ABSTRACT
There is a clear imperative to this work, which comes from talking to thousands of delegates over two decades. The process of compiling an event plan, risk assessment and specically the licensing application is onerous and time consuming; therefore, shortcuts, specically ‘cut and paste’ are the normal practice. Having reviewed many hundreds of event plans and risk assessments (some were excellent but most were substandard), it is obvious which plans are of the ‘dust off last year’s plan, slap a new date on the front, that will do’ category. Successful events grow larger, free events such as Christmas tree lights switch-on events often employ pop stars, attracting large audiences, and subsequently increase the risk of congestion and overcrowding. These are the events where last year’s plan may no longer work, specically if the crowd grows larger every year.
