliament today but I am from Portsmouth; I am a Pompey represent. Are you from Portsmouth?

Yes.

Just out of curiosity, where in Portsmouth are you from?

I was born in St Mary’s hospital.

Oh, so was I.

My constituency is Gosport, which is just across the harbour.

Oh, yes, I know Gosport.

Do not do that face.

Mate, I was born in Paulsgrove; there is literally nothing that compares to that. I come from a working-class family and I want to touch on what Nina had to say. I am seven years into comedy. Thankfully I am progressing quite well, but even now I still have to work my job part-time to fund me doing comedy. It is that whole thing about it being very London-centric and having to travel into London. One of the most difficult conversations with promoters is if a comedy show finishes at say 10 pm or 10.30 pm. You ask them, “If the pay is all the same, can I go on first because I have to travel two hours back to Portsmouth?” It is going to be late and if I do not have the car for whatever reason I will have to take public transport. Particularly for women, even from a safety perspective, it is so difficult that most of the gigs are not in smaller places. There are literally one or two gigs in Portsmouth that are regular. They are very men-heavy; they rarely book women. As we are outside London we are under pressure to keep travelling to London. If you are a London-based comic, unless you hypothetically get paid 100 quid for a gig you are probably paying just the underground charge. However, someone who lives in Portsmouth now has to pay about 50 quid for a return ticket. By the time I go to London, pay my train, pay the underground and grab something to eat I am literally making no money off that gig. It is a lot more difficult. Again, I would not know what the solution for that is. A lot of people are saying, “Why don’t you just move to London?” but it is not easy if you have responsibilities where you are. I do not want to live in London. I feel a lot of comics end up trying to live in London to pursue their comedy career. Q27 Rosie Duffield: I heavily relate to everything you all said because before I got to Parliament I wrote comedy, or tried to. I was a single mum on benefits; my kids were young. All these things where you have to basically pay to do your job just to get recognised: go out in the evenings, beg your parents to babysit, and network at all kinds of events. Before I got here in 2017 I was working mostly with men. I just really hope things have changed. You guys are changing it. I really wanted to come on to the childcare and caring responsibilities aspect. These questions were set for Lucy Beaumont, who could not be with us today. Even if you do not have these direct experiences, you probably know a lot of women who have. How do you think that pregnancy, childcare, and other caring responsibilities affect your chances of attending events like you were saying? Ola Labib: It is a massive fear for women. This is something I am really hot on because I know a lot of female comedians who have put off having a family because they think it is going to affect their careers. It is only when they get to their late 40s that they are like, “Oh my God, I have been pursuing comedy for so long. I am not necessarily making it to a place where I can ever have kids.” They end up losing the opportunity to have kids. I am married. I have been married for six years. My comedy career kicked off just after I got married. I am going to be honest with you: the comedy circuit and the comedy world itself make it seem like having a child or having a family is going to set back your career. That is the main thing that I want to see changed in the comedy world. You are automatically perceived as a mother. You are expected to talk about motherhood in your comedy. If you have a kid less than a year old and there is no one to look after them then it is a massive hold back. I have seen comedians bring their kids to a comedy night; some will have them on stage. Aisling Bea recently took her baby to a show and she was literally holding the baby while she did the set. It is actually really sad to say it. It is upsetting to want to have a kid but also want a career, and you feel as a woman that you cannot have both. Nina Gilligan: At the other end of that, I did not start until I was 40. I waited until I was able to make sure childcare responsibilities were in place and they were a little older. It means that you are starting later and comedy sees youth as a bit of a currency. Lots of new act competitions talk about emerging, new, and fresh. As a woman, if you have waited longer then you are no longer necessarily put in that bracket. Q28 Rosie Duffield: Rachael, you review all kinds of comedy. Do you ever hear that from men you know in the business? Rachael Healy: No. Actually, maybe a couple of years ago, I wrote a feature about women who are mothers and do comedy. Similar things came up from them all. If they were at a gig they would be asked, “Oh, where is your baby?” None of the men on the line-up would ever be asked that, or there would be an assumption that the only thing they are going to joke about is their children, family, and motherhood. It is good that we have comedy on those subjects because loads of people can relate to them and want to hear it, but it is an unfair assumption. No one assumes that fathers on the bill will only talk about fatherhood. Q29 Rosie Duffield: What do any of you think could or should change to help this? Is there any policy that the Government could get involved in? We usually get a set amount of childcare, do we not? Would something more flexible for people in the arts help? Nina Gilligan: Yes. We have to acknowledge that our job takes place in unsocial hours for us but social hours for the rest of the world. It is probably the same as shift workers. Rachael Healy: As a new mum who is also a freelancer, an improvement to statutory maternity pay would be hugely welcome. As Ola said, people may be putting off having kids because they are not in a job that is going to offer them maternity leave. Having a better statutory offering would really help with that as well. Q30 Rosie Duffield: Ola, do you agree with that? Ola Labib: Yes, totally. That is another thing I had completely forgotten. It absolutely terrified me when I looked up what statutory maternity is. If you are a single mum or come from