After the Revolution Who Will Clean Up the Mess?

Writing

The Glasgow Effect: A Tale of Class, Capitalism & Carbon Footprint

On 4 November 2019, Luath Press published Harrison’s first book. Inspired by her 2016 ‘durational performance’ The Glasgow Effect – for which she refused to travel beyond Glasgow’s city limits, or use any vehicles except her bike, for the whole calendar year – the book provides the complete context for her thinking and action. (Word count: 119,000)
Media

Summerhall TV Selection

13 Jan 2015
Central Station
Media

Generation: Pour l’historicité du présent

1 Jan 2015
Espace (Canada) (Issue 109 p.76-77)
Media

Interview: Ellie Harrison

3 Oct 2014
Generation
Media

A Most Unusual Referendum Results Party

22 Sep 2014
The Student Newspaper (p.19)
Media

Scottish indyref and artists: “No anger or disappointment”

19 Sep 2014
a-n website
Media

The Morning After the Revolution

19 Sep 2014
Summerhall TV
Media

Scottish Independence: Polling Day Live

18 Sep 2014
The Guardian
Newsletter

After the Revolution, Who Will Clean Up the Mess?

18 Sep 2014
Media

Picking up the Pieces after the Vote

15 Sep 2014
The Scotsman TV
Media

Independence will lead to Artistic ‘Desecration’

13 Sep 2014
The Spectator (p.56)
Media

Picturing Scotland’s Future

1 Sep 2014
Channel 4 News
Media

Counterpoint

31 Aug 2014
Scotland on Sunday
Media

Counterpoint

24 Aug 2014
The List
Media

Scottish independence and artists: “It’s not about nationalism at all”

24 Aug 2014
a-n website
Media

L’Ecosse Répète son Indépendance sur les Planches

21 Aug 2014
Le Monde (France) (p.12)
Media

Getting Straight to the Point

9 Aug 2014
The Herald (The Arts p.6)
Installations

After the Revolution, Who Will Clean Up the Mess?

An installation / event completely contingent on the result of the Referendum on Scottish Independence on 18 September 2014. The four large confetti cannons installed inside Talbot Rice’s Georgian Gallery would only be detonated in the event of a ‘yes’ vote.
Project website
Media

After the Revolution, Who Will Clean Up the Mess?

1 Aug 2014
Summerhall TV
Media

Royal High School set for Festival revival

31 Jul 2014
The Scotsman
Media

Counterpoint at Edinburgh Art Festival

31 Jul 2014
The List (p.88-89)
Media

Indyref Confetti Cannon to go on Display at Edinburgh Art Festival

31 Jul 2014
The Herald (p.10)
Media

Confetti Cannon Primed to Explode, or Maybe Not

31 Jul 2014
The Times (p.16)
Media

Edinburgh Art Festival announced three new commissions for 2014

7 May 2014
The List

Ellie Harrison Louise Haigh and Labour say that they will reform the complex fares system to ensure that passengers are confident that they are getting the best fare; confidence that X is the case, and X being the case are not necessarily the same thing. Simplification of fares would have to include the abolition of many fares. The assertion that simplifying the fares structure would reduce travelling costs is based upon a false premise, that being that the complicated-ness of the fares-and-ticketing structure is the reason why fares are expensive, that is not why they are expensive. They are expensive because the base level is too high. If you massively simplify the fares, one might then always be certain of getting the best available fare because there are no obscure cheaper fare hidden away in a Byzantine monolith, but that best fare is likely the best of a bad bunch. Railway fares are complicated, but it is within this myriad complexity that the nuances which facilitate cheaper options lurk; if you take a sledgehammer to the behemoth you bring down the cheaper options which lurk within the behemoth. If there are presently 18 options for doing Thing X, with 15 of those ways being cheap, and 3 of those ways being expensive, if you abolish the 15 cheap options for doing thing X you have massively simplified the paying-to-do-Thing X process because having 3 ways is much simpler than having 18 ways, and you have made it such that one is highly unlikely to not notice the cheapest of the available fares, because one is more likely to notice something when it is one amongst 3 than if it is one amongst 18, but it is nevertheless the case that the person is selecting the cheapest of the 3 most expensive. (i) Being guaranteed to always get the best fare; and (ii). getting cheaper fares are not necessarily the same thing. Be mindful of the actual specific wording of things: both before and after coming into government, Labour has never in actually promised cheaper fares, what Labour has promised is that one will be guaranteed to get the best available fare. The general public, politicians and public-transport campaign organisations alike have been seduced by the word 'simplification'. Simplification is not a virtue in and of itself. Simplification is a neutral concept, neither a good thing nor a bad thing; what is pertinent and important is the nature of the simplification. One can simplify travelling costs upwards. Simplification can simplify out the cheaper options. I deliberately say 'travelling costs', not 'fares', because thinking only terms of fares when it comes to simplification of railway fares and ticketing, and when it comes to Single-Leg Pricing is a proverbial red herring, one should think both in terms of fares AND in terms of travelling costs. Fare decreases do not necessarily mean travelling-cost. LNER is a prime example: with the June of 2023 introduction of Single-Leg Pricing on LNER, and the February of 2024 introduced of the Simpler Fares pilot, travelling costs for using LNER have gone up. Two halved-in-price Singles are more expensive than one Day Return; a fare reduction, but a travelling-cost increase. The changes December of 2023 fares-and-ticketing changes on c2c have many of the same fare-decreases-but-travelling-cost increases as LNER, plus its pay-as-you-go tap-in-tap-out integration with Transport for London (to simplify things) has necessitated the introduction of a weekday early-evening peak period between 4.00 p.m. and 7.00 p.m., which has numerous knock-on effects which can hugely increase one's travelling costs. The answer is not reform of the fares-and-ticketing structure. The answer is not simplification of the fares-and-ticketing structure. The answer is to decrease the price of all existing fares. Do not abolish any existing fares. Do not introduce any new types of fare. Just make all existing fares 45% cheaper, and leave it at that.

As the idiom goes: 'Be careful what you wish for, because it might come true'. Reform will only be good if it is good reform. We don't need reform, we need good reform. Some might fear that prices would inevitably be rationalised upwards. Inevitably, the rationalisation would rationalise out the cheaper options. Some might fear that reform of the fares-and-ticketing structure would, inevitably, reform travelling costs upwards, and reform out the cheaper options. Some might fear that simplification of the fares-and-ticketing structure would, inevitably, simplify travelling costs upwards, and simplify out the cheaper options. Just take a look at LNER. Be careful what you wish for, because it might come true.