‘It just got out of hand’: Geelong CBD business appears to breach Covid-19 rules in social media videos
A Geelong business owner has admitted a birthday party at a CBD venue “got out of hand” and appears to have breached Covid-19 restrictions over the weekend.
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A Geelong business owner has admitted a birthday party at a CBD venue “got out of hand” and appears to have breached Covid-19 restrictions over the weekend.
Videos uploaded to social media on Saturday night show up to 18 people drinking, dancing and standing indoors at a new licenced venue – which is yet to open to the public – on Custodian Arcade in Geelong.
Current regional Covid-19 restrictions allow hospitality venues to open for seated service only, with caps of 10 people indoors, 30 outdoors and a density cap of one person per 4sq m, while also requiring patrons to wear masks unless seated.
Police on Sunday confirmed they had not received any complaints about the party.
But, business owner Nathan Johnston on Sunday shared his disappointment the private function appeared to have breached the restrictions, having “done extremely well” to follow Covid-19 rules since the start of the pandemic.
“I think at one stage we pushed everybody out, but it just got out of hand,” Mr Johnston said.
Paul Votsaris posted the videos to Instagram on Saturday night during his birthday celebrations, which he said had been organised to adhere to restrictions.
“We didn’t intend to break any rules,” Mr Votsaris said on Sunday.
“We invited a few people down to have some drinks, made a proper booking and had 10 people inside and 10 people outside.”
“Being a prominent location obviously people do walk past and pop in.
“I take responsibility, we probably could have managed it better than what we did.”
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Originally published as ‘It just got out of hand’: Geelong CBD business appears to breach Covid-19 rules in social media videos
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