I suggest the trad. Arr. Is the best thing to do, to keep these songs alive. After all, the (mostly tiny amounts of) money is going directly to artists who are getting out there and keeping the songs played and heard. Would a fund that existed to to popularise the songs be any more effective? What would they do? Adverts on Weetabix boxes? Or would it just be one or two people getting a London wage and a London office, with all the costs that entails whilst all the musicians who wanted to play the music had to make yet another arts application, just so they had enough money to play the blinking songs...

It’s up to the individual musicians to credit their sources. But if their source is Martin Carthy, why lie? By all means do research and say... Martin Carthy who learned it from etc etc But since most of these songs we don’t know the original author(s), surely Harry Cox and Martin Carthy are all just links in the same chain?

Money to the performer’s is the right way to go. The miners on the coal face getting the rewards, not a man in a suit in an air conditioned office.