PAST EVENT - PAY - Assistant and Associate Designers | 8pm – 9:30pm BST | Running time 90 mins

The recent improvements negotiated to the UK Theatre and SOLT contracts stipulate that both the material and construction costs of making the model, including the costs of an Assistant Designer, should now be covered by the company, and not by the designer. As we go forward, finances will be even tighter and whilst the producers may be required to fund model making that doesn't mean they will fund it effectively? So how do we avoid Assistants getting squashed by reduced budgets?

As part of an ongoing conversation about Associate and Assistant roles, let’s try and set a pay scale across different tiers of production budget and indicates how our rates should increase with experience/skills/inflation.How can we be contracted? Should we be paid hourly/daily/weekly/monthly/fee based? What about a retainer for a main associate/assistant - giving more consistent pay? Let’s talk about whether a ‘kit-fee’ system might help cover costs of specialist programmes/tools/equipment that are a requirement as an assistant?