Lone Ranger approach ‘not enough’
The solution to Oxford St’s violence problem lies in greater policing of bars, not people, according to Greens councillor Chris Harris.
Council this week, in its last sitting before September’s elections, unanimously passed a motion out forward by Harris, to employ more compliance staff to patrol late night venues for breaches of noise and servicing regulations.
The suggestion came in response to Liberal councillor Shayne Mallard’s idea that Council pay for a team of civilian security guards to patrol troubled areas.
The Greens’ initiative attacks the root cause of homophobic violence by ensuring that premises are better managed and that fewer patrons are tipped onto the streets in a pissed state, Harris said.
This is in contrast to Cr Mallard’s vigilante squads who will just cause more violence and potentially more problems.
Harris has proposed a 12-month trial period to see whether hiring more compliance staff to patrol areas, particularly between 8pm and 4am over Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights, would have any effect on the level of violent incidents.
While it is recognised that compliance staff do not have the authority to enforce responsible service practices, it is hoped that such monitoring would better inform police and place greater pressure on licensees to act responsibly.
The move has been supported by Potts Point and Kings Cross Heritage Conservation Society president Andrew Woodhouse who said alcohol outlets needed to be scrutinised more.
Sydney Council does have plans of management for these clubs, but enforcement of conditions is lax, Woodhouse said.
There are too many breaches between midnight and 4am for council rangers to cover all outlets. Few know that between 9am and 5pm there is only one lone ranger on duty.
It’s a sentiment that Chris Harris certainly agrees with.
It is clear that the most violent incidents that occur in the City’s late night entertainment areas such as Oxford St and Darlinghurst Rd are associated with the excessive consumption of alcohol, he said.
The Greens initiative to increase compliance by putting more compliance staff on the beat will contribute to early intervention by ensuring that venues that serve alcohol are better managed, that they comply with conditions of consent and that alcohol is served responsibly.
Oxford Street is a complete joke!!!
What do the Greens know?
All the work that the community, police and supportive government bodies are doing to curb the homophobic violence is great, its not perhaps 100% effective but at least something is being done, however, I’m so sick of the above 3 mentioned doing all the work when the hetro clubs on the street are doing absolutely nothing to help us out, I feel they should be MADE to make some changes to curb the violence as its mainly coming from their customers, hello???
Its disgraceful how in modern times we are finding ourselves playing a similar role of the queers in past, fighting (literally) to establish (or keep) a place that allows gays to roam around in a relaxed and fun atmosphere.
I agree with Shayne the slogans may inflame the violence, I mean, lets look at what we are dealing with here :
Heterosexuals between the ages of 18 – 35 (its only gay people who goto clubs after the age of 35 and hey this is a VERY good thing), now, in the heterosexual specicies, in social settings, the “ego” gets rather driven/inflamed, now when you have a group of “ego’s” in a single setting what occurs is a battle on who can inflame their ego the most and what better way of doing this act by going against authority or any form of public advertising that depicts positive moral values (i.e anti alcohol/smoking signs or in this case – the antihomophobia slogans) in front of friends.
Get them out.
I think gay men are probably pretty cynical and love to take the piss, and I actually quite like that most of the time. But I think that the upcoming election is a time to get serious because it does promise, at least, some hope for some iniatives to finally be made about the unacceptable street violence. So I’m not just nit-picking for the sake of it here.
First, I think there is some weight to the argument that bashers are not going to take one bit of notice of ‘homophobia-free zone’ stickers. In fact, it might even inflame them, in a twisted process of logic, that they might feel the signage declares Oxford Street glbqti ‘territory’, and think they have the right to take it back by bashing a few queers.
Harris also said -œI get a leaflet in the mail almost every week trumpeting Clover Moore’s achievements. Why not use that facility for something more worthy, to send out pamphlets and brochures educating people about homophobia? Why not launch a full-scale education campaign through the mail to every household in the City of Sydney?” Because the bashers are not from around here, Mr. Harris. This is one of the few areas in Australia where most residents accept that the glbqti subculture is not only accepted, but seen to be a valuable contribution to the mainstream. I don’t want to sound ‘suburbist,’ but send your flyers west, mate.