How small bars have 'Melbourne-ified' Brisbane

Applications poured in, new bar owners were made, and nooks and crannies across the capital were opened for boutique drinking business. Then a change to the capital's planning scheme threatened to unravel the good work.

A fix of sorts that came into effect in July follows hot on the heels of heavy, state-sponsored security reforms. Industry veterans, licensees and patrons are wondering: is the dream over?

Brisbane teenager Emily-Rose Hilton came of legal drinking age in March 2017 and wasted no time making plans to go out.

A decade earlier, in 2007, local lad Michael Thompson was making similar plans for his debut, albeit with more limited choices. Then it was "big pubs or dance clubs", and certainly nothing like the chic small bar Thompson now owns in town.

The Brisbane scene was "gross," he says. It was even less sophisticated 20 years prior, when a young man called Matthew Jones started work in the liquor division of the Queensland Licensing Commission.

From this prime position, Jones surveyed his hometown nightlife, and found it so wanting that he and his friends would hightail down the highway for the glittering lights of the Gold Coast. But that didn't mean Jones didn't want Brisbane's bar culture to be better.

"There was always talk, especially among the young guard, of diversifying drinking culture in Brisbane," Jones says.

He's perched on a bench at a hip coffee shop-cum-bar, in a poky basement space under an architecture firm, down a narrow backstreet on the fringe of Fortitude Valley. It is exactly the sort of place you would expect to find in Melbourne, and the sort of place 18-year-olds like Emily-Rose Hilton now take for granted.

It's quite similar to the place a now 28-year-old Michael Thompson currently owns, and similar to the others he used to run.

But it is also exactly the sort of place Queensland's patrons of the '80s, '90s, and most of the '00s would be hard-pressed to find, largely because of the state's liquor licensing laws which were introduced in 1912. Despite multiple amendments, Jones says the legislation was "restrictive". He was excited when Parliament introduced a new Liquor Act in 1992, one he says was supposed to create a more "open, permissive" framework.

"But the people in management or leadership within government were the same people before and after the change," Jones explains. "It was quite frustrating for the young brigade (at the OLC) because our initiatives were quickly squashed."

This schism translated to things such as the 20 per cent no-dining rule which was in place before the reform, and lingered a short time after. It meant businesses with a restaurant liquor licence - which were cheaper than commercial hotel licences - had to feed 80 per cent of their patrons before serving them alcohol, though the remaining 20 per cent were allowed to just drink.

It was difficult to regulate, especially as Jones remembers some restaurants to bringing pizza around regularly to enable broader bar-like trade.

"Hoteliers hated it because it was an incursion on their territory and they'd paid a fortune for their licences," he says. "There were a couple of restaurants that pushed it too far and lost their licences over it." Such tension underscored the need for further legislative tweaking.

'Vibrant laneways' for the smart state

By 2007, conversation was seriously turning towards more licensing reform. The "smart state" had a new government, its capital had a new world-glass modern art gallery and an energetic mayor at City Hall with big infrastructure plans for a "new world city".

There was a desire to among urban planners and architects to make more of the city's built environment, and the council's master plan for the city centre introduced a "Vibrant Laneways" program. The mood to "Melbourne-ify" Brisbane was ripe.

But there were also fears about alcohol-fuelled violence. So-called 3am lockout laws had been in place since 2005, and a major liquor accords conference two years later resulted in calls for even tougher regulation.

Punitive action did result from the reforms, which eventually passed Parliament in 2008, but so too did action in favour of licensing diversity via the introduction of a new "small bars" license category that removed the need to serve food too.

Then-treasurer Andrew Fraser, whose department was responsible for administering the changes, had said "the new boutique licences" were designed to encourage the opening of "eclectic establishments??? catering to a growing clientele and allowing the growth of live music and cultural venues across Queensland."

The new licences were cheap, capped patronage at 60 people, worked well with the council's planning focus, and came into effect in January 2009, two years after Michael Thompson started enjoying the "gross" Brisbane nightlife for himself. He soon decided to open one of his own.

Licensing costs

First it was The End, and then The Jungle in West End, then Barbara in Fortitude Valley, small bars Thompson wished were around in his day.

"All our friends were moving to Melbourne - for the art, for the culture, and that included things like small wine and cocktail bars," he says.

"We'd look around Brisbane, and there was nothing like that here, but we loved living here and wanted to make it better, so when the new licences came out it, it was our chance."

Thompson's first licence cost about $700 annually. But when the city council introduced a new planning scheme in 2014, suddenly costs went up. Small suburban bars went from being self-assessable to code or impact assessable in the same way a large pub or hotel might be.

Jones, who now owns a liquor licensing consultancy, says it's a procedural difference that adds upwards of $20,000 to start-up costs, or sometimes or renders the project "so expensive you just wouldn't bother".

He says it suddenly became more attractive to open a small bar in council area such as Toowoomba or Moreton Bay, where assessment processes were different.

Figures from the Office of Liquor and Gaming Regulation show the number of small bar licences issued in Brisbane dropped from 17 in 2012-13, and 12 in 2013-14 to just four in 2014-15.

When a bar is not a hotel

Brisbane City Council planning chairman Julian Simmonds explains small bars may have an easier time accessing approval once a new state planning act had come into effect, on July 3. Cr Simmonds says the act separates out the definition of bar from "hotel", enabling the council to implement "transitional" approach to its own scheme with regards to planning assessment.

"It will mean we can make amendments that will help if you are wanting to open a small bar in an area where we are encouraging small bars - like Spring Hill or Fortitude Valley," he says.

"Council for a long time have been very supporting of this small bar culture, and we will continue to be where we can."

But while it might be welcome news to industry consultants such as Jones, Thompson raises the spectre of other regulation that threatens the survival of these boutique businesses especially in areas like Fortitude Valley: ID scanners.

ID scanners come into the picture

From July 1 this year, patrons of licensed venues in designated entertainment precincts in Brisbane - like Fortitude Valley - have to submit to an ID scan at the front door for entry after 10pm.

For a small bar licensee, with ordinary trading hours of 10am until midnight, the scanning technology and associated staff costs are an impost.

From research for clients, Jones estimates a standard 18-month contract term could cost a venue with two entrances, with authority to trade until 3am seven nights per week, that usually closes at midnight Sunday to Thursday, upwards of $120,000.

After the initial upfront contract costs, Thompson estimated he'd spend $100 a week to hire a scanner, and an extra $800 in associated staff costs, despite only using the scanner two nights a week.

"It's pushing me out of existence really," he says. "There should be different compliance standard for small venues than bigger ones - we are called low-risk venues because that's what we are, low risk; low risk of violence, of intoxication, underage intoxication - small, boutique bars aren't the problem."

'Just so regimented'

Eighteen-year-old Emily-Rose Hilton agrees.

She and her friends love going to small bars because "you can have a proper conversation - it's a place that has a better social environment - you go there to talk and enjoy a nice glass of wine, or a cocktail if it's a special occasion".

Hilton relishes the opportunity to socialise this way, or to choose a dance club for a big night, or a pub for the popular "Sunday sesh" tradition.

But despite the arrival of small bars on the Brisbane scene, a presence she and her peers take for granted, Hilton - like generations of 18-year-olds before her - still doesn't think the local nightlife is "anywhere as sophisticated" as it could be, or is elsewhere.

"Brisbane is just so regimented," the law student says. "Melbourne has something new, something interesting and creative to offer; the vibe in Brisbane is just ??? mundane."