NSW ramps up drug detection targets as it flogs the dead horse of prohibition

Good policing or self-fulfilling prophesy?

NSW Police are being given detection targets that demand an increase in drug detections by a massive 86%

Certain suburbs like Kings Cross, Broken Hill, Mt Druitt and South Sydney have far higher targets than the average while North Shore suburbs have among the lowest. Cynics may conclude that the well-off areas where cocaine is the drug of choice are getting a 'Get out of Jail Free' card.

And, despite clear international evidence that decriminalisation and case management is a cheaper and more effective way to address illicit drugs, those targets are the highest of all categories.

Critics say this quota approach will result in bias errors like racial profiling and do nothing to increase community safety – at a time where the incarceration rate of non-white people is stoking widespread protest.

From the SMH article linked above –

Professor Murray Lee, director of the Sydney Institute of Criminology at the University of Sydney, said focusing on... drug supply, could push the offence rates higher over time and risk it becoming a "self-fulfilling prophecy".

"You may well see police going for the low-hanging fruit, whether that's over-policing in particular areas to meet those targets, going after the usual suspects," Professor Lee said.

The target for robbery in Ku-ring-gai has fallen 40 per cent since 2016 to 20 this year, while actual incidents have been increasing in that area, tripling from 10 in 2016 to 30 last year.

This is a landmark in the War against Kings Cross

OK I was wrong. I had predicted that 1.30 lockouts and 3am closing would result in more violence as the Kings Cross crowds battled it out over taxis. But after three weeks of the new regime it seems the crowds have simply stopped coming. It's a landmark in the eternal War against Kings Cross.

Bayswater Road last Saturday night, showing one of several
trailer-mounted signs flashing the new regime.

I took these photos on Saturday night, when the trial closure of Bayswater Road to through traffic was being trialled. The signage flagged a 9pm closure but at 9.30 they didn't seem to be in place and the crowds and traffic were so sparse there didn't seem to be much point.
It looks as if the authorities, too, have been caught offguard at people's desertion of Sydney's late-night entertainment precinct.
It makes sense though - when I pointed out the lack of people at 9.30, a friend said "people will come later". But if there is no "later", why would they come?
People have to eat somewhere, then they have to get into the city, or they go somewhere local for some cheaper drinks before heading in. The crowds used to really hit after midnight. But what's the point of that if you are going to be locked out of all venues at 1.30? It's not worth the trip in from the 'burbs. In today's mobile phone-fuelled, flexible social landscape, people from all over the city move about, change venues and meet their friends anywhere. The 1.30 lockout freezes all that.
These ill-conceived rules were made by old farts who still think in terms of their distant youth, before mobile phones (and before drugs that help people party all night were common currency - you know, the ones that are "controlled" by prohibition). I have heard more than one old killjoy say things like "Why can't these people just go home by midnight".
The baby has truly thrown out with the bathwater and when the data are in, I now predict a sorry tale of  lost jobs, business failure and - if the data are even collected - the displacement of drunken violence to other areas and private homes.
Welcome to the nanny state.

PS I'm told 25 staff have been sacked from the Kings Cross Hotel alone after the lockouts reduced their average 1am crowd from 900 to 200.

Maybe the lockouts have an upside - The Vegas Hotel seems to be getting creative
about pulling customers, with bloke and girly shows. But these sexy boys were finding
it hard to pull girls from nearly non-existent crowds.

Lockouts and new anti-alcohol laws simply deny the facts

There was a petition on the bar of my local against the NSW government's recent early lockout laws. I signed it. While I have been railing for years against this moral panic-driven nonsense, this piece by Bernard Keane on Crickey unpicks the hypocrisy of the laws and the media campaign behind it, particularly the shameful behaviour of the formerly trustworthy Sydney Morning Herald.

The piece is less than complimentary about media tart Dr Gordian Fulde from St Vincents Hospital, a doctrinaire prohibitionist who in my view should stick to his doctoring and keep his doctrines out of public commentary.

