The man behind several popular Sydney wedding venues has said he would flout the NSW Government’s coronavirus restrictions to reopen his business to “any numbers” next month, saying he did not want to “deal with upset clients anymore”.
Sal Navarra, the chief executive of Navarra Venues, took to Instagram to announce that his business was “taking a stance” after seeing the lack of social distancing in restaurants and protests over the last weekend.
“We are reopening, and we are reopening to any numbers,” Navarra said on a video posted Monday.
“We don’t want to deal with upset brides anymore, upset clients anymore because it’s not fair on them.”
Navarra claimed he saw restaurants seating in more than 50 customers, in contravention of the limit applied by the state government.
“The restaurants were doing more than they were supposed to, which I don’t blame them because they’ve been closed for three and a half months,” he said.
But Navarra said the limit breach and the Black Lives Matter protest at the Town Hall led him to make the decision.
More than 20,000 people took to Sydney’s streets on Saturday to rally against Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander deaths in custody. Attendees were unable to maintain social distancing, the ABC reported.
“With the government okaying to all of this and leaving our industries sort of closed is something I don’t understand,” he said.
“Hopefully in the next 10 days when we don’t have a spike in the coronavirus and my prediction is correct … will make us open on the first or the seventh or the 15th of July.”
He said social distancing measures, including provision of hand sanitisers, would be applied at the company’s five venues.
On June 1, the NSW Government eased wedding restrictions to allow up to 20 attendees.
This article originally appeared on Over60.