Sydney lock-out laws - Data analysis
In February 2014, Sydney introduced new laws to curb alcohol-fuelled violence within Sydney CBD (1.30am lockouts and 3am last drinks at bars, pubs and clubs).
With the latest news that the lock-out laws will be lifted from 14th January 2020, we looked back at the impact the laws had on related crime within and just outside the designated zones.
Methodology
We looked at four key crime offences (domestic and non domestic violence related assault & offensive language and conduct), from 59 months pre lock-out (Mar-09 to Jan-14) compared to 59 months post lock-out (Feb-14 to Dec-18).
Data from Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research.
We have contextualised by showing the NSW overall trend.
The analysis below uses an interactive map that we built. You too can dig for insights. Click here (best viewed on a laptop).
Analysis summary
Over the analysis time period, NSW has seen a decrease of 11.6% in these four offences:
So with this in mind, we would expect our locked down entertainment zone to also exhibit the same trends, which it does (see the black border indicating the lock-out areas).
The green colour represents those suburbs that have shown a decrease between the time periods; so all of the Lock-out zones have seen a positive impact.
Red indicates an increase, which we can see in Pyrmont, Double Bay, Zetland and the inner west areas around Newtown.
Our tool allows you to hover over a suburb and see the underlying data.
So for Potts Point, home of Kings Cross, one of the main troublesome areas, we can see the huge impact the lock-out law had; a 56% decrease in these offences.
Whereas Pyrmont (home of the Star casino) has seen an increase of 51%!
Given that the rest of NSW has seen an overall drop of 11%, this is a huge discrepancy.
This hasn’t been the case for all proximal displacement areas, such as Surry Hills and Paddington, even though there is a large pub and bar scene.
Newtown (part of the distal displacement area) has seen an 11.3% increase, with similar increases in nearby Camperdown and Erskineville.
Another prime displacement location is the Golden Sheaf in Double Bay. This area has seen an increase of 25%.
While both of these percentages are large, the underlying volumes of incidents is still relatively small compared to Kings Cross and Sydney CBD in general.
Conclusion
The lock-out laws have had the desired impact on the zoned areas and although the displacement impact has been quite heavy in terms of percentage change, the overall volumes of incidents has decreased dramatically.
Here are the numbers:
The lock-out area has seen a decrease of over 6,000 incidents.
The largest volume increase was seen in Pyrmont of 434 incidents.
So the net gain has been very positive in terms of crime statistics but at what cost? With pedestrian traffic dropping by 80% and Sydney having to deal with a nanny state image problem, will the reversal of the lock-out laws bring back a nightlife culture with lower crime statistics? Time will tell.
Side analysis
Whilst investigating the lock-out laws, we spotted an overall increase in Domestic violence related assaults throughout NSW. Although not a direct link to the lock-out laws, this was highlighted in 2015 as a Priority from the Premier (“Reducing domestic violence reoffending”), so this is rather concerning.
If we pan out, the number of red hot spots (% increase) is quite varied across the Sydney region, although keep in mind, that some volumes are quite low (we’ve removed any suburbs with less than 100 incidents):
We took this side analysis a little further and calibrated to rising population figures in NSW but the numbers are still tracking higher.
“Unreported as a crime” context
It is possible that the publicity of the Premier’s campaign and movements like the #MeToo would have caused more people to come forward and report domestic violence, compared to the pre period.
We’re hopeful that this is the reason but will continue to dig for more data sources and reports to find out more.
For more data analysis and visualisations, click here.
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