Mr. Robert Donnelly:

The Association of Irish Musical Societies, AIMS, has lost all its productions and shows since March last year. I am sure the same is true of the drama organisations. We have lost approximately 170 shows in the past year. We obviously want to get back on stage. As Senator Malcolm Byrne said, there has been a lack of clarity from the Government regarding the roadmap to allow us back on stage. As a musical society, we have approximately 40 members on stage and up to 100 people working on each production. We obviously cannot get those numbers of people into theatres and venues around the country at the moment. We need clarity and a roadmap to address that issue.

There are also limits on audience numbers. To stage a musical production in this country costs, on average, between €30,000 and €50,000. That means we would need up to 80% capacity in theatres and venues around the country to break even. We need a roadmap, guidelines and help so that we know when our societies can go back to rehearsals. It normally takes approximately 12 weeks or three months for us to put a show together. Our year starts in August and all our shows between August and Christmas have been cancelled because we cannot fit them within that timeline. We would like any help or guidance we can get to enable our shows to take off from January next year.