Writes Keane:

Fulde is insistent that violence is getting worse in Sydney and that alcohol is to blame. It is a claim that the Herald was happy to repeat. It is also a claim that is blatantly false... Last year’s Review of the Liquor Act 2007and Gaming and Liquor Administration Act 2007 showed that violent incidents on licensed premises had fallen 28% from 2007, and alcohol-related assaults had fallen 35% between 2008 and 2012. Assaults across NSW had also fallen significantly, as had hospital presentations for acute alcohol-related problems.
And for those who believe that review was a Big Grog conspiracy, you can go to the NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research site and look at the data yourself.

Here are the relevant data:

Keane again hits the nail on the head, ascribing the cheap populist campaign run by Sydney's newspapers to their plummetting circulation:

This takes us to the most relevant statistics about this whole sordid affair. The Sydney Morning Herald’s circulation is in freefall — it lost more than 15% of its circulation in the year to September. And in 2013, it fell 7 points in its readers’ trust, according to Essential Research’s trust in media survey, tumbling to 64%. The Telegraph is Australia’s least-trusted metro title — trusted by only 41% of its readers — and its circulation fell by nearly as much as the Herald’s in the year to September. They are two dying newspapers, each desperate to outdo the other.

The lockout laws so-far seem to be killing the Cross, which might please a few local NIMBYs but will cause hardship to all the hospitality workers and entertainers now thrown out of work.

Latest 'coward's punch' triggers more moral panic about Kings Cross

Sean McNeil, charged with the murder of Daniel Christie.

Sadly another young life has been ended by a violent thug king-hitting innocents in the street. Daniel Christie was attacked in Kings Cross on New Year's Eve and later died in hospital. Shaun McNeil, a self-described 'mixed martial arts expert', has been charged. Bizarrely, photos show has the name of his victim tattooed on his arm (while apparently sculling Bundy rum, the one said to contain "a bushfire and a bashing in every bottle").

Predictably the anti-Kings Cross hordes (most of them from elsewhere) have spun into loud chorus blaming venues and the AHA, and calling for lockouts, earlier closing of pubs and application of the Newcastle 'solution' to Kings Cross.

The facts, however, throw a few wet blankets over the moral panic.

The attack happened at 9pm. How would earlier closing have helped in this case? Do the anti-venue crowd propose 8pm closing?

Meanwhile violence rates in Kings Cross venues have dropped by about a third (a similar rate to that of Newcastle after the lockout regime) since the similar manslaughter of Thomas Kelly - which happened at almost the same spot and at 10 pm - also nothing to do with late-night venues.

And the "coward's punch" has been used to deadly effect in other places besides Kings Cross. Strangely the anti-Cross brigade do not raise a hue-and-cry in these cases.

So, what's the bet that Shaun McNeil is a Rugby League fan, like other recent king-hit killers? When is macho footy culture going to be dragged into this debate? That sacred cow is where the real problem lies.

Getting the facts about Thomas Kelly's manslaughter.

The War on Kings Cross continues, with the king-hit killing of Thomas Kelly being dragged in by both sides of the debate.

In letters to the Wentworth Courier, the AHA's Paul Nicolau rebuts a previous claim by local resident Jo Holder that Keiran Loveridge had been served alcohol in Kings Cross before he king-hit Thomas Kelly. In fact both are wrong. J Campbell's published Supreme Court judgement says:

"...before catching a taxi to Kings Cross where they went to a bar in Darlinghurst Road shortly before 9pm. There is no agreement about whether the offender consumed more alcohol in this bar."

The anti-alcohol brigade always blame venues for violence, claiming they don't apply Responsible Service of Alcohol (RSA) provisions, ie refusing to serve drunks. Apparently they ignore this in the interests of maximising their evil profits. However I can get absolutely shitfaced and still act sober enough to get into a pub and then served.

The judgement does say Loveridge had been refused entry to a bar in Bayswater Road at about 9.30pm immediately before he started on his violent rampage. Possibly this bar's correct application of RSA principles actually triggered or aggravated his violence, illustrating the dilemma venues have in managing pre-fuelled drunks - they are damned if they do or don't. It illustrates that RSA is an inexact science and tighter enforcement will not necessarily solve problems.

It also annoys me that this tragic crime has been enrolled by the anti-alcohol brigade in their campaign for earlier closing and lockouts at venues.  It happened at about 10pm folks. How would earlier closing have helped that?

