Diversity, equity & inclusion (DEI) Principles.

Diversity CREATES AND Changes Comedy.

We value difference and celebrate the creativity, challenge, and connection it brings to comedy and to public life.

We are committed to building an organisation and an industry where people from a wide range of backgrounds, identities, lived experiences, and access needs can shape comedy – on stage, behind the scenes, in policy, and in leadership. This includes diversity of class, race, gender, sexuality, disability, age, geography, and migration experience, as well as diversity of thought, politics, and creative style.

Comedy is structurally underfunded and often informal, which means the barriers faced across the wider creative industries are amplified for those without wealth, contacts, or traditional routes in. At the same time, comedy has always been a space where new voices, dissent, and cultural change emerge first. For that to continue, the people making decisions, setting standards, and distributing resources must better reflect the audiences and communities comedy serves.

For CRAFT, equity, diversity and inclusion are not add‑ons – they are core to our public purpose. Our work is designed to reduce structural inequalities in who gets to participate, whose work is visible, and who benefits from the economic and social value comedy creates. A sector that only works for the already-established is a sector that will not be resilient, innovative, or trusted.

We believe the comedy workforce – performers, writers, producers, venues, platforms, and the wider ecosystem – should better reflect the full diversity of the UK. That means creating conditions where working‑class talent, disabled and neurodivergent creatives, people of colour, LGBTQ+ communities, migrants, carers, and those outside traditional cultural hubs can start, stay, and thrive in comedy on their own terms.

Through the Comedy Levy, a National Comedy Membership Registry, and sector‑wide standards on pay, safety, and accountability, CRAFT is working with the entire ecosystem of comedy—including talent, venues, agents, festivals, policymakers, and partners—to build a more inclusive, fair, and future‑facing comedy ecosystem.

Our goal is simple: a comedy industry that is as diverse, inventive, and dynamic as the audiences who rely on it for connection, relief, and challenge every day.

We are proud to state diversity starts with us—CRAFT’s own team. We are made up of Brits, immigrants, people from a range of different ethnicities, ages, sexual preference and identity, lived experiences, politics, and socio economic backgrounds.