Leon McDermott thinks that attempts to combat ticket touts are only hurting music's fans
Ticket touts, much like the biblical poor, have always been with us. Pick a sold-out gig, any one you want, and there will be shady-looking fellas baseball cap, tracksuit top, Mancunian accent ready to sell you a ticket on the door, for twice, or more, the official asking price.
The latest attempt to clamp down on touts, which has been focused on their online activities especially on internet auction site eBay has had limited success. Why? Because the clampdown misses the fundamental point.
As long as there are going to be fans willing to pay over the odds to get into gigs which is to say, always there are going to be ticket touts. But people who legitimately want to get rid of a gig ticket, which includes anyone who can't make a gig for genuine reasons they're stuck doing an extra shift at work; their partner is ill; their dog decides that that day of the Radiohead concert is the day to start looking pregnant are left in an almost impossible position: sell the tickets on (already illegal) or leave them languishing on the mantlepiece (thus wasting over a hundred quid, which is what two stadium gig tickets will cost these days).
These are the fans who will really get squeezed by any new legislation: those who geniunely want to shift their tickets without making a profit. As long as gig venues refuse to take back or refund tickets - which would reduce the tout's business immensely - there is no way for gig-goers to get rid of their unwanted tickets without making themselves criminals.
Promoters can complain all they like and most of the time, you get the feeling that the sole reason for complaint is that touts are making money they'll never see a cut of but until they institute a system which offers gig-goers a chance to return their tickets is put into place, nothing will change.
Because it's only then that touts will find themselves marginalised.
Leon McDermott is the Sunday Herald's rock critic
