And also with you

On 8 June 2019 it was announced that the early May Day Bank Holiday in 2020 will be moved back four days to coincide with the 75th anniversary of V.E. Day. Monday, May 4th, 2020 will no longer be a public holiday; instead we’ll be given the day off on Friday May 8th to mark Victory in Europe Day, a defining moment in history which took place in the closing stages of World War II. What difference does that make? For some of us, quite a bit.

To change the date of a public holiday with no forewarning, no public discussion and only 11 months’ notice was always going to cause problems. The first headlines concerned ruined wedding plans. Brides-to-be and grooms-to-be having to change plans after their guests could no longer commit to attending on the shortened weekend.  Many people book return visits to their holiday destinations a year in advance, so to change the date of a public holiday in less than that timescale has led to confusion both for travellers and the holiday industry. Schools have had to reschedule exams. Printers have had to pulp thousands of diaries and calendars which included the dates for a public holiday which subsequently has been changed.

But the main concern to those of us who inhabit the Folk World is that the first Monday in May is a traditional coda of a long weekend of folk festivities and festivals, with events large and small taking place across the country. Starting on May 1^st itself, there are celebrations of May Day and Beltane across the United Kingdom, often starting at sunrise or even the night before; with fires and bonfires on Calton Hill in Edinburgh; a choir on the tower of Magdelen College in Oxford, and Morris Dancers across the land setting their alarms for the middle of the night so they can be ready to climb an appropriate hill or visit a site of particularly special significance to Dance at Dawn. Many of these May Day events don’t have a long continuous history but they are revivals of older celebrations which along with newer customs have become part of a living, evolving tradition.

May Day has been celebrated as the start of Summer since Roman Times; traditions and celebrations are found in many cultures. It’s one of the cross-quarter days, halfway between the Spring Equinox and the Summer Solstice. The appropriation of May Day in the socialist calendar as International Worker’s Day since the late 19^th Century complements the traditional celebration without diminishing or replacing it. The Public Holiday in the United Kingdom was established in 1978 to mirror Labour Day holidays taken across the world. It’s one of the few international public holidays that isn’t linked to an established religious festival. The late May Bank Holiday by contrast, on the last Monday in May, is generally linked to Whitsun or Pentecost.

For last few years May Day has been isolated in the middle of the week before the May Day Bank Holiday weekend, but 2020 had all the ingredients for a classic long weekend. May 1^st falls on a Friday; this would be followed by a long weekend of celebrations; a four day long festival, lasting from dawn on Friday until Monday night. Major folk events across the country that take place on the May Bank Holiday Weekend every year include the Upton-upon-Severn Folk Festival, Hastings Jack-In-The-Green, and the Rochester Sweeps Festival. Bristol’s May celebrations will commence with dancing at dawn on Brandon Hill and Castle Park. The weekend will continue with the Jack-In-The-Green procession, which always takes place on the first Saturday in May and possibly a continuation of the revival of the Bristol Folk Festival, which took place again in 2019 after a few fallow years.

Some of these major events book artists and venues years in advance; they may depend on local schools and playing fields to provide accommodation and campsites; and more importantly they expect to be able to draw in the crowds on a Bank Holiday Monday to provide an audience. Removing the May Day Bank Holiday next year will affect all these things and will diminish the casual audience who won’t necessarily want to take a day’s annual leave in order to participate in these events, especially if it’s an ordinary school day. (Perhaps we could start a campaign for all schools to have an INSET day). The organisers of large and small events across the country, are having to make difficult decisions about whether to curtail their plans, continue with plans for hosting events on May the 4^th, or reschedule for the following weekend, where the traditional events planned may not be appropriate for a weekend commemorating the anniversary of the end of armed conflict in Europe in the final months of World War Two.

The commemoration of the 75^th anniversary of V.E. day is important. This will be the final “quarter century” anniversary for those who fought in the conflict and for most of those who lived through it; it is a time for both celebration and quiet reflection. It is a matter for discussion whether it deserves its own Bank Holiday more than the 100^th anniversary of the end of the Great War – which happened last year without one – or whether the commemorations could be encapsulated within the adjacent weekend; in the same way that armistice day parades and memorials have traditionally taken place on the Sunday following November 11^th.  The Acts of Remembrance in November are part of the national calendar; the anniversary of V.E. day is not something that is regularly marked in the same way, which is why this announcement caught so many people by surprise.

It is also a matter for debate whether an additional Bank Holiday should be offered instead of moving an existing one, so that the May Day Bank Holiday can be celebrated in its traditional form without disrupting those people and organisations who have had well-established events thrown into turmoil.

The same shift in Bank Holidays happened once before in 1995 to mark the 50^th anniversary of the end of the Second World War, when the Bank Holiday Monday was moved from 1^st to 8^th May. Perhaps then it didn’t feel so awkward as it was still technically the weekend “following May Day”; and I suspect it was announced with more than 11 months’ notice. Since then we have seen additional Bank Holidays being offered in 1999 for the Millennium Celebrations; for Golden and Diamond Jubilees in 2002 and 2012 and for the Royal Wedding in 2011. So, “moving” a bank holiday is historically far less common than offering an additional one.

Unfortunately, the debate and discussion about the move of these dates was non-existent and the announcement of the change was late – to the point of rudeness.

This has led to the second set of headlines, with lurid tales of “Furious Morris dancers who plan to march on Parliament”.  The rebellion has begun; with a Facebook group and a petition to parliament and a plan to assemble outside the House of Commons on Tuesday the 23^rd of July to make their feelings known.  [Episode I – The Folkie Menace]

While I whole-heartedly support their activities and wish them every success, I’m afraid I can’t join them; for me it doesn’t seem sensible to take an extra day’s annual leave to travel to London, especially as I’ll have to save up my holiday in order to take an extra day off on May the 4^th next year. Good luck and may your protests be peaceful and effective! However, I fear that any publicity for an event outside the House of Commons on this 23^rd of July will be somewhat overshadowed by events inside. [Episode II – Attack of the Clowns]

It also seems rather disingenuous of our duplicitous Government to be encouraging us to celebrate “Victory in Europe” at the same time as tearing us out of the European Union. The Victory in 1945 was of Allies from across the world united in their resistance of a tyrannical ideology; it wasn’t about one country versus another. The partnerships forged after that conflict have helped preserve the peace on our continent, more or less, for the last 75 years. It seems absurd to be breaking those chains and attempting to stand alone. I’m afraid that the celebration of V.E. day will be recast in the shadow of the populist right and misunderstood by our conflicted and humiliated nation – especially as it appears to have usurped a more traditionally socialist holiday . [Episode III – Revenge of the Sith]

Finally, I’ve got one more reason why I support the retention of the May Day Bank Holiday, and the addition of a new Public Holiday to mark 75 years since V.E. day. I’m old enough to have seen the original Star Wars movie when it was first released, and I was born on the 4^th of May. I happen to have a Significant Birthday next year, and I was hoping to spend the day off work with family and friends. I’d realised that this particular day was going to be on a Bank Holiday a long time ago (in a galaxy far, far away) and I was rather looking forward to it. I was even in the contemplation for a new mummers’ play for the occasion. And now that’s all in jeopardy.

With so much going wrong in the world, perhaps it seems unnecessary to focus on one disappointment out of so many. But sometimes our conflicts choose us. [Episode IV – A New Hope]

I have placed information vital to the survival of the morris rebellion into the memory systems of this WordPress unit.

Help me, Jack-In-The-Green, says I, you’re my only hope.