Push to import Victorian music laws
Image: Live music at the Annandale Hotel in Sydney's inner west
By Edmund Kirkwood
Live music advocates have called upon the O’Farrell government to follow Victoria’s lead in reducing regulation of live performance venues.
The Napthine state government in Victoria used the last sitting day of parliament in 2013 to declare a series of red tape reforms aimed at making it easier for small pubs and bars to establish themselves as live music venues.
Victorian Planning Minister Matthew Guy vowed to implement an “agent-of-change” planning principle that would provide assurance to venues that clash with new residents over noise complaints.
Under the new laws, the party that changes the pre-existing conditions of the building – a pub or residential property – must pay for soundproofing to improve the amenity. The 36 total reforms also include the removal of unnecessary regulation of liquor license applications and other requirements for venues wishing to host live music.
Darcy Byrne, Mayor of Leichhardt and advocate of the inner west’s live music scene, lamented noise complaints from new residents and demanded the O’Farrell government respond immediately.
“For too long, Sydney’s live music venues have been under threat from vexatious noise complaints made by newly arrived neighbours,” he said.
“The Victorian Liberal Government is taking the threat to live music seriously and the O’Farrell Liberal Government must act too.”
Clint O’Hanlon, Marketing and Promotions Manager at the World Bar, a prominent night club in Kings Cross, said the legislation is “necessary” to improve the prosperity of live music in Sydney. But he suggested a lot more needs to happen before reforms like this are adopted at a state-wide level.
“At the rate and intensity that the NSW government is criminalising and ostracising Sydney venues, it would take a complete attitude shift from Police, the media and subsequently the voting public before these kinds of reforms could truly be on the table.”
Many of the Victorian government’s changes form some of the key recommendations made by Sydney’s Live Music Taskforce last year.
But Dr Ianto Ware, member of the Taskforce and co-director of the National Live Music Office, said while these reforms are suited to Victoria, they are not necessarily what is needed in Sydney.
“Sydney needs to approach things differently from Melbourne, largely because Melbourne retained its music venues through the eighties and nineties, whereas Sydney – and most other Australian states – actively repressed them,” he told the Inner West Independent.
“[These reforms] would help protect existing venues but Sydney needs more venues hosting cultural activity so we need to go beyond simply protecting what we’ve got and start helping new initiatives to start up.”
