Outdoor films canned
Council rule makes event ‘unsustainable’ Fashions of field ban extended
A LAST minute demand from Cairns Regional Council has resulted in two school holiday movie screenings at an outdoor cinema being scrapped.
End Credits Film Club had been promoting a September 25 screening of Ralph Breaks the Internet, and an October 2 screening of Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, to be shown at the Cairns Botanic Gardens as part of the Starry Night Cinema series.
The club was engaged as event suppliers by the Friends of the Botanic Gardens (FOBG).
The organisation, however, wrote on social media that recent policy changes and charges by the council had made the event “unsustainable”.
Club president Brett Hitchens said the council had advised that due to workplace health and safety policy, a council staff member had to be present at each screening.
“They told us we had to pay (the officer’s) salary to do that,” he said.
Mr Hitchens said the request surprised the club – which had been screening movies in Cairns for 20 years – and the only option was to cancel the upcoming school holiday screenings.
“As a non-profit organisation, we can’t run events that we know are going to cost us money,” he said.
“To be given a charge like this in the middle of our season, just completely disrupts the entire financial plan of the series.”
A council spokesman said a review of emergency processes of public events and venues identified a requirement for a council-trained duty technician to act as a chief warden at all council venues and events, inclusive of third party users.
“The review found that these processes were in place at all events with the exception of the FOBG movie nights,” he said.
“The event historically engaged a council duty technician, but this role was no longer being engaged at the event and some of the responsibilities of the role were being monitored by the FOBG.
“Council requires this position to be put back into place for all future events.”
He said the council was working with FOBG to limit the impact on fundraisers. A TURF club tiff at a bush racetrack has deepened, with a 76-year-old style queen not ruling out legal action after being slapped with a five-year ban from entering Fashions on the Field.
Alison Wilson exclusively revealed in the Cairns Post on Saturday she was facing a ban from the Atherton Turf Club until the end of the year over “bad behaviour” in the fracas over Fashions on the Field.
Her ban was yesterday extended to five years, but could be “reviewed” if she publicly apologises.
“This is so dirty,’’ Mrs Wilson, of Tolga, said.
“It’s a shit fight. I will fight this to the end to get a stop to it with every last breath in my body.”
The “sash obsessed” septuagenarian has won 97 ribbons over 11 years at country race days and lives to get “glammed up” for the fashion stakes.
She said she went public because she wasn’t given a fair right of reply to her first ban.
ATC Fashions on the Field co-ordinator Georgie Cole said she requested the ban after the national publicity and “disappointing behaviour from this lady time and time again”.
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