Viagogo Pulls Out Of Second Ticket Resale Hearing In UK Again, Citing Legal Reasons

Scene from the hearing on secondary ticketing in UK Parliament
Screenshot parliamentlive.tv – Scene from the hearing on secondary ticketing in UK Parliament
Lucinda Brown (venue business manager, Islington Assembly Hall), Stuart Galbraith (CEO Kilimanjaro Live), Andrew Parsons (MD Ticketmaster UK), and Adam Webb (Campaign Manager, FanFair Alliance) answer the politicans

Viagogo did not show up for a hearing on secondary ticketing, Sept. 5, in the UK Parliament’s Digital, Culture, Media and Sports Committee (DCMS), because it fears its statements might be used against it in upcoming legal proceedings.
Viagogo released an open letter to member of parliament Damian Collins, dated Sept. 5, in which it states that it won’t be attending the hearing on secondary ticketing based on advice from the company’s lawyers. Viagogo’s legal advisors said, participation in the hearing would “jeopardize [Viagogo’s] position with respect to the ongoing legal proceedings which the [Competition and Markets Authority] CMA has initiated agains us.”
According to Viagogo’s operations manager Prabhat Shah, the company’s lawyers had asked the CMA, to assure Viagogo “that it would not consider any statement made by Viagogo in the hearing to constitue a breach of any of its non-disclosure provisions, or a waiver of its without prejudice privilege in the context of the CMA investigation.”
In other words, Viagogo doesn’t want anything it would say in the parliamentary hearing to be used against the company in court.
According to Shah, “the CMA categorically rejected this request. Indeed, it went further and asserted a positive entitlement to rely on our client’s evidence at the DMCS hearing in the litigation.”
In other words: Viagogo claims the CMA intends to use anything that Viagogo might say in the parliamentary hearing against the company in court.
Shah argues, that “this is in direct contradiction to the guidance on parliamentary privilege given in the House of Commons.”
Viagogo claims to be “sincerely disappointed” at being prevented by the CMA from attending the hearing in the form of its head of business development and sales Cristopher Miller, wich the DMCS had listed as a participant. It said it would submit written evidence instead.
While Viagogo emphasizes that its withdrawal from the hearing was “entirely unrelated to our lawsuit against Stuart Galbraith and Kilimanjaro for defrauding fans, the DMCS claims the opposite.
“Late yesterday evening, Viagogo wrote to the Chair of the DCMS Committee, Damian Collins MP, to say that Viagogo’s head of business development and sales, Cristopher Miller, would be unable to give evidence before the Committee at the scheduled oral evidence session on live music today, citing the legal action the company has decided to undertake against Kilimanjaro Live and the Competition and Markets Authority’s (CMA) investigation into the secondary ticketing industry,” a statement from the DMCS reads.
Damian Collins MP said it was “hard not to view this eleventh hour withdrawal cynically,” calling Viagogo’s non-attendance a “gross discourtesy,” exacerbated by the fact that the company already failed to attend last year. 
“If Mr Miller fails to appear his place will be set out and the questions put, involving much public embarrassment, and the disappointment of consumers and users who expect answers.”
Collins also addressed Viagogo’s fear of exposing itself prior to the CMA court proceedings: “The session does not fall within the scope of the House’s sub judice resolution, and the CMA has no objection to the session taking place. As is usual we would take great care not to discuss issues to do with the future court case.”
The politician concludes that, “Mr Miller has no valid reason not to attend and answer our questions on secondary ticketing.” 
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