Paul Nicolau also claims that violence in Kings Cross has already dropped by 37% as new precinct management principles have been applied over the past few years. This fits with what I know from local sources and neutralises the anti-alcohol brigade's mantra that Kings Cross should emulate Newcastle's lockout regime, which is said to have reduced violence by the same amount.

It's also interesting reading the rationale behind the controversial sentence imposed on Keiran Loveridge. I think it was a fair sentence by the standards of our legal system. However the role of Loveridge's involvement with Rugby League is seen as a mitigating factor rather than part of the problem, as I have previously blogged.

Thomas Kelly and the latest Kings Cross panic

Even the recently diminished Sydney Morning Herald has bought into the latest tizz about 'fixing' Kings Cross after the senseless murder of Thomas Kelly who was king-hit from behind at random in Victoria Street, about 100 metres from where I live.

Never mind that this assault, and a day or two later a serious 'glassing', took place before 10 pm, the hue and cry is again raised about late-night trading and 'over-saturation' of venues.

Never mind that neither Thomas Kelly or his alleged attacker had been in any of the local venues [This was later debated as I have sinced blogged here]. Never mind that within the week another man was similarly killed by a king-hit in Kingscliff in northern NSW, and another serious 'glassing' took place in south-west Sydney. No, the problem is apparently Kings Cross and its late-night venues.

Then two ex-first grade Rugby League players were arrested for the Kingscliff incident and one Kieran Loveridge was arrested over the Kings Cross incident - while watching a practice session of League team the Canterbury Bulldogs at Belmore oval.

Presuming that Loveridge attends practice sessions of his favourite League team because he is pretty heavily into the game, it seems football and its culture of macho violence is the common problem here, not Kings Cross. But do we hear any outcry about Rugby League? Quite the opposite as I show below.

Laneway drama a storm in a coffee cup

Jane and James in Llankelly Place in the old days
before it came back to life.

A local dispute reported in the SMH over café chairs in Llankelly Place Kings Cross has escalated into a bit of a drama via emails and letters to the editor.
After the original story appeared I got an email from someone I didn't know - David at exemail - copied to restaurateur Neil Perry, demanding that Mr Perry apologise for siding with the Room 10 coffee bar in Llankelly Place. I replied, asking who 'David' was, where he got my email address, and also siding with the coffee bar. Mr Perry replied this morning, not apologising but explaining he was not a 'celebrity chef' -

I'm an Australian who employes 520 staff, pay millions in taxes and raises lots of dollars for charity. I own 7 businesses in 3 States of Australia, I believe in young people making a difference.
Thanks, Neil

It seems Jo Holder of the Cross Arts Gallery, said to have complained about the seats, has some supporters besides 'David' at exemail (who did not reply to my email).

Next came a letter in the SMH from Carole Ferrier, a local Labor branch colleague of Ms Holder's and close ally in the War Against Pubs. She complained about café people keeping people awake at night, making it sound as if she lived above the café. But I'm pretty sure the café doesn't open at night, and as far as I know Ms Ferrier lives in Altair, facing east - about  half a k from the café. But maybe she's moved downmarket?

Anyway, two letters replied brilliantly. Couldn't have said it better myself:

Don't go back to the bad old days 

Carole Ferrier (Letters, March 14) needs reminding that Llankelly Place where Room 10 is situated, was formerly a rat and needle-infested laneway. It was frequented by prostitutes, drunk revellers and addicts needing a place to shoot up. There has been a concerted effort by council and local business people to bring life and a sense of community to an area of Kings Cross that sorely needed rejuvenation.
There are now at least a dozen restaurants, cafes and shops in this alley that provide employment, services and a sense of security to locals. Would she prefer the bad old days?
Adrian Young Elizabeth Bay 

I grew up in Kings Cross many years ago, but even then it was a noisy, rambunctious and ''colourful'' precinct, and has been, famously, since its hobohemia days of the 1920s and 1930s. Moving into it and complaining about noise is a little like diving into the ocean and whingeing about being wet.
John Newton Glebe

Then two more great letters turned up on March 16:

Cross still the king
Of course Kings Cross is noisy (Letters, March 15). It is peppered with people struggling to survive in society, and sometimes violent, but you won't find a livelier place to live anywhere in Australia.
Norm Neill Darlinghurst 

