Well done Barry O’Farrell, you have won the Idiot of the Year Award and it’s only January.
The proposed ‘solutions’ put in place by Mr O’Farrell have so many flaws. The attacks that have happened in Sydney which led to this occurred at 10pm and 9pm, yet the laws are imposed around 1.30am lockouts and banning the service of alcohol past 3am which already has diverted the issue at hand.
Not only have these laws not addressed the real problem out on the street, they encourage more intoxicated patrons to roam the City and Kings Cross with no means to get home due to an already insufficient transport system (not to mention 3am is taxi changeover time making it near impossible to get a cab).
If these attacks are happening on the street and not inside the clubs, there needs to be measures to control the violence on the street with minimal effect on the business owners who abide by the law and work in line with RSA laws and restrictions. The lockout and 3am shut off of alcohol will only push huge numbers of people piling onto the curb, frustrated with not being able to get home and irritable. Way less problems happen inside the clubs so why are we keeping them out?
The Sydney drinking culture will not change nor will the mentality of these people causing the issue. People will continue to drink and idiots will continue being idiots and punching people. If we push people out of the clubs, forcing them to drink at house parties etc, does this make the next death or serious injury ok because it wasn’t in the City and therefore linked with our entertainment industry? Of course not.
I personally for the last 13 years until recently ran or worked in several Sydney nightclubs. I have also spent many weekends in Kings Cross and the City drinking with friends where on many occasions I have entered venues past 1.30am and also purchased alcohol post 3am. Never once in this time have I ever been involved in a fight and I don’t think this is because of luck. Which leads us to the following points, does alcohol really make people fight or are these people going to do it with or without alcohol and should we really use a blanket solution to fix this problem?
Under the new laws, someone like myself would face the same restrictions as someone who has a repeated history of violence and stands at a much higher chance of causing trouble. Perceptively fair as all are equal, but it sure sets a scary precedent when criminals and the innocent are treated as one- correct me if I’m wrong but aren’t we innocent until proven guilty?
On several occasions over the years, I have had the misfortune of visiting friends of mine in hospital who have been at the helm of these ‘king hits’ in our city and it’s something I never wish upon anybody. So of course, we need this addressed but we need it addressed with an exploration of possible options, not an ACT NOW OR NEVER outlook. I can NEVER put myself in the shoes of someone who has lost a family member to this caveman mentality and nobody should ever have to face this again, it has happened twice in recent times and this is twice too many.
No family should EVER have to endure pains like these and we must make sure it doesn’t happen. But as a hopeful future parent, would I feel safer knowing my kids are stranded on the street at 2am unable to get home or knowing that wherever my child goes, they will have an authority figure watching over their every move? Will these new laws stop someone binge drinking at home before they go out and walk the streets at sundown looking to punch an unsuspecting youth who’s out for a night with his friends? Most definitely not. This is another case of people with power making completely uneducated and irrational decisions to appear like they’re doing something.
Stop treating the people of Sydney as a whole, we are individuals and whilst we cannot have a law for each person out on a Saturday night, we can provide a better plan of attack than the proposed laws from Mr O’Farrell. The problem is not in the clubs, it is on the streets and alcohol does not cause fights, idiots do.
I would have more Police on the street, two on every corner to act as a deterrent for anyone wanting to start fights. Ban people with known histories of repeated violence. People will respond to this with “We don’t have enough Police” but when you can see 20 Police busting one person for half a bag of Cocaine on Darlinghurst Road any given Saturday night, it’s fair to say our resources could be used better. Taken into account here that 2 are doing the search and 18 of them are looking around chatting.
The new “One Punch” laws are a step in the right direction and combined with more Police on the street would make a great introduction to culling these attacks. The alcohol and lockout related decisions will affect so many venue operators that fall under the designated precinct, venue operators and business owners that will lose huge amounts of cash and in some cases, be forced to close down leaving many people jobless.
We can only pray that the violence ends here and now. But if it doesn’t, and in 12 months from now we are still in this situation with the lockouts in place and these gutless attacks happening regularly, where to from here? Do we close all nightclubs and bars? Do we ban alcohol in Sydney? A complete prohibition.
One last thing we need to think about here is if clubs are stopping serving alcohol at 3am and people start drinking about 10pm on a Saturday night, does this mean that people will start drinking earlier and pre drinking at home more heavily? If so, we are right back where we started and revisiting the never ending merry go round…Oh, and the icing on the cake is shutting bottle stores at 10pm, that’s clever…Because it’s really hard to go to the bottle shop an hour earlier and buy 4 cases of VB and head into the city for a fight.
It appears that something had to be done and it had to be done right away but was this the solution? I’m far from convinced that this will stop the next thug king hitting a poor young boy at 9pm on our streets and that’s why we’re here right?
Christian Avant is a former club promoter from Sydney.
