This report presents views and experiences gathered through the first phase of Access Folk through a process we call the consulting group. The purpose of the consulting group was to gather current issues faced by different sectors of society when accessing folk singing in England in order to inform our future research. We began by identifying six areas where it seemed that access to folk singing might be problematic. Informed by the protected characteristics categories from the Equality and Human Rights Commission (2010), and Arts Council England (2021), our six chosen themes are – Belief, Politics & Religion; Disability; Gender & Sexuality; Race & Ethnicity; Age; and Class & Socio-Economic Background.