VICTORIAN MUSIC VENUES LAUNCH HARDLINE “NO QR, NO ENTRY” POLICY TO ENSURE SURVIVAL
Venues pledge check-in rate of 100% in a bid to make live music one of the safest industries in the state.
Illustration by Sebi White
Music venues in Victoria have today taken their punters’ safety into their own hands by launching a NO QR, NO ENTRY policy. Initiated by Save Our Scene as a proactive measure to address the concerns of the Department of Health, music venues across Victoria are confirming their COVIDSafe compliance on a registry hosted by Music Victoria.
“We know that QR Code compliance is a big piece of the puzzle. We’re stepping up to show Health that music venues and music fans can be trusted to do the right thing.” – Simone Ubaldi, Venue Booker, The Croxton Bandroom; Manager, Amyl and the Sniffers.
To combat seemingly arbitrary disparities in restrictions between indoor non-seated venues (which make up the majority of music venues) and other industries or social settings – Save Our Scene and Music Victoria are working together to ensure that music venues have a QR code check in rate of 100%. This would enable fast contact tracing in the case of an outbreak and make live music one of the safest and most compliant industries in the state. This is ahead of the 28 May deadline announced on Friday.
“As an industry we are doing and will continue to do whatever is asked of us from Health in order to create safe environments for artists and audiences. That is number one priority, not just during COVID times but always.” –Correne Wilkie, Manager, The Cat Empire and Boy & Bear.
In addition to this new policy, many music venues have a second line of defence, through their ticketing system with Moshtix, Oztix and Eventbrite implementing mandatory Track and Trace fields, for not only the ticket purchaser – but for each guest.
“It’s in everyone’s best interest to have good contact tracing –especially with the delay in vaccine rollout – but for music venues –it’s our chance to prove that we are absolutely serious about working with the health department.” – Ben Thompson, Venue Booker, 170 Russell
With this new QR policy and such high compliance rates Save Our Scene expects to see the further easing of restrictions in June.
“We desperately need to keep pushing up the capacities of our music venues. Friday’s announcement has alleviated the pressure on about half of our venue members, but there are still many who remain severely impacted by the density quotient of 1 person per 2 square metres.” – Simone Schinkel, CEO, Music Victoria
The Victorian live music sector contributes over $1.7 billion per year 2 in GDP (including ancillary spending by patrons) and on an annual basis 116,000 full time equivalent jobs are created through the live music with every $1 spent on live music returning $3 in value.
Save Our Scene and Music Victoria urges live music audiences to get behind this campaign.