a household where your husband or partner does not make as much so you need both incomes to get by, it is really frustrating. If you are employed or on zero hours then you at least get the first six to eight weeks’ full pay, but because we are self-employed we do not even get that. It is literally statutory pay the whole way through. It is quite depressing and scary for people who are about to be mums, or who are new mums, who are in our positions as well. Q31 Rosie Duffield: Nina, do you think any of the organisations that you are involved with, such as Chortle or maybe even Equity, recognise any of this? Nina Gilligan: No, I do not think so. We have done a bit but I will have to send a note. Equity has worked alongside comedians but found it difficult and limited because it cannot really do collective bargaining as it is so fragmented. It is difficult. It has attempted a code of conduct. A high representation of comedians do not join Equity as it is seen as a union that deals with actors. Q32 Kevin McKenna: I would like to move on to some difficult stuff around abuse and harassment, particularly how common and widespread it is. What is the prevalence in the sector? Nina Gilligan: Get Off did a survey a few years ago. You may have seen it. We got 842 participants and one in six or one in seven said they had experienced or witnessed some form of sexual harassment. When we lined it up against Acas findings for other industries, it was not massively different. However, because we have nowhere to go when something goes wrong it really becomes problematic for us. Q33 Kevin McKenna: Rachael, does that align with your understanding of it? Is it just performers who are at risk? Rachael Healy: For the first part of that question—even pre pandemic—every time I interviewed a woman in comedy, issues would come up such as harassment, sexual abuse and sexism. I ended up writing about this in 2020 because things came to a head during the pandemic online and people started sharing their experiences. In preparation for this session I went to my network and asked people what the status of things is right now. Unfortunately, people have come to me with very recent incidents of serious sexual assault, sexual harassment, unsolicited sexual pictures, and all kinds of horrible things that are still ongoing. It is absolutely not just comedians who are affected. I have heard from stage managers, venue managers and producers. A lot of people who are in this grey zone of freelancer do not have the protections you might have in other industries. They often work alone and have to deal with these issues without the supportive structure of a company or regular colleagues. It is across the board. You may have been going to ask this anyway but it is coming from a lot of different areas. People are reporting issues with audience members, other comedians, and people who hold power in the industry. We are talking promoters, producers and agents. People are encountering these issues from all sides, and as Nina said, where do you go with these? That is a major stumbling block. Kevin McKenna: It sounds incredibly widespread and endemic. Rachael Healy: Unfortunately, that is what people are reporting to us. Q34 Kevin McKenna: Is there something in the nature of the work you are doing that puts extra pressure on a victim to just laugh it off as a joke? Is that used as a degree of cover and excuse? Rachael Healy: That is an issue because, as you mentioned, Nina, a lot of bookings and opportunities are coming via these informal networks of who knows who and who is recommending who. Being seen as potentially humourless is obviously not a good thing if you are looking to get booked for further comedy work. It can lead to pressure to keep quiet and not complain about things. Q35 Kevin McKenna: Does that fit with your perceptions? Nina Gilligan: Yes, absolutely. One of the reasons we set up Get Off was so that people had somewhere to go but could also talk confidentially where it would not affect their later progression. For a number of reasons you might want it kept quiet because it is extremely personal. You also may not want to go directly to the person who employed you for the night because you are worried about what the consequences of that might be. Q36 Kevin McKenna: Without naming individuals because that would be inappropriate, you have talked a little about some perpetrators being audience members, bookers, and across the board. Are there any particular factors around those that make it more likely that people are exposed to particular ones? Are there any who are more frequently the perpetrators in this situation? Nina Gilligan: Lots of people come to you personally, Rachael, do they not? We found that surprisingly a lot of it is peer-to-peer. It can be among the comedians themselves, and there is a power dynamic where it might be used as a form of coercion. Rachael Healy: A lot of people reported to me inappropriate advances, or people using what should be a professional or work setting to make sexual advances, which are completely unwelcome. Sometimes people have described retaliation when they have rejected someone’s sexual advances and then active steps were taken to curtail their career. Obviously, once you have experienced that and heard of that happening to other people it is going to make you less likely to speak up when these things happen or make you feel less safe in the workplace. Nina Gilligan: There is a terrible perception that goes around that sometimes women report for reasons that are not valid. People may put stuff on the internet that is not true. There is a persistent belief that women are not believed, and we see it in criminal justice. Rachael Healy: That has come up a lot as well: people felt that their peers have not believed them. Someone said to me, “People cannot wrap their head around somebody who was their mate doing a bad thing.” That comes down to the informal nature of the industry and it being based on these informal friendship-type networks. A lot of people have found themselves frozen out or have decided to leave the industry after trying to raise an issue and finding that they were not believed or were met with active hostility. Nina Gilligan: There are so few places to talk about your experiences, so they sometimes end up on social networks. That is where women will go to talk about what happened to them because