Exclusive:'We're just not seeing any of it' warns Fringe boss over visitor levy cash amid warning on Leith shows

Fringe Society chief executive Tony Lankester called for the council to take faster action over any benefits to be passed down to the Fringe from the visitor levy which came into force this month, putting a five per cent tax on overnight accommodation, saying he was expecting the tax to impact the festival.

“We’re no further forward,” he said. “It’s frustrating that we don’t have a clear road map. We’re in the frustrating position where we see about £6 million go into the pot as a result of Fringe activity and what we don’t have at the moment is a clear line of sight as to how much of that is going to come back in some form to the wider Fringe.”

He said the Fringe Society, as well as other stakeholders, had put forward ideas to the council as to how visitor levy money could be used by the festival, but that the ideas had not yet been considered.

“We’re just not seeing any of it and that’s the frustrating part,” he said. “We’ve tabled many ideas to the council to suggest to them what would be useful.”

A paper submitted by the Fringe Society after a consultation last year called for £1.7m to support venue infrastructure, which would in turn be passed on to artists, as well as grants to support the creation of new work.

“The proposal is still live, it exists,” he said. “What we have heard back from the council is, ‘we haven’t got to that yet’.”

Edinburgh City Council’s culture and communities committee is next due to meet on 13 August.

“It will be hard for them to ignore the Fringe, given that it will be happening all around them at the time of the meeting,” Mr Lankester said.

He pointed to calls by Gilded Balloon directors Karen and Katy Koren for Fringe artists to be given an exemption from the tax, saying he understood the idea, but believed that would be difficult to administer.

“But I think it would be a non-conversation if there was genuine value coming back to the Fringe as a result of the artists’ investment,” he said.

“There will be an impact from the tax, we will feel it.”

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He also warned the organisation was bracing itself for a major drop in audiences for Fringe shows held in Leith due to the cancellation of all tram services for another three weeks following a blaze in the former Debenhams store on Princes Street.

Although trams are running between the airport and the West End, the route between the city centre and Newhaven, through Leith, has been entirely suspended.

Many free fringe shows are held in Leith, as well as a professional theatre production of author Andrew O'Hagan's Mayflies and work at community arts centre Citadel.

“We don’t know yet what the impact of the congestion on George Street is going to be with the buses, we don’t know what the absence of trams is going to do,” Mr Lankester said. “All we can do is give advice to audiences and artists and suggest to them to plan more ahead.

“My concerns about it are on the impact on venues in Leith, which are predominantly free fringe venues, but there are other projects up there too. That is where the pain is going to be felt.”

He said performers due to be based in Leith had already contacted the Fringe Society for support.

“They have flagged that they are concerned and they are worried about it,” he said. “But we are also worried about it. The truth is, we don’t know what’s going to happen, we don’t know how audiences are going to respond.”

He said his box office team were preparing to be contacted by audience members who have missed shows due to the travel chaos.

“There may be some customer service incidents that we will just have to manage on a case by case basis,” he said. “It comes back to the advice we’re giving, which is to just plan ahead, now that we know there will be disruptions. It’s a known factor now, so we encourage people to plan.”

Mr Lankester said he had already been personally affected by the disruption, having waited for 20 minutes on Princes Street for a bus that never came after The Stand Comedy Club Fringe launch on Sunday night.

“It isn’t rocket science, getting those [bus information] boards right,” he said. “It’s about closing that communications loop and recognising that customers coming into town will generally be using Google Maps or Apple Maps to navigate and there are ways of pushing updates through so they flow into those tools.”

He said he had written to the council to ask for “more proactive solutions” to the problem, demanding that they “alleviate the congestion and just keep people informed better”.

Gary Cheung, general manager of the Brass Monkey venue on Leith Walk, which is holding comedy shows in the free fringe at weekends, said he had started doing the shows in a bid to “bring the festival a bit more to Leith”.

He said: “It’s about trying to bring some of the Fringe atmosphere to Leith,” he said. “The problems with the trams really aren’t going to help that and there doesn’t look like there is going to be any solution soon.”

Edinburgh City Council ​leader Jane Meagher said: “Cities and destinations across the world have managed similar schemes for many years and there’s no evidence to suggest that they have impacted the number of visitors they welcome each year. The five per cent rate is modest in comparison to other cities and the five-night cap we’ve placed on the levy, limits the amounts that artists and others staying for longer periods will have to pay.

“I don’t disagree that hotel prices in Edinburgh have risen exponentially in recent years but the responsibility for that lies with the hoteliers, not the Council. Our focus is on reinvesting the proceeds of the levy in areas that maintain and enhance our reputation as one of the most popular and enjoyable destinations in the world.“It’s also worth pointing out that our cultural sector stands to benefit from the levy too, with plenty of funding options available for cultural organisations.”