Page 197 - Week 01 - Wednesday, 10 February 2010
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The Greens included in our paper a proposal for better public transport late at night. This received strong support and people made clear that they need and want to be able to travel home safely at night. However, the model of transport the Greens proposed and continue to support is one where transport options are provided throughout the night on an ongoing basis so that patrons can disperse on their own terms, as opposed to a predetermined surge point during the night.
If either the increased police presence or reconfigured public transport is missing, the experience has shown that lockouts simply push people out onto the streets, where they group together, some not wanting to go home just yet, others wanting to go home but being forced to wait in taxi lines. In this scenario there may be the potential for increased violence. The research talks of violent queues to enter venues before lockout, as people get nervous they are going to miss the cut-off, and violent spillover periods as the streets fill with people after lockout.
A poorly organised lockout scheme quite literally pushes the problem from a controlled space inside a venue out into the uncontrolled space of the streets. The Greens’ view is that the ACT would be foolish to take on a system of lockouts which requires large expenditure on police numbers and significant public transport reconfiguration to cater for the spill-out effect associated with lockouts. These costs would be significant and would be unjustified because, even when spent, the money would not be going towards a policy strongly backed by evidence. We would be far better served by targeting those policies that we know have a better chance of success.
The government have flagged that they will be moving to implement lockouts. The Greens do not support this and we will call on them to revisit the decision. There is much in their raft of proposals that can be acted on, that we believe are good proposals, and we would urge the government to focus on those when they bring the legislation before the chamber.
I would like to come back briefly to public transport. Our motion calls on the government to share with licensees the responsibility for getting patrons home safely. The government final report has raised the prospect of requiring venues to offer courtesy transport when there is no public transport available. This is a positive initiative that deserves support. It is dangerous to have people at drinking venues without ready access to public transport. It is sad but true that, for some, the temptation will be too great and instead of waiting for a taxi or walking to public transport they will get in their car and drink drive.
There has been significant public discussion in the last six to 12 months of the problem we have with this in the ACT. For those who drink to excess and wander home at night, it is again a shame that some will become destructive and cause distress to local residents unfortunate enough to live on their route home. Another good reason for ensuring people have ready access to transport home is that where people line up for taxis and congregate in large groups violence and antisocial behaviour can occur. Again, this is unfortunate but true.
Where the risk-based licensing system seeks to spark a cultural change about where and how we drink, providing transport recognises that this cultural change will not
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