there is nothing else and they then find themselves in the court of public opinion as to their motives. Kevin McKenna: A secondary assault comes off of that. Nina Gilligan: Yes, it is re-victimising. Q37 Kevin McKenna: If these threats are made in this sector in particular, are those threats actually credible and effective? Can people’s careers be destroyed? Rachael Healy: Some people feel that it can be hard to prove but the timing of things is suspicious. I have had a number of women tell me that after they rejected someone’s advances that person or someone they were friends with stopped booking them for something that had been regular work, or they were dropped from a line-up. From the reports I have received, these things definitely happen. More broadly, the fear of it happening creates a de facto silencing as well. Q38 Kevin McKenna: Moving on from that slightly, to what extent are venues aware of this? What steps do they take to protect the performers, staff and customers? Nina Gilligan: It is patchy. Some venues are very aware of it. They will set out their stall and put something in place, such as a clear reporting line, or make expectations clear before and after what should happen in the event of something like that happening. They might have it in their email communications. It would be good practice, but not all do. Rachael Healy: Someone described it to me as a lottery whether you are in a venue or working with a producer who has any policy or procedure to deal with something like this. There are certain theatres and venues that have an actual policy, train their staff, and encourage reporting, but that is definitely not the case across the board. Someone made the point to me this week that often now, if you are working in TV, and that could be TV comedy, at the start of a production someone will give basic training or read out the policy on sexual harassment and abuse. Although there are still issues with reporting in that context, where the power lies with freelancers, etc, it is at least making some effort to put a structure in place and to encourage reporting whereas you would rarely, if ever, see that in the live sector. Q39 Kevin McKenna: You have already talked about travelling to and from venues late at night and the risks and anxiety about that. What measures can and should venues put in place to protect women because you are working late at night and potentially in a much more vulnerable situation inside and outside the club? Rachael Healy: As I mentioned before, the pay issue feeds into this. If you are being offered a gig that requires travel or an overnight stay it should be part of your fee or it should be given to you as part of that job rather than you potentially having to spend your full fee just to keep yourself safe. It would be helpful if venues and promoters had policies on this rather than having to rely on peer-to-peer support: someone walking you to your car and other things like that to keep you safe. A lot of clubs have policies and procedures when it comes to audience harassment, or when people have had too much to drink, or when they are heckling or following people and waiting outside the venue, whatever it is. Something more official across the board would be welcome. Chair: I have just been told that wind-ups are happening in the Chamber. They will be followed by eight votes. When the Division Bell goes, we are unfortunately going to end the session, but we have got through a large chunk of it. The remainder of the questions are going to be put to you in writing, if that is okay? Are you happy to respond in whichever way works for you, whether it is having a conversation with the Clerks or in writing? I am really sorry. The way that this has happened is really unfortunate. I am going to hand over quickly to Kim to get through as much of the reporting side of things as possible, because it is really important. Q40 Kim Leadbeater: I am sure there are people who would say that we do not need any more comedians in Parliament, but you are very welcome today. Thank you for your insights, some of which I know are very personal. I am delighted that we are doing this session, which came as a result of a conversation I had with Lu Jackson, the founder of Craic, who is heavily involved with the Comedy Representation and Artform Trust, CRAFT, which we have talked about—we actually met at a comedy gig, which was wonderful. I know it has a consultation open about misogyny. It is really good to encourage people to contribute to that, including men, because it is important that we hear everybody’s voices. I also want to pay tribute to a couple of colleagues, Simon Opher MP and Samantha Niblett MP, who have also done a lot of work in this area. None of it would be possible without your voices being at the forefront, so thank you very much for everything that you have done. We have talked a bit about reporting, and it sounds as though there is consensus that there is nowhere to go if you want to report harassment. Nina Gilligan: There is Get Off, which we set up. It is an unofficial body. Kim Leadbeater: There is no HR department. There is nowhere you can go officially. Nina Gilligan: No, but that is essentially what we tried to set up. We tried to set up an HR department that anybody can join to have access to HR should they need it. Q41 Kim Leadbeater: It is brilliant that you have done that, but presumably there are some limitations to it; there are certain things you can and cannot do. Tell us a little about that, Nina. Nina Gilligan: The limitations are resources. It is a volunteer-led organisation. What I hear from women more than anything is that they want to know where it is safe to go, and we cannot say that. We can have these individual cases but we are not able to share the results of those cases. We are bound by confidentiality, as we should be, but it makes it very difficult. People are left with having to read between the lines. We have clubs that have joined up on our website, and we have a map of those and would love the coverage to be so wide that if they are not on there it could be inferred that there is a problem. People have been slapped with a cease and desist, or told that they will get done for defamation. There are lots of things that we cannot do. Q42 Kim Leadbeater: It sounds as though there is a gap that you are trying to fill but you need more resources to do it.

