City visitors to be provided with $100 restaurant vouchers

Diners can enjoy discounted meals at city venues under a spending blitz to get people back to the CBD. Here’s how the voucher scheme works.

More than $200m will be injected into Melbourne CBD – including providing diners with $100 off their restaurant bill – in a bold bid to reinvigorate the heart of the Victorian capital.

The Sunday Herald Sun can reveal the May 20 state budget will invest $107.4m to boost outdoor dining in the CBD and attract visitors from near and far to bolster the revenues of city businesses.

It can also be revealed a new dining scheme will be launched to entice people to the city’s restaurants and cafes, with $8.4m set aside to help pay for bills.

Rebates of 20 per cent – up to a maximum of $100 – will be made available.

Sam Heathcote from Beer DeLuxe at Federation Square is hoping the scheme encourages people back to the city. Picture: Tony Gough

Diners will pay for their meal and drinks, including alcohol, at an eligible eatery and then apply for the rebate.

The minimum spend will be $50 which will deliver a $10 rebate.

A $150 bill will generate a $30 rebate while the scheme will max out with a $100 rebate on a $500 bill.

The scheme will be open to everybody, including interstate visitors, and there will be no limit on how many times a person can make a claim.

More than 200,000 rebates are expected to be issued under the scheme which will be launched in the coming weeks.

A separate $100m investment by City of Melbourne will create a $200m funding pool which will be used to renew city spaces and finance CBD arts and cultural events.

Popular dining precincts such as Degraves St are starting to get more people back. Picture: David Geraghty

Acting Premier James Merlino said the cash splash would support the things Victorians and visitors most love about Melbourne.

“Life is returning to the CBD and we’re making sure the recovery continues,” he said.

“We’re backing the buzz of our cafes, restaurants and bars – and the people who make their living from them.”

The new investments will be channelled into the existing Melbourne City Revitalisation Fund.

It will build on a $100m investment already made into the fund which has provided 1200 grants of up to $10,000 to convert space for COVID safe dining, support cultural events such as Melbourne Fashion Week and Melbourne Music Week and finance streetscape works including widening footpaths and installing planter boxes.

Acting Premier James Merlino said the program was about “backing the buzz of our cafes, restaurants and bars”.

Melbourne Lord Mayor Sally Capp said the early investments have been critical in keeping thousands of Melburnians in work, particularly in industries hardest hit by the pandemic such as hospitality, events and retail.

“We know there’s still more to do to support our city’s economic recovery and that’s why this joint fund is so important for local businesses and workers,” she said.

Melbourne’s CBD is starting to fill again although office occupancy rates were still only running at 41 per cent in April.

City of Melbourne sensors logged 2400 pedestrians pounding the pavement in the Bourke St Mall at 1pm on Wednesday.

That count was flat over the month and about one-third lower than on the same day pre-COVID.

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