Music and sports ticket sellers would be required to tell fans maximum prices at the start of the buying process under a new proposed law following the Oasis “dynamic pricing” backlash.
Prompted by the pricing method that left Oasis fans paying much more than they expected for the band’s 2025 reunion shows, the Sale of Tickets (Sporting and Cultural Events) Bill has been put forward in the House of Commons.
Labour MP Rupa Huq, who has proposed the bill, said she wants the law changed to improve pricing transparency and prevent fans from being ripped off.
When Oasis’s 2025 UK and Ireland tour went on sale at the end of August, fans waited for hours in a virtual queue to find out standard tickets, originally worth £148, were being sold at a dynamic pricing level of £355 on Ticketmaster.
The Britpop group, who last played together in 2009, said they did not know dynamic pricing was going to be used, while Ticketmaster stated “all ticket prices are set by the tour”.
Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy and the UK’s competition watchdog, the CMA, both pledged to review the practice.
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Oasis ticket prices surge
Ms Huq, the MP for Ealing Central and Acton, said she was “scandalised” by the Oasis ticketing situation and felt people were pressured to pay the high prices after waiting for six hours.
She explained the bill calls for a maximum price, but dynamic pricing could still be used for prices to go up and down within that range.
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The MP, who said she watched Oasis live in the 1990s, said: “There needs to be some fairness in the process because it feels as if the consumer balance is wrong and the ticket merchants can literally double it, triple it, think of a number, infinity and beyond.
“This won’t outlaw dynamic pricing, it’s just introducing transparency and certainty because there is a place for the market as well.”
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The chancellor has said she was having a “tough day” yesterday in her first public comments since appearing tearful at Prime Minister’s Questions – but insisted she is “totally” up for the job.
Rachel Reeves told broadcasters: “Clearly I was upset yesterday and everyone could see that. It was a personal issue and I’m not going to go into the details of that.
“My job as chancellor at 12 o’clock on a Wednesday is to be at PMQs next to the prime minister, supporting the government, and that’s what I tried to do.
“I guess the thing that maybe is a bit different between my job and many of your viewers’ is that when I’m having a tough day it’s on the telly and most people don’t have to deal with that.”
She declined to give a reason behind the tears, saying “it was a personal issue” and “it wouldn’t be right” to divulge it.
“People saw I was upset, but that was yesterday. Today’s a new day and I’m just cracking on with the job,” she added.
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Ms Reeves also said she is “totally” up for the job of chancellor, saying: “This is the job that I’ve always wanted to do. I’m proud of what I’ve delivered as chancellor.”
Image: Reeves was seen wiping away tears during PMQs. Pic: PA
Asked if she was surprised that Sir Keir Starmer did not back her more strongly during PMQs, she reiterated that she and the prime minister are a “team”, saying: “We fought the election together, we changed the Labour Party together so that we could be in the position to return to power, and over the past year, we’ve worked in lockstep together.”
PM: ‘I was last to appreciate’ that Reeves was crying
The chancellor’s comments come after the prime minister told Sky News’ political editor Beth Rigby that he “didn’t appreciate” that she was crying behind him at Prime Minister’s Questions yesterday because the weekly sessions are “pretty wild”, which is why he did not offer her any support while in the chamber.
He added: “It wasn’t just yesterday – no prime minister ever has had side conversations during PMQs. It does happen in other debates when there’s a bit more time, but in PMQs, it is bang, bang, bang. That’s what it was yesterday.
“And therefore, I was probably the last to appreciate anything else going on in the chamber, and that’s just a straightforward human explanation, common sense explanation.”
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Starmer explains to Beth Rigby his reaction to Reeves crying in PMQs
During PMQs, Tory leader Kemi Badenoch branded the chancellor the “human shield” for the prime minister’s “incompetence” just hours after he was forced to perform a humiliating U-turn over his controversial welfare bill, leaving a “black hole” in the public finances.
The prime minister’s watered-down Universal Credit and Personal Independent Payment Bill was backed by a majority of 75 in a tense vote on Tuesday evening – but a total of 49 Labour MPs voted against the bill, which was the largest rebellion in a prime minister’s first year in office since 47 MPs voted against Tony Blair’s lone parent benefit in 1997, according to Professor Phil Cowley from Queen Mary University.
Reeves looks transformed – but this has been a disastrous week for the PM
It is a Rachel Reeves transformed that appears in front of the cameras today, nearly 24 hours since one of the most extraordinary PMQs.
Was there a hint of nervousness as she started, aware of the world watching for any signs of human emotion? Was there a touch of feeling in her face as the crowds applauded her?
People will speculate. But Ms Reeves has got through her first public appearance, and can now, she hopes, move on.
The prime minister embraced her as he walked on stage, the health secretary talked her up: “Thanks to her leadership, we have seen wages rising faster than the cost of living.”
A show of solidarity at the top of government, a prime minister and chancellor trying to get on with business.
But be in no doubt today’s speech on a 10-year-plan for the NHS has been overshadowed. Not just by a chancellor in tears, but what that image represents.
A PM who, however assured he appeared today, has marked his first year this week, as Sky News’ political editor Beth Rigby put to him, with a “self-inflicted shambles”.
She asked: “How have you got this so wrong? How can you rebuild trust? Are you just in denial?”
They are questions Starmer will be grappling with as he tries to move past a disastrous week.
Ms Reeves has borne a lot of the criticism over the handling of the vote, with some MPs believing that her strict approach to fiscal rules has meant she has approached the ballooning welfare bill from the standpoint of trying to make savings, rather than getting people into work.
Ms Badenoch also said the chancellor looked “absolutely miserable”, and questioned whether she would remain in post until the next election.
Sir Keir did not explicitly say that she will, and Ms Badenoch interjected to say: “How awful for the chancellor that he couldn’t confirm that she would stay in place.”
Downing Street scrambled to make clear to journalists that Ms Reeves was “going nowhere”, and the prime minister has since stated publicly that she will remain as chancellor “for many years to come”.