Yes, 100%. Q43 Kim Leadbeater: Partly because of that, do you think people working in the comedy sector feel they can report incidents of sexual abuse and harassment? Nina Gilligan: No. They may feel a bit better that there is somewhere like us to go to but that will be an individual choice because they know that we have limitations. They know we are not a silver bullet to the situation and that we cannot necessarily fix it but they at least know there is somewhere to go and talk to somebody confidentially. Q44 Kim Leadbeater: When someone does that, in your experience how have they been treated? Nina Gilligan: In my experience well but I would say that because I am part of Get Off, aren’t I? Q45 Kim Leadbeater: They have been treated well by you but what about by the sector or industry? Nina Gilligan: If it is a club that has signed up to us and is completely in the spirit of it, it would react very positively. It would try to work with us to reach some mutual resolution. It would be very difficult to approach clubs that we have had a report of sexual harassment in but are not joined up to us. It is hard, but we do try. Rachael Healy: There is a real mixed bag from the people I have spoken to. Some say that venues or producers will believe them or investigate and deal with things in a way that makes people feel safe. Other people have said that they might have reported someone or raised concerns about someone and those concerns are then fed straight back to the alleged perpetrator, or they will let a promoter know but will see the same comedian they made allegations against booked again by the same promoter the next week, which obviously does not instil confidence. It is such a mixed bag and leads to this culture of open secrets, a term we have all heard quite a lot now, which is people stepping in to try to protect one another. Nina Gilligan: Whisper networks. Rachael Healy: Yes, whisper networks. People have WhatsApp groups or more informal friendship groups where they will share this information. It is limited because not everyone is going to receive that information; not everyone can protect themselves in that way. As Nina said, it opens you up to legal issues, especially if some clubs or promoters have an informal blacklist of people who they have been told things about and will not book. Even having a document like that can open them up to legal issues. Kim Leadbeater: What was that expression you used, whisper networks?

