Theatre Tours Cut Back as Rising Costs Threaten Towns Across the UK
The number of plays touring the UK has fallen by 64 per cent since 2019, and the industry bodies representing British theatre are asking the Chancellor to step in before more towns lose their shows altogether.
The Society of London Theatre (SOLT) and UK Theatre, which together represent venues and producers across the country, warned on 8 September 2026 that rising travel, freight, energy and business rates costs — alongside increased National Insurance contributions — are making visits to smaller and medium-sized towns financially unviable. Domestic touring activity overall dropped by 24 per cent between 2019 and 2024, according to figures the two bodies cited. More than half of the 571 touring organisations examined in Arts Council England's recent Touring Review recorded losses.
Claire Walker and Hannah Essex, the co-CEOs of SOLT and UK Theatre, have called on the Chancellor to introduce measures in the autumn budget to support touring, protect venues and improve access to theatre across the UK. The sector still drew more than 37 million attendances last year. For every £1 spent on a theatre ticket, the bodies said, a further £1.40 is spent locally in restaurants, shops and pubs — meaning that when a tour skips a town, the high street feels it too.
Kate Varah, executive director and co-chief executive of the National Theatre, said the 64 per cent collapse in touring plays since 2019 was putting theatre infrastructure and local cultural economies at risk. The National Theatre will tour a new production of Jim Cartwright's The Rise and Fall of Little Voice next year, a commitment that stands against the wider retrenchment.
The case the bodies are making to the Treasury is specific. They want unavoidable touring costs such as freight made eligible for Theatre Tax Relief — a government scheme that lets theatre companies claim back a portion of production costs. Independent modelling commissioned by Arts Council England found that a proposed expansion of the relief could generate an estimated £4.50 in gross value added for every £1 of gross Exchequer cost. Varah called such an expansion "transformative," saying it would unlock greater national access to the arts, support jobs and local economies.
SOLT and UK Theatre also called for the touring-rate threshold for opera and ballet to be reduced, arguing the current system does not reflect the costs of large-scale national touring. And they proposed extending existing business rates relief — already available to pubs and live music venues — to theatres and other live performance venues.
The wider picture has been documented in Theatre in the UK 2026, a report published by UK Theatre. It found the sector faces sustained margin compression: costs rising faster than income, public funding falling in real terms, and limited scope to raise ticket prices. The report projected that 91 per cent of theatres expect total costs to rise, including staffing, supply, energy and building maintenance. Thirty-six per cent of UK theatres are projected to face an operating deficit in 2026, rising to 51 per cent in a later period.
The detail is granular. Eighty-eight per cent of theatres expect supply costs to increase, 77 per cent foresee higher energy costs, and 82 per cent anticipate rising maintenance expenditure, the report stated. Touring companies and venues have faced increased costs and decreased income, with existing challenges accelerated and exacerbated by the pandemic, according to the BBC.
The audience figures tell one story — 37 million people through the doors. The balance sheets tell another. What is now being asked is whether the autumn budget will treat the gap between the two as an arithmetic problem the Treasury can fix, or whether more towns simply drop off the touring map.
