Live music industry figures criticise government’s U-turn on festival drug testing
nme.comJune 14, 2023As well as on-site drug testing, users are also alerted to dangerous substances that are in circulation. Harm reduction specialists such as The Loop work in partnerships with festivals and nightclubs to send out push notifications via apps with warnings.Sacha Lord, Manchester’s Night Time Economy Adviser and the co-founder of Parklife festival, which opened just days after the U-turn, told Resident Advisor: “To land such a decision two days before the UK’s biggest metropolitan festival, which took 12 months of planning that the government is an integral part of – is appalling.”Lord added that the government is “playing politics with kids’ lives”.“We’ve got a full summer where millions of kids will go through the gates,” he said. “And if there’s no testing facility and something happens, there’ll be blood on [Home Secretary] Suella Braverman’s hands.
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