Good News Folks, Nightclubs And Festivals Could Be Back On Sooner Than Expected
Restrictions for pubs, bars, and restaurants will also ease from July 1.
Nightclubs and music festivals in New South Wales could be given the green light from August, as coronavirus restrictions continue to ease across the state.
Yesterday, Premier Gladys Berejiklian announced more changes to restrictions across the state — including the lifting of the capacity limits for pubs and restaurants.
From July 1, the 50 person limit will be replaced by a one person per four square metre rule. Additionally, funerals and weddings will have no set capacity — they just need to comply with the four square metre rule. However, you won’t be able to cut as many shapes at weddings, as there will be a 20 person limit on the dancefloor. Which should hopefully put an end to drunken performances of ‘The Grease Megamix’, which can only be a good thing.
Additionally, 7News is reporting that nightclubs and music festivals in NSW are “likely” to resume from August, as long as local cases of the virus remain low.
“Music festival and nightclubs will continue to remain closed in July as the health advice remains that these venues and activities pose a high risk of the virus spreading,” reads a statement from the NSW Government. “It is anticipated that restrictions will be eased further in August if community transmission of the virus remains low.”
Last week, Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced that socially-distanced crowds of up to 10,000 people could attend sporting events and festivals across the country, in venues that allowed seating. Venues that hold more than 40,000 people could fill seats to 25 percent capacity.
“It would have to be a large, open area. There would need to be seats at the appropriate distance. It would need to be ticketed, so people would be able to understand who was in attendance at that event,” Morrison said.
The news comes after the cancellation of Splendour and the Grass last week, which had been originally rescheduled to October when COVID-19 lockdowns were first introduced in March. Falls Festival has already flagged it will announce an all-Australian line-up for this year, as it’s still unclear when international borders will reopen.
Previously, it looked as if festivals and clubs would be off the table until a vaccine was found, with Chief Medical Officer Brendan Murphy stating back in April that large scale gatherings would be out of the question “for the foreseeable future.”
NSW recorded four new cases of COVID-19 on Saturday, from over 15,000 tests. Only one of those cases was locally acquired, with the source currently unknown.