The situation does not look very good for unpaid sessions etc but for paid gigs in small pubs - it looks even worse. It is pretty obvious to anyone - apart from it seems our Government - that any overall increase in pub running costs is also going reduce the money available to pay performers.

The increase in the PPL fee to the £1000 mark - set for for the year 2006 - is not going to help.

And in the case of all Sam Smiths pubs - it has not helped.