Labor vows to empower Sydney’s ‘night mayor’ to take on bureaucrats, police

Labor is vowing to empower Sydney’s “night mayor” to take on big government agencies including the police, Liquor and Gaming, and planning in an intervention aimed at expediting the recovery of the city’s long-suffering nightlife.

Shadow arts and nighttime economy minister John Graham said the state’s 24-hour Economy Commissioner Michael Rodrigues had made a good start since 2021, but was hamstrung by bureaucrats with little experience of evening entertainment.

Queues outside the Cliff Dive nightclub at Oxford Square on a Saturday night.Credit: Dean Sewell

“They’re not out interacting with these businesses at night or seeing what’s going on, so there’s just less planning for that,” Graham said. “This is about corralling planning, police, Liquor and Gaming, transport. Without some real definition, without some real power, it’s a very tough task even with the best of intentions.”

The opposition’s bid to strengthen and expand the nighttime office is grounded in an October parliamentary report that revealed many of the government’s changes to liberalise and grow the nighttime economy had barely been used.

For example, dedicated live music or performance venues are allowed to stay open an hour longer than their standard trading time if they host a live arts event after 8pm for at least 45 minutes.

But when Liquor and Gaming surveyed 196 such venues, only 54 responded. Out of those, just three said they had used the 60-minute extension; two in the City of Sydney and one in Randwick.

The state’s NSW 24-hour Economy Commissioner Michael Rodrigues.Credit: Edwina Pickles

The government also created “special entertainment precincts” where councils could institute later trading and a more relaxed approach to noise complaints or outdoor dining. But so far, just one trial – Enmore Road in the inner west – has occurred.

“After promising a 24-hour economy, the government has hit the snooze button,” Graham said.

The government established the 24-hour economy office in early 2021 to help reshape Sydney’s nightlife after nearly a decade of damage by its own lockout laws and the COVID-19 pandemic.

But Graham said Sydney was still growing slower at night, and while bars and restaurants were OK, the city still struggled to offer a reliable, diverse mix of live music and performance options.

He said “stupid regulations” had discouraged live entertainment and the 24-hour economy office needed the power and mandate to drive change in those big bureaucracies.

“We’re still getting multiple reports of people being told they can’t do certain things, [defying] common sense,” he said. “People are starting to come back out again, and that’s encouraging, but there’s still a long way to go. The challenge is going far enough, fast enough.”

Asked what Labor would do if the 24-hour economy commissioner identified poker machines as a major inhibitor of Sydney’s nightlife, Graham said he would defer to Labor’s pokies spokesperson.

He acknowledged that Labor introducing pokies into pubs in the 1990s “clearly didn’t help, clearly had an impact on music”, but said the real culprits in the decline of live entertainment were the government’s lockout laws, pandemic lockdowns and over-regulation of venues.

Labor would also make the commissioner a permanent statutory position and expand its remit to include the Central Coast, Newcastle and Wollongong, as per the Greater Cities Commission’s ‘Six Cities’ strategy.

Night Time Industries Association chief executive Mick Gibb said Labor was moving in the right direction, but any serious nightlife reforms would need to look at legislative and regulatory requirements on noise. “That’s such a big issue for industry,” he said.

Graham acknowledged some of the changes he wanted the commissioner to pursue would require changes to planning and liquor laws, and said Labor would say more about that before polling day.

Our Breaking News Alert will notify you of significant breaking news when it happens. Get it here.