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“The relief when i received this email was huge so thank you” is one of the comments Beyond The Joke published on 10 November from anonymous recipients of the Live Comedy Association’s second Leicester<\/a> hardship round. Fourteen individuals and organisations shared \u00a36,000, raised from crowdfunder donations. Applications in that same round, the LCA confirmed to Beyond The Joke, came to almost \u00a370,000.<\/p>\n The LCA confirmed total applications in that second round came to almost \u00a370,000 against the \u00a36,000 awarded – more than eleven pounds asked for every one pound paid. The hardship fund is doing what a volunteer-run fund can do; the hole it’s pouring into was dug by a collapsed charity whose liquidators recorded its assets as nil<\/a>, which is the figure that decides what anyone on the creditors list actually gets from the insolvency itself.<\/p>\n So this is a follow-up: the money has been trickling out since July, in rounds, through a crowdfunder, which is not how anyone plans to get paid for a February run. The LCA says the 14 new awards are “in addition to the 19 awards made previously this year” – that earlier tranche being the \u00a35,000 split between eighteen comedians and one promoter<\/a> reported by Chortle on 8 July. Total now, per the LCA: “in excess of \u00a310,000 to 33 people owed money from Big Difference Company.”<\/p>\n Just over \u00a310,000, shared between 33 people, via two rounds of a crowdfunder-backed hardship fund. Nothing from the liquidation, because FRP Advisory Trading put the company’s assets at nil in the September filing Chortle reported. Against LCA director Jessica Toomey’s figure for the total owed, a staggering \u00a3250,000, the latest \u00a36,000 was raised from donations to a crowdfunder campaign. Liquidators FRP Advisory Trading said the company’s assets were nil.<\/p>\n The per-head maths moved between the two rounds, which is worth noticing if you applied in July and got a smaller number than you hoped for. Round one was \u00a35,000 across 19 recipients, an average of about \u00a3263, and round two \u00a36,000 across 14, so about \u00a3429 – fewer people, bigger cheques. I know comics who’d call \u00a3429 a decent week and comics for whom it’s one cancelled flight. All the second-round recipients were asked to remain anonymous, so an average is as far as the arithmetic goes. One of them told Beyond The Joke: “I am incredibly grateful for the support from the Live Comedy Association”.<\/p>\n Toomey’s line in the 10 November announcement is careful about what the fund can and can’t do. She notes “the total amount owed by Big Difference Company is a staggering \u00a3250,000”, then:<\/p>\n However, we know the support we have been able to provide is making a real difference to people affected.<\/p>\n Jessica Toomey, LCA director, in the 10 November announcement on livecomedyassociation.co.uk<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Back in July she put it more bluntly, telling Chortle: “We very sadly know that the amount of money owed is far greater than the \u00a35,000 we have awarded today.” Four months and one more round later, the fund has paid out more. Both are true at once, and the LCA’s June line still stands: “accepting support from this fund does not affect comics’ right to pursue Big Difference Company”.<\/p>\n Here is where anyone trying to follow this story gets stuck, because there are now three numbers in circulation and they are not the same number.<\/p>\n The statement of affairs, as Chortle reported on 21 September, put the total owed to unsecured creditors “primarily comedians and producers who brought shows there this year” at \u00a3184,510. The creditors’ own report, covered by Charity Times on 26 August, says the charity “owes more than \u00a3215,000 to more than 100 people”. And Toomey’s 10 November figure is \u00a3250,000. Chortle’s August write-up added the caveat that makes all three provisional: “it’s believed many creditors are missing from the list, meaning the figure could be much higher.”<\/p>\n Three sources, three ways of counting. Chortle’s September reporting does break out one line that stands alone in the filing: the biggest single debt is \u00a348,144 to local promoters Triple CeePee, who run a number of festival venues including Firebug.<\/p>\n Look at who is actually on the creditors list and this stops being a corporate insolvency story. Chortle noted in August that “the vast majority of people owed money are freelancers or sole traders”. <\/p>\n The LCA says its cumulative total distributed to people working in live comedy is almost \u00a3100,000, and is upfront that “this figure includes money from the SaveLiveComedy fund set up during the pandemic”. It also says it is “largely powered by volunteers and time donated by passionate people working in live comedy”. The LCA describes itself as largely powered by volunteers and time donated by people working in live comedy, which gives a reasonably clear picture of the scale we’re talking about: this is not a body with a reserve fund sized for a \u00a3250,000 collapse, and nobody has claimed it is.<\/p>\n Nobody in the sector has solved the next bit. If a festival goes down owing more than a hundred people, the current answer is a crowdfunder, paying out \u00a36,000 against almost \u00a370,000 of applications, administered by an organisation largely powered by volunteers and donated time. My own view is that the \u00a370,000 of applications is the most useful number in this whole story, because it’s the first time anyone has published what demand actually looks like when you open the door.<\/p>\n The structural fix, such as it is, has already been built into the city’s replacement festival. When it was announced in August, Chortle reported that it would work with ticket platform TixEvery, “which would pay comedians directly”, with “the festival having no access to box office receipts”. Comedian Alex Hylton founded it with promoter Colin Bowles.<\/p>\n A festival that never holds your ticket money can’t fail to forward it, which is the least romantic sentence anyone has written about a comedy festival. It doesn’t help anyone currently on the creditors list. But it does mean the replacement festival in Leicester, announced in August and founded by comedian Alex Hylton with promoter Colin Bowles, said it would run on a different plumbing arrangement from the one that broke: ticket platform TixEvery would pay comedians directly, with the festival having no access to box office receipts.<\/p>\n Whether that becomes the default for small UK festivals or stays a Leicester-specific reaction to a Leicester-specific disaster is an open question, and probably depends on how many promoters read the \u00a348,144 line and do the sums on their own float.<\/p>\n The second round weighed almost \u00a370,000 of applications against \u00a36,000 to award, and a grant doesn’t close a claim: in June, the LCA said accepting support from this fund does not affect comics’ right to pursue Big Difference Company. <\/p>\nHow much has actually reached comedians?<\/h2>\n
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Three different totals for the same hole<\/h2>\n
Almost \u00a3100,000 since the pandemic, mostly from volunteers<\/h2>\n
Leicester’s new festival says TixEvery will pay comedians directly<\/h2>\n
Sources<\/h2>\n
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