Old memories of Kings Cross are many but mine are dominated by an event in the early 1950s. I was having an illegal, after-hours drink in a dive called Le Primatif. I was with a former Wallaby when there was a raid by the vice squad detective Bumper Farrell and the local police. Bumper sighted David, the ex-Wallaby, and said, ''Get out, Dave, and take your dopey mate with you". Nice to be recognised.
Graeme Berman Manly

Police bid to control strip club management bounced

Trouble-prone Kings Cross strip club Showgirls is in the news again with the liquor regulator rejecting a police bid to veto the club's choice of manager.

A story in today's Sydney Morning Herald recounts a string of troubles linked to the club over recent years, from allegations of credit card fraud to cocaine being sold on the premises and dancers being arrested on drugs charges.

The veto was one of 14 new licence conditions slapped on the club. But the club fought it and Chris Sidoti, chairman of the liquor authority, agreed with the club's lawyer that giving police such powers could lead to police corruption. The law stipulates that licensing and enforcement powers are separated, precisely to avoid this problem.

Meanwhile another Kings Cross venue owner is claiming the old police practice of 'greenlighting' - offering drug dealers certain immunities if they dob in other dealers - is alive and well. The club owner claims that a 'greenlighted' dealer has demanded 'protection' money and ignored attempts to have him barred from the venue, including an AVO. Police would no doubt deny any such claim.

The venue owner, who claims not to use illicit drugs and works to keep them off the premises, says drugs should be legalised to stop the rot. Whether or not the allegations are true, the underbelly of prohibition is, as always,  dark, dirty and devious.

Getting real about Kings Cross nightlife

Police arrest a male in Roslyn St after he randomly
smashed his bag into a passing girl and
knocked her over, according to a witness. (File pic)

There seems to be a new wind blowing in Sydney, and it's a pleasant one. Good street art is staying on walls longer, new live venues are proliferating, and this: After years of we locals saying the best solution to violence in Kings Cross (or anywhere) is to arrest the thugs, not shut the place down, it seems that's what's happening:
http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/police-back-kings-cross-guards-who-are-helping-in-fight-against-crime-20111030-1mqet.html

I've reported on this as it developed, and while the move seems to be a good one, there are reservations about privatising policing. We'll see how it travels.

Policing Kings Cross goes private

Do we want Bobbies on the Kings Cross beat - or bouncers?

Despite a long-standing offer from Kings Cross venues and businesses to fund extra police on the late night weekend beats, it seems the only extra policing will come from a privately funded security force.

The private force will have limited co-operative links with the Police.

An editorial in today's Sydney Morning Herald documents the risks of giving private businesses and nightclub owners the power to exile certain people from their "feifdom". This informal business group intends to formalise an existing database of troublemakers it has compiled to protect each other from hosting violent incidents and attracting government sanctions. The SMH lists other concerns:

Yet many will wonder about the wisdom of setting up a private security service to carry out normal policing functions. What are the powers of the roaming guards? How are they selected? What privacy rules cover the troublemaker database? How will the information on it be used, or secured?

This raises the question: Why have the state government and the police refused to consider the long-standing offer to fund "DIY Policing" using the Police force. I'd rather have them, for all their faults, than another army of bouncers pushing people around.

The informal database of troublemakers began after Newcastle instigated its early pub shutdown and venue managers noticed a spike in violence in Kings Cross. They realised groups of young men were taking the train down from Newcastle, arriving drunk and then behaving badly. It's a perfect example of the balloon effect - the displacement of problems often caused by prohibition strategies.

Surprise surprise - Kings Cross residents like the nightlife

As reported in the SMH today:

The University of Western Sydney's City After Dark project found 88 per cent of residents in neighbourhoods such as Kings Cross and Darlinghurst said nightlife added to the appeal of their suburb, a view particularly strong among younger renters.

Fortunately even Clover Moore seems to have got the message that the local temperance union are a minority who simply moved into the wrong suburb, and pandering to them is a vote loser. Her rhetoric has changed from talking about "shocking evidence" of alcohol fuelled mayhem to a more balanced approach of fostering a diverse night time economy. Let's hope.

