Wednesday, October 18, 2006

Sydney views hugs as a liability

Typical of this uptight city -- Council and police could not handle Juan Mann giving away free hugs in Martin Place and Pitt St Mall so they stopped him until he could produce a $25m public liability insurance policy. It's one of Council's favourite blunt sticks to suppress community activity from those they don't favour

Mann collected 10,000 signatures on a petition and the City relented, to their credit.

But not before the saga got worldwide publicity via YouTube, 60 minutes and newspaper coverage. To see the (original) Sick Puppies vid clip featuring Juan Mann (since voted Youtube clip of the year) click here.

More prosaically city resident groups have repeatedly asked Council to provide a blanket Public Liability policy for the activities of community groups (like North Sydney does) but they are not interested. But it's back on the agenda of CityRAGs (City Resident Action Groups) so we'll see what our new CEO, Monica Barone, makes of it.

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