Festivale chairwoman Lou Clark
Festivale chairwoman Lou Clark says Tasmanian volunteer-run community events will either fail or have to contract expensive event co-ordination experts to survive increasing regulatory burdens.
On Thursday, Launceston's Carols by Candlelight was thrown in doubt when the Riverside Lions Club said it could no longer run the event after 33 years in charge.
Ms Clark said yesterday the regulatory compliance burdens at local, state and federal government levels were unlikely to be relaxed.
``What this means is that events predominantly organised and run by volunteers will either cease to run or those organisations that can afford to will have to employee event staff or contract event co-ordination out to private enterprise specialising in this area,'' she said.
Ms Clark, who also organises a community New Year's Eve event at Royal Park each year, said about $150,000 from Festivale's budget was swallowed up by compliance costs as well as hundreds of volunteer hours.
Coyote Special Events director Rick Marton said Tasmanian events were over-regulated.
``We seem to be getting to a point now where regulations are put in for the sake of being seen to do the job,'' he said.
``This is frustrating because it can risk the entire budget of the event.''
Ms Clark said a new compliance regulation emerged each year.
``A council officer puts a different interpretation from the previous year on a regulation or tells you that your experts' advice is not correct,'' she said.
``Or you have to deal with a number of different people in various different departments and agencies.
``It adds a whole new level of frustration to running an event because generally it's not about how can we help make this work for you.''
Launceston City Council general manager Robert Dobrzynski said all event organisers were provided with advice and assistance to meet regulatory requirements by the council's events facilitation officer.
He said the council would meet with organisations that had expressed frustrations over red tape related to community events to document their concerns.