Now if I could only find a small bar where I could afford the drinks...

Beware a new police state in NSW

David Clarke at home in Cherrybrook,
heart of the hills district bible belt
Photo: Hills Shire Times

Inner city subcultures beware: hard times are a-coming.

I was dismayed this morning to hear that hard-right Christian Liberal prohibitionist David Clarke ha been appointed Parliamentary Secretary to the Attorney-General AND head of the Standing Committee on Law and Justice. He had held these positions in the shadow government before the elections. On top of a $17,000 pay rise, this gives him powerful influence over the NSW law and order agenda.

This is where the nice avuncular face of Barry O'Farrell, who supported Clarke in his preselection, gives way to persecution and intolerance. Front and centre will be a crackdown on users of illicit drugs as Clarke is hand-in-glove with a worldwide network of fanatical right-wing Christian prohibitionists who really want to use the law to force everyone else to live like them.

Organisations such as Drug Free Australia (linked to Drug free America) incessantly lobby politicians to get tougher on drugs, wilfully ignoring mountains of evidence showing that prohibition causes more harm than drugs, and stereotyping drug users (other than alcohol, prescription drugs or tobacco, of course) as crazy dysfunctionals as per the film Reefer Madness.

They call for mandatory drug testing and ever-harsher penalties for drug offences. For a taste of what we may face, see Florida USA* which has just brought in mandatory drug testing for welfare recipients (who have to pay for the tests!). Those caught face a year or more without benefits - can you imagine the crime, distress and mayhem that will result from creating a new underclass of unemployed drug users with no income.

Locals win over Fitzroy Gardens but fake consultation reigns

Word has already raced around Kings Cross: After a massive local campaign of opposition, Clover Moore has backed down over Council proposals to redevelop Fitzroy Gardens and nearby Lawrence Hargrave Reserve.

Ms Moore made the surprise announcement via a Lord Mayoral Minute at last night's Council meeting.

You can read the details via the link above, but the language and content of the Minute reinforces the fake consultation processes Ms Moore has perfected since becoming Lord Mayor in 2004.

The minute opens with yet another lengthy spiel about the enthusiastic support the project had according to Council's consultation process. This support of course was never there, but was spun like fairy floss out of cherrypicked snippets and Council's biased analysis of feedback.

A prime example was the reporting on the first consultation session in 2008, when we residents were asked to use sticky notes to post what we liked or didn't like about the Gardens as they are. An avalanche of comments appeared on the 'like' board with relatively few on the 'don't like' board. Among them were many notes saying 'Leave it alone' or 'If it ain't broke, don't fix it'.

More drug busts but Sydney city getting safer

A story in today's SMH curiously contradicts various themes of moral panic and popular myth that dominate other areas of the media.

It reports a steep rise in victimless prostitution and drug 'crimes' - ie people being caught with cocaine, cannabis or amphetamines - but a reduction in crimes against person and property like assault, robbery or murder.

The City of Sydney along with parts of the north shore are the safest areas of Sydney. This curiously contradicts rhetoric about 'out of control alcohol-fuelled violence' that fills pages of media and the emails of serial complainers to Council.

The increase in 'drug crime' contradicts law and order rhetoric that the War against Drugs is working.

A passage from the story follows:

But the number of recorded cases of dealing in amphetamines rose more than 63 per cent, while possession of the illegal stimulants was up almost 55 per cent.

Cocaine possession was also up 23.3 per cent and trafficking in cannabis rose more than 33 per cent.

Prostitution offences also rose from 176 recorded incidences in 2009 to 275 the following year.

Across the state, motor vehicle theft fell 9.3 per cent, malicious damage was down about 10 per cent and stealing from a person also dropped more than 10 per cent.

The City of Sydney and Ku-ring-gai were the safest places to be, according to the bureau report released this morning. Sydney recorded fewer incidences of six of the 17 major offences and in the Ku-ring-gai council area the numbers fell in five of those categories.

But violent crime in two council areas – Ashfield and Cobar – rose almost 40 per cent and 50 per cent respectively over the two years.

Letter of the week: Clover Moore = Alan Jones?

