Clover Moore: she argued in favour.

NEWS

Photo: Tribune

City Council sells out

THE Labor Party-controlled Sydney City Council has shelved an application for funding from the Gay Counselling Service in a series of maneouvers that have badly embarrassed some ALP members. Independents and Civic Reform (unofficial Liberal) aldermen supported the defeated motion that would have paved the way for a donation to be made. They were out-voted by the ALP.

THE Labor Party controlled Sydney City Council has shelved an application for funding from the Gay Counselling Service in a series of maneouvers that have badly embarrassed some ALP members. In-

dependents and Civic Reform (unofficial Liberal) alderman supported the defeated motion that would have paved the way for a donation to be made. They were out-voted by the ALP.

It is believed the application was introduced at Caucus without anyone preparing a case. Labor Party sources have indicated that a hostile and homophobic reaction could be expected from at least some sections of the ALP in such circumstances. Whatever the result of the Caucus discussion, the Labor people voted en bloc to have the matter shelved.

The Counselling Service has now submitted an application to the Town Clerk for interim funding till January. They are asking for $5000 and are hoping that the combination of embarrassment and political pressure that has arisen will lead to the request being dealt with in a speedy and fair manner.

The decision to deny funding was initially made at the Council meeting of April 11. It was part of a composite motion, moved by Finance Committee Chair Robert Tickner, that also allocated funds to eight other groups, including the Tasmanian Wilderness Society. Alderman Clover Moore attempted to have the Counselling Service application considered separately, but was denied permission Moore then placed a recision

motion on notice for the next meeting that, if passed, would have permitted the reconsideration of the application.

On April 18 Moore's recision motion was debated with the main speakers against being Steve McGoldrick and Deputy Lord Mayor Tony Bradford, who are, like Tickner, considered part of the left on Council. Both Aldermen denied that Council was adopting a discriminatory policy. McGoldrick cited the denial of funding to the Multiple Sclerosis Society of Wahroonga (located on the upper North Shore in another Council area) as proof that objective and nondiscriminatory standards of assessment had been used. It was also said that Council was not discriminating because it had agreed to the bunting being put in Oxford Street for the Mardi Gras.

McGoldrick has since assured Campaign that he personally would be vigorously supporting the new GCS application "at all levels of debate", except if he is bound by Caucus to do otherwise. He will be getting strong support in this stand from other ALP sources.

The East Sydney Branch of the ALP has written to Lord Mayor Doug Sutherland recommending he immediately "take positive steps to improve Council's relation with the Sydney gay community, many of whose institutions are in the Macquarie and Flinders wards." Local State MP Fred Miller has also given assurances that he would take the matter up with the Council and attempt to get the decision reversed.

The Gay Counselling Service first made the application in early January without specifying a level of funding. It

extended an invitation to discuss the matter further on the assumption that a precise figure could be negotiated at a later stage. The application was made out to the Lord Mayor in an attempt to circumvent a possibly hostile bureaucracy.

Director of the Service, Terry Goulden was informed neither of the first vote that rejected the application, nor the

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Club 80 disordered by judge

SYDNEY: On Thursday April 21 Supreme Court Judge, Justice Lusher, declared Club 80 a "disorderly house" thus dealing the final blow in one of the most concerted campaigns against a gay venue in recent times. The declaration that Club 80 was a disorderly house was sought by the head of the NSW Vice Squad, Inspector Ernest Sheppard.

Counsel for Club 80, Caroline Simpson, sought to lodge a number of affidavits from community leaders but these were ruled inadmissable by Justice Lusher. Simpson was also disallowed the wider range of cross-examination that would have been required to find out why the police had decided to raid the venue.

The Disorderly Houses Act employed in closing down Club 80 was introduced in 1943. Section 3(1)(a) of the Act allows a Superintendent or Inspector of Police to lodge an affidavit showing reasonable grounds for suspecting that "drunkenness or disorderly or indecent conduct or any entertainment of a demoralising character takes place on the premises, or has taken place or is likely to take place again on the premises".

If evidence is produced proving the charge the Act states that "any judge of the Supreme Court may declare such premises to be a disorderly house." Premises are defined as any building or part of a building. Licenced premises or registered clubs are exempt from the Act.

The police are only required to show "reasonable grounds for" suspicion. Also the term "indecent conduct", which is not defined in the Act, is clearly open to discriminatory interpretation.

Once a premises has been declared a "disorderly house". and after notice of this is given, the Act allows for the following police action:

1. The police may break open doors, windows and partitions, and do other such acts as necessary to enter the premises (section 10(d));

2. Any person in, entering or leaving the premises may be liable for up to six months' jail (section 7)-likewise the occupier/lessee.

In 1968 a new section was included in the Act to cover premises "habitually used for the purposes of prostitution' It is this section which the Vice Squad has used in the past to close a number of alleged brothels in the Darlinghurst area. When this law was originally introduced it was not intended for use against homosexuals or prostitutes, but was enacted as part of a campaign by the then government against organised crime. Consequently the Act contains many references to

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AN answer to the Gay Liberation Quire? Sistas, a women's percussion group, is every bit as spectacular. Caught in mid-drumstroke at the San Francisco 8th Annual Women's Day in the Park on March 3.

1983 MAY CAMPAIGN 5