Yes. Q46 Kim Leadbeater: Can you tell me what it means? Nina Gilligan: I do not know where the whisper network came from exactly but it is the idea that we can keep each other safe if you are in a particular network by sharing this information among ourselves. It falls down if you are a new comedian coming in and do not have access to those networks. Rachael Healy: That is a key point. People who are entering the industry are probably the most vulnerable and less likely to have access to even this really informal network of potentially protective information. Q47 Kim Leadbeater: Ola, do you want to add anything to that? In the context of the MeToo movement, of which we all had high hopes, did you see any changes as a result of that in your industry and sector? Ola Labib: When I was doing open mic, it was around the time there were massive talks about creepy comedians. People were plastering over social media that nothing had been done about it and promoters were still booking. A lot of women were going to social media and literally doxing these people. They were saying, “This person did this. This person did this.” Those women who were too scared to say it about themselves would go to other comedians or other people and tell them, “This person did X, Y, and Z. You post about it,” even though a comedy club would still book that person. For example, if someone did something to me and I went to a comedy club about it, it might raise the concern and speak to that person and still book them. It sounds terrible but the only way some people find that action is taken is by putting it on social media. You then have masses of people putting pressure on that club. It is so unfortunate that it has to come to that; it has to come to a point where you have to seek help from a mass of people on social media rather than them action it themselves. From personal experience and people I know, concerns have been raised. There is always a fear that it is going to affect your career and that you are one of “those”, which is so jarring. You are labelled as someone who complains, even though it is something so serious. It is not just a complaint. You did not get the wrong flavour of crisp at a pub. Someone sexually abused you or was sexually inappropriate with you. Unfortunately, the way I have seen it being handled is you go to a promoter, or you go to your agent—if you are lucky enough to have an agent—and they will ask you, “Do you want to raise a concern? Do you want to go to the police? Do you want to do that?” If for whatever reason, and you have your own reasons, you say, “I do not want to go to the police,” because it is a big deal to go through with something like that, then their approach is, “If you are ever on a line-up with that person, let us know and we can take you off, or we can speak to the promoter and they can then choose if they want to keep that person and you want to go on there.” It is not an automatic, “Okay, we will make sure the promoter does not put that person on there.” It is: “We will speak to the promoter and maybe you will not be on that line-up.” You are losing pay and an opportunity because that person is on a line-up. I have only been doing this for seven to eight years now and when it comes to stuff like this, if it is not outed publicly, I personally have not seen a solution to it at all. Q48 Kim Leadbeater: Nina, you were nodding along. It feels as though there is a very different course of action for the victim versus the person who has been accused of doing these things. Nina Gilligan: Absolutely. I just want to add that one of the problems is within the legislation. You only have three months less one day to bring a complaint of sexual harassment, which is not long enough. I was sexually harassed, which is one of the reasons Kiri and I set this up. It took me a year to tell my husband and it took me a further two years to tell anybody else. I do not think three months less one day is long enough for us to get women to confidently come forward, against all the odds that Ola has quite rightly mentioned, and present their evidence and be in a situation where they feel they can do that. Kim Leadbeater: I am very sorry you had to go through that.

