Premier Chris Minns flags NSW residents will be charged 'millions' for Sydney protest which shut down Harbour Bridge
Police estimated 90,000 demonstrators took part in the 'March for Humanity' through the heart of Sydney, which shut down the Harbour Bridge from 11.30am to about 5pm, although it was originally scheduled to end at 4pm.
Speaking on Monday morning, Mr Minns was asked if there was an indication of how much the protest cost.
NSW Premier Chris Minns. Picture: NewsWire / Nikki Short
'It costs taxpayers millions, certainly in overtime, and more on top of that, but I don't have a final figure,' he said.
On Saturday, Premier Minns was handed a significant blow after Supreme Court Justice Belinda Rigg rejected an application to deem the Palestine Action Group's Sydney Harbour Bridge demonstration unlawful.
Despite police stating the march would put 'public safety' in jeopardy and force the city to a grinding halt, Justice Rigg said the right to freedom of assembly and freedom of speech outweighed any other argument.
'The application by the commissioner should be refused,' she said in her judgment with protestors also afforded immunity from a litany of offences including blocking or obstructing traffic or pedestrians.'
Mr Minns, who vehemently opposed the demonstration, said people should not think the Harbour Bridge was open to constant protests and said the government was examining the Supreme Court's consequential ruling.
'No one should believe it is open season the bridge police still have to make a judgement about public safety and logistics,' Mr Minns said at a press conference on Monday.
'I'll just repeat – many people who were at the march would accept that we can't knock out the bridge every weekend. No one should assume it's open season on the bridge, the anti-vaxer group has it one Saturday and the weekend after that we have an environmental cause and the weekend after that because of an industrial dispute.'
Former NSW Police minister David Elliott told Sky News on Sunday veterans had to pay for the right to march on ANZAC Day each year while the Palestine Action Group, who organised the Sydney Harbour Bridge march, were 'getting away with wasting literally millions of dollars'.
'This would have cost millions of dollar and the opportunity cost of that, of course, is not only schools and hospitals, but … police should have been working hand in glove with the SES to make sure that roads were closed and traffic was diverted and that people were getting messages about why they needed to be careful about the inclement weather,' he said.
'I think that's probably why Chris Minns didn't want it to go ahead, other than the fact that he probably didn't want to see his state divided on something that, quite frankly, should be best to be left with the United Nations.'
While serving as minister in 2020, during the Black Lives Matter protests which were given the green light by then premier Glady Berejiklian, Mr Elliott said political freedom was 'virtually impossible to stop'.
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