Statement from Overflo Festival organisers:
We are sad to announce that as a result of the Queen’s passing last Thursday, Southwark Council has withdrawn the permission for Overflo to take place on Sunday 18th September. We are working closely with the council to find an appropriate date to hold thIs event and will be able to inform you of these in the coming weeks.
We are devastated to not be able to move forward with the event. Both Southwark Council and ourselves have looked at every avenue to ensure the event can go ahead, however, for the reasons outlined below, Southwark Council will not permit them to at this time.
The government guidance says events can still go ahead if the organiser wishes, why has this one been cancelled?
Southwark Council are the landowner of Burgess Park and therefore have the ability to cancel the event for reasons of reputation and also for public safety. In addition to this, we work closely with the Safety Advisory Group which includes members of London Ambulance Service, the Metropolitan Police and Environmental Health, all of whom will no longer have the resources to support the event going ahead next weekend.
Why does it matter that these authorities aren’t available, I thought you have your own security and medics?
Whilst we do have our own resources that are paid for by the event, all events in Southwark have to work closely with the authorities who give resource to the events to ensure protection of the event locally. They need to be reassured that in the event of an incident occurring at the event there is enough police resource and ambulance resource to deal with this and unfortunately all resource is being drafted in to support with the Queen’s funeral and advance planning.
Why are some other events still going ahead?
Every event will have a different landowner and local authority involved in planning and the location of the event will play a big part in decisions. Burgess Park and the borough of Southwark are heavily involved in Operation London Bridge and as such will not be able to facilitate any events in the borough of Southwark during this time.
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