Dublin South West TD, Se\u00e1n Crowe, has welcomed the comments of Peter Aiken of Aiken Promotions, one of the country\u2019s biggest music promoters, on the need for the regulation of ticket re-selling\u00a0in Ireland. Peter Akien spoke out against the use of secondary ticket\u00a0selling websites, such as\u00a0Seatwave\u00a0and\u00a0Getmein.com after tickets for concerts for U2 and Ed Sheeran were recently being touted for over \u20ac1000 on the internet.<\/p>\n
Deputy Se\u00e1n Crowe said these comments will add to the pressure on the Minister to fast track legislation in this area.<\/p>\n
The Sinn F\u00e9in TD said:<\/p>\n
\u201cTicket touting has escalated in recent years. With advances in technology, the practice has grown from traditional touts selling counterfeit, cancelled or extortionately priced tickets outside venues, to online sites, in the grey area of regulation.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese events are designed to give fans of music and sport the opportunity to see their heroes live, and should be a positive experience all round, but the abuse of ticket reselling is reflecting badly on the industry.<\/p>\n
\u201cEach time tickets go on sale for a concert or sporting event, it is usually followed by a news report that outlines how the tickets sold out in minutes and are\u00a0immediately reselling online at extortionate prices.<\/p>\n
\u201cDespite people\u2019s best efforts in queuing and arranging to buy tickets online the morning of a sale, most have no chance as a result of the misuse of the system by secondary resellers.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe reselling of tickets is not benefitting the\u00a0public,\u00a0the music artists, or sports teams involved. Sinn F\u00e9in\u2019s new piece of legislation, the \u2018Sale of Tickets (Sporting and Cultural Events) Bill 2017\u2019,\u00a0aims to address these issues\u00a0and give everyone a fair\u00a0opportunity to buy tickets to these events.<\/p>\n
“Our legislation would allow\u00a0consumers\u00a0who buy tickets in good faith, only to discover that they cannot attend the event,\u00a0to\u00a0dispose of their tickets\u00a0allowing up to a 10% profit margin. It would also have the effect of being a disincentive\u00a0to ticket touts by means of substantial fines.<\/p>\n
\u201cI believe this practice has gone on for too long, and is making what should be an enjoyable experience for people into a nightmare trying to obtain reasonably priced legitimate tickets.<\/p>\n
\u201cI welcome the intervention and comments of Peter Aiken of Aiken Promotion and his comments on the need for the regulation of ticket re-selling\u00a0in Ireland.\u00a0Hopefully this will add to the pressure on the Minister to eliminate this despicable practice.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
ENDS<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Dublin South West TD, Se\u00e1n Crowe, has welcomed the comments of Peter Aiken of Aiken Promotions, one of the country\u2019s biggest music promoters, on the need for the regulation of ticket re-selling\u00a0in Ireland. Peter Akien spoke out against the use of secondary ticket\u00a0selling websites, such as\u00a0Seatwave\u00a0and\u00a0Getmein.com after tickets for concerts for U2 and Ed Sheeran […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[296],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3085","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ticket-touting"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3085","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3085"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3085\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3086,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3085\/revisions\/3086"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3085"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3085"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3085"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}