An autistic woman has said her “heart broke in a gazillion pieces” when she saw the main accessible platform at Electric Picnic was next to the toilets this year.<\/p>\n
Kate Raftery felt \u201cexcluded\u201d and she called on the organisers to meet people with disabilities before next year\u2019s festival for better planning.<\/p>\n
This was Kate\u2019s second EP but she felt distressed instead of enjoying the music as freely as she did in 2025.<\/p>\n
She said problems started last Friday when an official festival map showed an incorrect location for this platform.<\/p>\n
When they tracked it down, she said: \u201cWe were between queues for the bar and the toilets. We couldn\u2019t get in sometimes, people thought we were skipping the queues.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy heart dropped, I was crying and my heart broke in a gazillion pieces.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
In addition, it had two spotlights attached to light up pathways around the toilets, leaving Kate and others disorientated by the brightness.<\/p>\n
One was switched off after people raised concerns but the area remained far brighter than usual, she added.\u00a0<\/p>\n
She is a big music fan and regularly goes to gigs, saying: \u201cThe accessibility was so good last year (at EP), we were praising it to everyone.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“You didn\u2019t feel like you had a disability, you were part of the crowds.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
This year she still managed to enjoy acts on the smaller stages especially Audrey Hobert, but was often so distressed from the main area she needed to take breaks instead.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI love music,\u201d she said, adding she has emailed organisers Festival Republic about these issues.<\/p>\n
Kate is considering setting up a committee to lobby for better accessibility at music gigs and festivals.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Her mother Michelle was with her at EP. The pair run a popular Instagram account with almost 18,000 followers called @juzt2girls.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not fair that so many people were let down,\u201d Michelle said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve had hundreds of messages about it, we can\u2019t get through the messages we\u2019ve had.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
They had prepared for weeks.\u00a0 However instead of repeating last year\u2019s success when they did a day-trip, she saw her daughter in a panic when they at first thought there was no accessible platform.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were asking staff where it was, no-one seemed to know where it was,\u201d she recalled.<\/p>\n
\n When we eventually found it, it was off the path between the bars and main arena, and near the toilets. It was bonkers.\n <\/p>\n
\u201cThe smell from the toilets was awful.”<\/p>\n
Michelle felt it was in a much better location last year, and shared photos online showing the different set-ups.<\/p>\n
She also pointed out, however, that the accessible campsite was \u201cabsolutely brilliant\u201d, praising the staff who worked there for their assistance and support.<\/p>\n
When Kate became too overwhelmed by distractions on the platform, they retreated to the small quiet camp-site for breaks.<\/p>\n
They both noted how she needed so much time to decompress, they missed out on visiting other parts of the festival. <\/p>\n
Michelle echoed her daughter’s wish for more supports, saying: “We emailed Festival Republic, we’d love to have a sit down with them about this.”\u00a0<\/p>\n
Festival Republic were approached for comment.<\/p>\n
Some of these issues were raised with director Melvin Benn at a press conference during the event.<\/p>\n
He told reporters: \u201cIt\u2019s a really good accessible place in my view, you get a good view of the stage.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“I\u2019m really not sure why people think it\u2019s a poorer view.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
He also said: \u201cWhere it was previously a huge, great delay tower was right in the middle of your view from between the disabled platform and the stage.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“And I moved it so the delay tower isn\u2019t in view anymore. You get a much clearer view of the stage.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An autistic woman has said her “heart broke in a gazillion pieces” when she saw the main accessible…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":614775,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[1111,93,61,60,43,1112],"class_list":["post-614774","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-court-and-crime","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news","tag-politics-and-analysis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/614774","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=614774"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/614774\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/614775"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=614774"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=614774"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=614774"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}