An employment tribunal has ruled two actors previously engaged by Cambridge Shakespeare Festival were in fact ‘workers’, not volunteers.
This means the actors were entitled to at least the National Minimum Wage and other basic employment rights such as holiday pay, minimum rest breaks and pensions. In breach of these rights, the Festival paid the performers nothing aside from 50 and 150 a week respectively “towards expenses”.
The judge found that the actors were subject to a “high degree of control” by the operator of Cambridge Shakespeare Festival, Dr David Crilly. This included working “extremely long days”, six-day weeks, and being made to leaflet.
Despite the judgement – which took place in August 2023 and was brought by two Equity members engaged in the 2022 season – Equity can reveal that Cambridge Shakespeare Festival is even now engaging performers as volunteers, rather than workers entitled to national minimum wage and employment rights.
As with previous runs, the current 2024 season is being staged in the gardens of Cambridge University colleges and runs until 24 August. According to the judgement, the Festival’s 2021 season had a budget in excess of 250,000.
Cambridge Shakespeare Festival must be held accountable to this ruling, which constitutes another major victory for Equity in reaffirming that performers are generally ‘workers’ in law. This means they are entitled to basic employment rights that cannot be circumvented by an engager’s attempts to cast them...
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