Emily Eavis in rehab shock

Regular listeners to this blog might of realised that it has disappeared, reappeared, been disconnected, edited and hacked about over the last few months. I've not been able to talk about what has been going on for fear of screwing up all manner of sensitive things.

We have been having an interesting time with our licence. All festivals need to be licenced by their local authority and without a licence you can't have a festival over 500 people. We have on the whole been lucky that our licence application has been supported by the majority of our neighbours with one exception, the caravan park which is adjacent to Baldersby park. I used to love the idea of living in a static caravan dead cheap, getting it well toasty inside, saving up money to buy a loony Subaru and nice guitar. I'm slightly put off now. The couple who run it do not want a music festival anywhere near them. We can understand why anyone might hold this view. I went to see them before we put in the application and I was not surprised that they opposed the licence.

It was an interesting chat, during which I was told that youngsters can damage their ears through listening to loud music and that we should bring back national service. I think we should bring it back for oldies as they seem by far the keenest. So yes, it was always going to be tricky.

The licence application has to go out to lots of different bodies, the police, environmental health and many many more. None of these had any objections (or representations as they are called) except environment health who were concerned about noise levels. We have had to have an independent noise control report commissioned which satisfied the enviromental officier that we could meet the required noise guidelines.

So we went off to Harrogate council chambers for our licence hearing at the end of January. Us vs the caravan site plus our local councilor who the caravan site had asked to represent them. Walking in there we had the feeling that we were going to get stitched up. We had however spent some money on a licencing solicitor who whilst not being by our side that day had prepped our case for us. Three councilors, one from each party had to make the decision, they were advised by a council solicitor so they couldn't to make up the law, WILLY NILLY, as they went along.

I suppose we are now used to the fact that if you stick your head above the parapet you'll get shot down. In our heads we have always thought we were doing something good. But we left this hearing feeling that nobody liked us much - especially the Tory councillor after I quoted Harrogate Councils's own licencing policy back at him. No one likes a smart arse. 

We got our licence at this hearing subject to appeal, but only after having the contents of this blog used against us for which I felt pretty foolish and a little angry.

One of the caravan park residents had come along to support the case of the site owners. He said that the festival would be 'toxic' for the caravan site. Up to this point the only thing that is toxic is the overflow from the site's septic tanks which seep into the park's drainage after a heavy bank holiday weekend of toilet flushing. I wish I'd said this at the time, but don't honestly think it would of helped our case. He also said that the noise from the event would be 'intolerable'.

Being allowed to 'cross examine' this fella I asked him what evidence he had that the noise would be intolerable. (A piece of case law, Thwaites brewery vs Wirrell council, basically states that there has to be evidence that an event - in our case - will be too loud, too dangerous, too whatever.) He said that his son was 'a senior sound engineer' and that HE said it would be 'intolerable'. I used to be a sound engineer and I could tolerate just about anything. I never met a 'senior' one, it's not that sort of profession. I suppose it's the sort of job description that might comfort a disappointed Dad [meow]. In the end he didn't have any evidence he even had a son at all (although I'm sure he does.) I wouldn't of mentioned this here if this guy hadn't been so up himself.

So, blogs can get you into trouble so this one will remain detached from our main festival site.

We are certainly starting to feel the pressure. We have 3 kids and 2 businesses to run as well as doing the festival. I worry about the wheels coming off. The kids have started to realise that all we talk about is the festival, and whilst trying our best to not neglect them we are concious that they are not getting as much time as we could give them. We have various views on this which make us feel better about it but we're not sure they hold water.

I have just finished Harry Potter 6 and must say that I am drawing some comfort from Harry's struggle, he'll have to up his game for book 7 though after that pitiful display against Snape.  But we are selling tickets, and 50% of these sales are bringing their kids with them. I'm really cuffed about this. I'm sure this is a really high figure and means that our marketing messages are getting through. Our plans for the kids stuff are now way further forward than the art and confirmed bands. The bands are making us a little jittery. It seems to me like a big game of musical chairs, with bands being the people and the festivals being the chairs. We are hoping to pick up some bands from Latitude which is on the same weekend as us. We have offers in for various bands we love but until other festivals (bigger ones) had decided we are not able to do much. I seems to be just the way it works.

On the Tuesday night football front I've fallen foul to a weird groin strain which won't go away. Hoping it gets better for Barcelona match.