A landmark ruling has been handed down by NCAT, overruling an ILGA decision to prevent late-trading at Iris Group’s Station House Hotel in Campsie.
In 2015 Canterbury Council granted development approval for what was to become the Station House, on Beamish Street, in the south-western Sydney suburb of Campsie. The approval granted 2am trading Monday to Saturday, and midnight Sundays.
Application was put to the Independent Liquor and Gaming Authority (ILGA) to transfer an existing hotel licence from nearby Hurlstone Park. This was granted, but on condition the trading hours were cut back to midnight, and 10pm Sundays.
The Hotel’s current licensee, Suphanna Bun, applied to ILGA to extend the hours to what had been approved by Council, but this was denied, and a merits review was subsequently filed with NCAT (NSW Civil & Administrative Tribunal).
In December, a hearing took place between ILGA (the Respondent) and Bun, represented by industry specialist law firm Hatzis Cusack. The ruling by NCAT senior member Naida Isenberg has now been released.
The Application submitted that Council had previously approved the hours, implying it was satisfied the extended trading was acceptable to the community, and noted having not received a single complaint from locals in the 18 months trading since Bun had been licensee.
There are three other gaming venues in close proximity to the Hotel, all of which are licensed to trade well beyond midnight.
Adam Purcell, former Superintendent of Police, was engaged to conduct surveillance and presented evidence of observing most of the Station House patrons (75 per cent on Friday and Saturday nights) migrating from it to the other venues upon closing. At no time did he observe anyone noticeably affected by alcohol, nor any sign of anti-social behaviour or criminal activity.
In its application, the Hotel also agreed to cap patron numbers after midnight at 75 people, with two security guards and CCTV, a two-drink serving limit at the bar and a free courtesy bus delivering revellers home after 10pm. It was suggested allowing the later trading would mean patrons dispersing more incrementally, rather than be forced out as a group at midnight.
In consideration, Isenberg stressed NCAT must be satisfied the overall social impact – negative and positive – will not be detrimental.
Particular weight was given to a petition signed by over 600 patrons of the Hotel, but most pertinently it was deemed “clear” that requiring the midnight closing was not preventing gaming patrons from continuing to gamble elsewhere.
This echoes with research commissioned by Liquor & Gaming published late 2019, which argued that an effective shutdown period on gaming machines must be across the board.
Isenberg saw the mandated early closing as an attempt to conduct policy on alcohol and gambling, and not based on evidence.
“It is somewhat disingenuous, it seems to me, if this were the case, to target the Applicant in order to achieve this end.
“It is difficult to see why the Respondent continued to oppose the application when the issues the departmental officers and the Police had raised appear to have been addressed by the Applicant in the proposed conditions.”
As a result, the decision under review was set aside and the Hotel’s licence extended.
This represents the first time a decision by ILGA on trading hours has been overturned, highlighting its mandate to apply evidence-based reasoning in its decisions, and showing it can be held accountable to a higher authority.
Parties involved were unable to comment.
