‘Suffocated’: SA late-night venues battle lockout laws and Casino rules
One of the state’s best-known businessmen is calling for lockout laws to be scrapped as he lambasts ‘unfair’ standards for the casino.
SA Alliance for Night-Time Industries (SAANTI) president Tony Tropeano – formerly a nightclub owner and now a lawyer – has blasted expensive red tape imposed on independent venue owners in the city’s nightlife precinct in a major submission to South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas.
The 15-page submission – ‘Modernising South Australia’s Night Time Economy’ – to a statutory review of the Late Night Trading Code of Practice expected later this year – recommended 3 am lockout laws be scrapped and for a Night-Time Economy Advisory Committee to be established.
Tropeano, who heads up SAANTI – a coalition of live music venue owners, nightclub owners and security services companies established earlier this year – said red tape on businesses meant businesses were being “suffocated”, noting the Adelaide Casino enjoyed the privilege of not being subject to lockout laws.
Lockout laws, since their creation in 2013, impose a blanket curfew on allowing new patrons into venues after 3 am. They were no longer not fit for purpose and had hamstrung businesses in Adelaide, the Hindley Street identity said.
Tropeano said he was not in favour of broad deregulation of safety standards or service of alcohol laws, noting he welcomed the doubling of police in the CBD late-night precinct of the West End.
“Licensees are fully responsible. They need to make sure that the inside part is safe,” Tropeano, who previously owned said.
“But outside, the licensee doesn’t have any say.”
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It called for the curfew be repealed, and a 12-month monitored transition phase be implemented, governed by a ‘Late-Night Data Dashboard’ which could track violent incidents, alcohol-related emergency department presentations and transaction volume growth within the CBD.
But the lockout “generates artificial precinct compression and forces a mass exodus of patrons”, the submission read, Tropeano saying that no matter the time of night: “if a person’s an idiot, they’re an idiot”.
“Whether it will be 3 o’clock in the morning or it happens at 10 o’clock during the day, that guy’s got it in his DNA. The lock out is not going to change that,” Tropeano said.
“Removing the lockout allows for “managed dispersal”, enabling patrons to move naturally and gradually between venues, food premises and late-night transport,” the report reads.
“The lockout was created in 2013. We‘re not dealing with 2013 anymore,” Tropeano said.
“We are suffocating independent venues with redundant red tape.
“It’s about time we get the statistics. It should be based on risk management; if the premises does not comply, take away their license.”
The submission pointed to independent economic analysis by BDO which found that South Australia’s live music industry contributed $490 million to gross state product and supported more than 9200 jobs.
But over the past four years, a number of major venues had closed, including the likes of Enigma Bar, Fat Controller and Super California in 2023, Red Square in 2024 and Sugar Nightclub, in 2025.
“They couldn’t keep up, Tropeano said.
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“We should try not to create obstacles. We should try to assist the small businesses in any way we can.”
And they were being slugged with major fees, including a ‘Trading Hours Penalty’ of $35,000 for venues that operate past 5 am.
Tropeano said one major gripe was a lack of “market fairness”, with venues paying thousands of dollars in fees and told to close at 3 am, “but the casino operates 24 hours a day”.
“It just doesn’t seem fair.”
And a voice for the industry was needed, Tropeano said, floating the idea for a ‘night mayor’.
In the SAANTI submission, the organisation called for a ‘multi-agency Night-Time Economic Advisory Committee’; a “structured, ongoing forum connecting the South Australian Government, local government, regulators, industry and community stakeholders on matters affecting the economy between 6:00 pm and 6:00 am”.
It would coordinate policy development, monitor reform outcomes and provide advice for a “safe, vibrant and productive night-time economy”, the submission reads.
“At least they can have a voice at a table somewhere,” Tropeano said.
“We must not forget that Adelaide now is a very modernised city.”
A state government spokesperson said lockout laws would be reviewed again later this year – three years on from the last review in 2023.
Tropeano’s submission followed the December 2025 release of a South Australian parliamentary inquiry report into the health of the state’s live music scene.
The report recommended 12 actions the government could take to bolster the sector, including scrapping lockout laws and breaking the “insurance chokehold” by exploring options for a state-based insurance scheme.
The committee found that in the past four years, 27 per cent of live music venues in South Australia had closed, with the industry facing multiple coinciding challenges like the rising costs of rent and insurance, inner-city development and noise complaints.
Changed audience behaviour from COVID-19 was also to blame for the industry’s woes, as was the popularity of at-home entertainment and the cost of living, plus the impact of the Late Night Trading Code of Practice.
At the time, the state government said the recommendations would be considered.
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