Not at all. Chair: The Minister is going on quite a bit so we have some extra time. Q49 Caroline Dinenage: I am going to ask my shortest question first. Would you like to see greater support for comedy by the Government and the Arts Council? If so, what would that support look like and what would its priorities be? Nina Gilligan: It would be helpful, but we have to be super aware that, if we are going to make money and gather funding through us becoming a defined live sector, we need to know how that money is going to be prioritised and who it is going to go to. It is about making sure those things are in place. My priority would be safety. Rachael Healy: As I have mentioned a few times, some issues stem from the informality and lack of professionalism in a work context for people who work in comedy. Recognising it as an industry and introducing some measures that add that element of professionalism would actually help with people’s safety. Ola Labib: Safety would be a priority. If it is a professional body, I go back to maternity and stuff like that. As a self-employed woman in this industry, I can honestly say that for someone who wants to start a family, it is something you dread. We need something in place to protect us, and to make us feel that this is a career from which we can go off on maternity and come back, and that we are safe to have this career regardless of our personal life choices. Q50 Caroline Dinenage: Already a number of either existing or emerging national bodies are being set up to support comedy and the creative industries more widely, such as the Live Comedy Association, CRAFT, which I have already mentioned, and CIISA, the Creative Industries Independent Standards Authority. How much confidence, Ola, do you have that these bodies will improve the situation for women in comedy and more broadly? It is quite a fragmented sector; how much understanding and awareness is there among women in the comedy sector that they actually exist and what they do? Ola Labib: I genuinely did not know that they existed, by the way. This is the first I am hearing about it. It is only because I am a pharmacist that I am saying this: I feel that professional bodies only start taking you seriously if you are paying an annual fee. If it is a support system that is available to you for free, I do not know. I have a feeling that the only way this is going to be official is if all the comedians start having to pay an annual fee so that they can be financially supported. If the council are willing to give us a bit of moolah for free and create this platform then it can really go forward. Rachael Healy: It is good to see these bodies being formed, and things such as CIISA and Get Off—potentially places where people can go with their complaints and see some investigational outcome or consequence. It remains to be seen practically how that will work in such a fragmented industry. As Ola said, funding for these bodies is a real issue. I hear time and again from people in comedy that they feel they cannot afford union fees, for example. There is a real lack of union membership, which potentially could improve these issues. Finding a way to bridge that gap would be crucial. Q51 Caroline Dinenage: To what extent do you think people have heard of CIISA and understand what it does? Rachael Healy: That is a good question. Ola had not heard of it. Ola Labib: No, I had never heard of it. Rachael Healy: I have heard of it because I have written about it. Nina Gilligan: It has consulted with us. Rachael Healy: Raising awareness is another point. Q52 Christine Jardine: We will get through this as quickly as we can. I may not ask questions in the right order, but we have talked about the steps you could take. To sum everything up, is there a specific thing above all else that you think would be important for us to take away, since we might get stopped any second? Nina Gilligan: You touched on freelance champions. We need to make sure that all the promoters entering this industry, at whatever level they are entering it, are aware of their legislative responsibilities. Q53 Christine Jardine: Rachael, is there anything more that you think we should take away? Rachael Healy: It is tough to name one thing but recognising women in comedy, all comedians, and all people who work in comedy as workers and empowering them to exercise their employment rights would improve some things. Ola Labib: I agree with what Rachael just said. Q54 Christine Jardine: When we did the inquiry into misogyny in music, we heard that non-disclosure agreements are used to silence victims of harassment and abuse. Have you heard of them being used in the comedy sector? Nina Gilligan: I hear of them more in TV. Rachael Healy: Yes, especially because a lot of the issues are at the entry point to the industry: open mic nights and things. I have heard fewer instances of NDAs being used in live comedy but I would say that there is probably more a case of individuals with the resources to make threats or try to enforce NDAs. As Nina has said, there is less of an issue in live comedy than in TV. Nina Gilligan: They use cease and desist. Rachael Healy: As I said before, it is more of a de facto silencing where people feel that there are going to be consequences if they speak up but there is nothing on paper. Christine Jardine: Ola, would you like to add anything to that? Ola Labib: I have signed loads of NDAs but I am going to be completely honest with you: I have never read any of them. Q55 Christine Jardine: Have you complied with any of them? Nina Gilligan: You are probably breaking one now, Ola. Ola Labib: Probably, to be honest. Nina Gilligan: I do not think so. Christine Jardine: I will not say another word; I might get into trouble. I will leave it there. Chair: We are about to go to votes now, but I want to say a massive thank you to the three of you for sharing your experiences, knowledge, and commitment to making this better. Thank you very much. We need to be shouting about Get Off so that more women comedians know about it, and we will. I also want to say a massive thank you because it was really difficult to get women to come forward and talk about this even though they knew the importance of this inquiry. I hope your courage and bravery is rewarded. Thank you very much. That brings this session to a close.