Resources For The Live Music Sector

Aotearoa’s live music sector is vibrant and diverse, ranging from small bars and clubs to iconic festivals and large stadium tours. The live music sector is the biggest source of jobs and income in the music industry accounting for over 40% of the jobs, and over a third of the NZ music industry’s total revenues in 2020.

Alongside this, research and feedback indicate that there are high rates of sexual harassment and harm in live music settings. The factors that contribute to this include the transient nature of the teams and workplaces, the presence of alcohol and drugs in the workplace and the role of live shows as a place for audiences to cut loose. You can read more about this in the independent report Creating Culture Change.

Everyone working in the sector - promoters, venues, contractors, suppliers, artists and everyone who works with them - can play a part in creating a safer live music industry.  SoundCheck Aotearoa has worked with a group of industry professionals to create a range of resources to assist in this process, which you can access below.

Because of the diversity across the sector, it’s tough to create documents that are “one size fits all”, but we have attempted to strike a balance between making the resources comprehensive and widely applicable to make these useful for as many people as possible.

Below we have included some guidance on who may want to use these resources and how they can be used, and some general guidance on what responsibilities exist under the Health and Safety at Work Act 2015 or HSWA. Please note this is high level general guidance only and the legal position in any particular case will depend on the circumstances of that specific situation. 

The templates provided below are designed to be modular; we encourage you to adopt a Sexual Harassment Policy as a foundational framework for any other tools you choose to use. However you can also use almost all of these as standalone pieces, except where the guidance specifies otherwise –  e.g. the Merlin’s Pass must be linked back to a policy.

Finally, for an overview of the health and safety context for the resources, and how different entities work together on live music events, we encourage you to read the Guidance on Resources for the Live Music Sector.

To find the resources and guidance most relevant to you, click below depending on your role: