Dan is right - and I can vouch for his extreme integrity.

The PRS system is flawed, for sure, and some of their initiatives have been wrong-headed, and we have to correct them all the time. But their brief is to maximise revenue for their members - it's why they exist.

Given the almost impossible challenge that collecting royalties on music presents in this free-for-all day and age, the PRS system is largely fair (ok, with occasional faults) and certainly better than any alternative system I've been able to dream up.

How the hell else do you collect writer's royalties? (If someone knows of a better way, I'd like to hear it).

Talk of all the money going to the rich people is misleading and unhelpful.

The sums actually collected for each original work is tiny, so obviously only the people who's music is getting played a LOT will make much money. But even minnows like me make what I think is a reasonable return - £1,300 last year (and I was only gigging for three months of that time). So fairness to composers is NOT an issue - and if you make zilch (as I used to for a long time and soon will again) it's because your music is not being played out much. Can't blame PRS for that.

Fiddler's Green is correctly attributed in the PRS database, as is Shoals of Herring, for example. They are NOT responsible for idiots who insist that these songs are trad - in fact they work to correct this. Yes, there is an issue that the database gets muddied by people sending in wrongly-attributed returns (12 different composers of Dirty Old Town, for example), but all PRS can do is run the system as people advise. The are not the police, and only operate under civil law. If someone has an issue with a misuse of copyright then the matter is settled between writer and user in the civil court. PRS may provide evidence, but they don't represent either party. They are merely a collection agency.

The alternative would be to have a free-for-all, no-payment royalty system, where music was not copyright, and no-one ever made a penny from his works.

But this is untenable in law. Copyright in a work exists at its creation. We can choose to waive it, but you can't draw a circle round 'folk-style' songs, or songs that folkies fancy singing. And you can't separate out copyright on songs from other music, or film, or the written word, or the design of products, paintings, buildings etc.

We have copyright laws, and royalties thereon, because it's what makes the world go round.

How would you feel if I said you should not be paid for your job?

I'm sorry to hear about the dance school. That sounds wrong, but there IS royalty free music available, so it should not have been a problem with the right advice.

Tom