Super-touts are facing a reckoning

THE staggering consumer rip-off by the super-touts has been exposed and documented in the campaigning pages of the Daily Record in the past year.

Nefarious individuals running barely legal operations harvest thousands of tickets for top gigs and sporting events the minute they go on sale then sell them on at vastly inflated prices.

It costs fans millions to see their idols and the musicians appear to see little of the creamed-off cash.

Now that the attention of the Commons culture committee is focused on the issue we might see some change.

MPs were stunned yesterday to hear from witnesses that cut through the excuses, the evasions and the non-appearance of some of these secondary sales agents who rip off fans.

The Record’s own investigations were highlighted as an exemplar of just how journalism should be done.

But what is to be done to those agencies and sites who clearly breach consumer law by selling on tickets for hundreds of pounds more than face value even when promoters warn they will not be valid at venues?

The sanction of the law must be brought to bear on them, with hefty fines for selling fraudulent goods, as MPs alleged yesterday.

Online search engines that promote these dodgy ticket sites for commercial gain – and we’re talking about you, Google – should be taken to task for colluding in the practice.

Fans can play their part. The anti-ticket touting organisation FanFair Alliance have an online guide on how to avoid the touts and get the tickets legitimately.

Venues and promoters have to be investigated, too, because there is – as our reporter to the Commons committee confirmed – a shady cross-over between the primary and secondary sales market.

Organisations such as Scottish Rugby, who actually have contracts with these rip-off merchants, ought to get their houses in order, too.

Hats off to the MPs for taking consumer rights, and in his case the rights of young people and their out-of-pocket parents, seriously. Now, let’s see some action.