The widening cultural gap between regulators and the rest of us was beautifully expressed in a Sydney Morning Herald letter today. The sad thing is, the Law and Order class will never understand.

The zombie-like security process at the Jack Johnson concert occurs often enough, but rarely on this delicious scale. That is, the middle-aged leisure classes who bray for ''law and order'' and curbs on those outside their own lifestyle are finally subjected to their own rules. To sinfully paraphrase William Makepeace Thackeray: it is one thing to hoot in agreement with Alan Jones and Clover Moore from a snug armchair at home. It is another to experience the reality first-hand.

William Cattell Sydney

What's most interesting is the comparison of Clover Moore and Alan Jones, who are usually cast as mortal enemies. But they share this in common: Raising a moral panic and then demanding heavy-handed regulation to solve the 'problem'.

Yesterday the state government revoked Clover's Late Night Trading Development Control Plan, a surprise move that has Clover spitting chips, accusing the government of caving in to the AHA and the alcohol industry. While this may be true, I'm cheering because it's a great outcome for youth culture, youth employment and my right to live in a global city with a 24-hour entertainment precinct.

And after Clover used her casting vote "with great pleasure" to order the demolition of the caretaker's cottage and ending Rory Miles' hopes of continuing to run the adjacent Rushcutters Bay Tennis courts, I am truly over Clover. Rarely have I seen such a ruthless trampling of clear community desires.

The action casts Clover as an old, out-of-touch dictator rather than the resident-friendly progressive pollie she likes to portray. She has destroyed a community for the sake of her old-maidish Tidy Towns obsession. As one older man said from the gallery at the Council meeting after her vote: "Shame, Clover - you're a disgrace to Australia".

Do I look good in the battle at El Alamein?

Mr Gormly ... "If it ain't broke, don't fix it." Photo: Helen Nezdropa

Photographers generally hate being photographed -- you know how the picture never matches your self-image.

So it's weird seeing my picture in today's Sydney Morning Herald, in a story about our local campaign against the demolition and redevelopment of Fitzroy Gardens .

Forget the issues -- I look like a sad, sagging old bloke instead of the fit, statuesque Adonis I feel myself to be.

But the story's not bad for a brief summary. Council justifies their intention to remove over 5,000 convict bricks by saying they "appear to have been imported from elsewhere" -- like, perhaps Japan?

No, wherever they came from, they "appear" to have been in situ for 40 years now and, unlike a museum piece or a brass plaque are still functioning as they were intended to - forming useful walls, and totally in the public domain where people can appreciate them and touch part of the earliest white history in Australia.

The story mentions key points like the rally to be held tomorrow and the unsuitability of opening up the entertainment precinct to the residential precinct behind via a new visual boulevarde running past the police station.

Clover Moore's latest pro-redevelopment letter is quoted, saying the ''renewal will respect the park's extensive heritage since 1939."

How does demolishing something respect its heritage? Mind you, the sentence is a finely crafted piece of spin, using their current buzzword "renewal" when the Local Action Plan says "refresh"; and it refers to lost 1939 heritage and ignores the heritage-listed 1971 layer of significance, as per the whole Council justification for their radical plans.

[at 5.16am there were three people reading the SMH story. Hello to those anonymous kindred spirits - or are they Council spin-doctors girding themselves for another day battling the residents they are supposed to represent? Hullo! at 5.18 there were six people reading it! It's the new craze!]

But that story is only a tame introduction to local writer Delia Falconer's opinion piece in the same edition, headlined: "Council's plan to rip out heart of the Cross". [Mind you, only two people were reading it at 5.22am! -- but the day is still young).

More on that on the Save Fitzroy Gardens website!

Wave of support to save Fitzroy Gardens

Beautiful Fitzroy Gardens - if it ain't broke, don't fix it!

The City's plan to demolish and redesign Fitzroy Gardens in Kings Cross, site of the El Alamein Fountain, is stirring a growing wave of opposition as locals realise the treasure in their midst. Meetings among all the local business and resident groups, a fast-growing petition and a rally to be held at the Gardens on Saturday 6 November are just some of the roadblocks being erected in front of Council's bulldozers.

