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Legal High Boosts Exodus Spirit

Exodus meeting with police and landowner results in first legal outdoor rave

15th June 2000 / Squall Download 5, July-Aug 2000, pg. 4.

A new era of legalised underground raves could be inaugurated in Bedfordshire this summer after an auspicious meeting between the Exodus Collective, Beds Police and landowner Lord Howland.

The new Bedfordshire Chief Constable, Cliff Dickson, met with Lord Howland and Exodus members on June 9 to discuss an Exodus rave planned for July 29. The rave is to take place on a stretch of Lord Howland's land near Junction 13 of the M1.

As reported previously in SQUALL (see New Deal Down on the Farm and Praise From The Lord), Lord Howland has been involved in several spirited conversations with Exodus members over the last year and also paid a visit to the Free the Spirit Festival held on Exodus's newly secured farmstead last summer. These negotiations have resulted in the selection of a rave-suitable piece of the 135,000 acre Bedfordshire estate managed by Howland on behalf of his father the Marquess of Tavistock.

With two more illicit raves planned by Exodus during the coming weeks, their first fully licenced outdoor rave will now take place on July 29. The Collective plan to start the event at 8pm and run through to 10am. "By the end of the summer we are hoping to be fully licensed but on our terms. There must be no compromise on the spirit," said Exodus collective spokesperson, Glenn Jenkins.

Beds Police have agreed to co-operate with Exodus on traffic management and have also agreed to waver their usual insistence on payment for their services. The cost of paying police to attend live events has been a persistent financial obstacle to the organisation of community events around the country and Exodus's insistence that the dances remain profit free looks set to establish a new precedent. Beds Police have also promised that none of the police officers involved in previous operations against the Exodus Collective will be involved in the process.

During the June 9 meeting, the incoming Chief Constable of Bedfordshire, Cliff Dickson, acknowledged that Exodus have proved themselves capable of self-policing their own events.

"It's a victory for common sense, reasonableness and social inclusion," said Exodus spokesperson Glenn Jenkins after the meeting.