Yours truly volunteered to make the website in co-operation with a network of locals and, even if I say so myself, when you see the facts and photos laid out you have to wonder what ignorance prompted Council to launch this project -- which has been on their books at least since 2003, although they are spinning that the community requested it in 2007.

The site is at http://www.savefitzroygardens.com/index.html (not all the pages are finished at the time of writing, but you'll get the idea.

Herald journalist gets all mixed up

Vanda Carson has been writing in The Sydney Morning Herald about Kings Cross lately. Her story in Saturday's  edition though, shows either terrible confusion or really bad sub-editing. It was a long weekend, after all.

In a story about Council’s War on Kings Cross, Vanda writes:

Residents are also mostly supportive of the plan, with the majority of Kings Cross and Oxford Street residents wanting fewer pubs or a cap on the number of liquor licences, according to a council survey.
The survey also showed 20 per cent of Oxford Street residents and 16 per cent of Kings Cross residents believed either the opening hours or the number of alcohol outlets should be restricted to curtail violence, noise, vomiting and public nuisance issues.

Excuse me, Vanda, how do figures of 16% and 20% justify the phrase "the majority of Kings Cross and Oxford Street residents wanting fewer pubs". They sound like a rather small minority to me, as I have been banging on about.

The only survey Vanda Carson could have been referring to* showed only 16 percent of residents wanted to "Restrict opening hours/alcohol outlets". That's far from a majority. Perhaps Vanda is a bit mathematically challenged and reads what she expects to believe.

Vanda also qualifies Council's recent series of losses in court by describing the victors with terms like "powerful hoteliers", as if Council's bottomless budget and corporate size does not match or exceed that of their opponents. The fact is, Council's evidence simply does not stack up, as I reported on at length in the current City News.

In a series of reports, I show from Hansard records (2 June 2010) how Clover Moore wants to shut everything down at midnight (Off to bed early, Sydney, says Clover);

And how Police and Council are ignoring other measures to improve amenity in Kings Cross (DIY Policing offer ignored).

All the above were tied up in a comment piece (My generation’s War on Nightlife puts down a new generation).


*P 32 (print) or P 38 (pdf pagination) of Late night trading - Community perceptions (June 2008, Urbis)

Sydney suffers split personality over Sin City

The Underbelly-inspired avalanche of television, books and museum exhibits about Kings Cross sits in strange contrast to the ongoing War on Kings Cross being waged by Council, the State Government and a few local NIMBYs (Not In My Back Yard).

Latest is an exhibition in the Police and Justice Museum, Sin City, described today by Michael Duffy in the SMH. with a few juicy quotes from a new book by former High Court Judge Michael Kirby. Interestingly, 71 people were reading it when I logged on. By contrast, nobody else was reading about an art exhibition by visiting rocker Niagara, and only eight people were reading about indigenous students being six years behind other school students in literacy and numeracy.

People seem to love life in the fast lane up the Cross, but you'd never know it from the moralistic rhetoric coming from police and City of Sydney councillors.

Ever was it thus, I suppose, going back to our convict origins. What bemuses me is why the partying masses tolerate the nanny-state attitude of the authorities. My theory is that it's all rooted in Catholic-type guilt as the sinners tug their forelock and say "Sorry, Your Honour, I know I did wrong but I can't help myself". They promise not to do it again -- at least until the next weekend rolls around.

My other theory is that the more our society is oppressed by nannyism, the more people will behave like children instead of adults, so the ever-increasing regulation reduces the personal responsibility of the governed class and the problem just keeps spiralling.

Pic: Some of the thousands of partygoers still flocking to Kings Cross. What chance do sour old Councillors have in combating the joie de vivre of Sydney's gorgeous youngsters?

Anti-drinking ad may achieve the opposite

Gee, the advertising fraternity needs to go back to basics. This ad displayed at Kings Cross station tries to deter girls from binge-drinking. But look at the imagery. Delete the uptight girl in the middle and what have you got? Everyone's idea of a good time -- what people really want to do if only they could shed their inhibitions. The choice of a middle-eastern looking guy as the 'bad predator' is interesting, too.

Message to guys: get the girl drunk if you want to score.

Other ads in the series are far better, like the one showing a young drunk dickhead razzing a thick-necked bouncer and probably about to get his head punched in.