The five-day Esoteric Psychedelic Circus Festival, cancelled just hours before gates opened, became the latest in a string of Australian music events to be axed this year. But this wasn’t due to the usual high insurance premiums, lack of ticket sales or extreme weather events that have recently been suffocating Australia’s festival industry. 

Instead, a single denied permit brought down the country’s biggest bush doof and left an estimated 2,000 early bird attendees stranded in regional Victoria. 

With thousands more en route, small businesses facing massive losses and a media storm looming, a messy blame game erupted between stakeholders. Music and community advocates called it bureaucracy gone mad, while Victorian festival regulators denied any wrongdoing, accusing the event organisers of endangering punters.

In reality, this story is far more complex. and reveals a system which has, and could likely again, negatively impact thousands of people, small businesses, and an already fragile events industry.

Bureaucratic breakdown

Speaking to Farrago, Dr Guy Morrow, a Professor of Arts and Cultural Management, acknowledged the importance of safety regulations, ‘There’s a need to balance a festival’s interests with the safety of its music-loving community.’ 

In the case of Esoteric, it needed two key permits approved, both of which focused on patron, staff, and volunteer safety. 

The first was a planning permit, previously valid for five years, that expired after last year’s event, prompting Esoteric to apply for a new ten-year permit in September 2024. The permit was denied by the Country Fire Authority (CFA) and Ambulance Victoria (AV) on the 28th of February 2025, following requests for further documentation. 

AV raised concerns over insufficient measures to address heat health, communicable disease, and illicit substance use. At the same time, the CFA cited unacceptable fire risks and a lack of mitigation plans for such a long-term permit.

A key factor in the denial was last year’s gastroenteritis outbreak, which affected over 250 attendees. 

With the nearly sold-out festival’s future in doubt just days before kick-off, Esoteric applied for a temporary 12-month permit. Relevant authorities approved the permit on 03 March—three days before the festival gates were supposed to open. 

The permit was subject to 47 conditions, which Festival Director Sam Goldsmith said his team was ready to adhere to before, during, and after the event.

Several days before the first permit was approved, Buloke Council had publicly warned that ‘even if the planning permit is issued, the organisers will require a POPE-OP [Place of Public Entertainment – Occupancy Permit], which is likely to also be refused.’ 

Regardless, ticket sales resumed, small businesses continued to stock up, and punters readied themselves as preparations continued full steam ahead. 

The POPE Permit

The next day following the issuance of the temporary permit, the festival’s second crucial permit was denied by Buloke Council’s municipal building surveyor (MBS), citing 33 grounds for refusal. The MBS operates independently from the council under state law. 

In the events industry, it is standard practice for a POPE permit to be approved hours before an event begins, as festivals work to tight deadlines when building infrastructure. 

Speaking with Farrago, John McConville, festival volunteer and lifetime member of the community advocacy group Donald 2000, claimed that not only was the MBS absent from the site the day he denied the permit, but he hadn’t visited it in weeks. 

‘From the 22nd of February, he wasn’t on site, and so how can he make a realistic judgment of whether [the conditions had been] rectified or not, when he’s obviously not there,’ said Mr McConville.

On the day of the cancellation, Esoteric’s official Facebook page made a statement reaffirming this claim that the MBS hadn’t attended the site. Conversely, though, they claimed that he hadn’t completed a site inspection since 2024.

To further complicate this timeline, there is no official statement from the council on when the MBS last visited the site. Buloke Council declined Farrago’s request for comment.

While the first permit (planning permit) was approved, a significant portion of its conditions implied that the temporary structures—still under construction at the time—would be formally applied for via the POPE permit and inspected upon completion.

Yet despite Buloke Council acknowledging that these structures were unlikely to be finalised the next day and would require approval during an on-site inspection later that week, the MBS rejected the POPE permit the following day.

A Last-Minute Scramble

From 4 to 6 March, the Esoteric organisers made appeals to the Minister of Housing and Building, the Hon Harriet Shing, and the State Building Surveyor Steven Baxas to overturn the decision. Their appeals were unsuccessful. 

Esoteric organisers stated they had addressed the 33 previous safety failures and were expecting a chance to resolve any remaining MBS concerns before the scheduled opening.

On 6 March, the MBS conducted an onsite inspection and concluded that there were nine safety-related items remaining, which were used to issue the Esoteric organisers with an Emergency Order, which is when structures are deemed as a considerable risk to human life. 

It is important to note, Esoteric organisers have released all nine of these items and have stated that six of the nine issues raised had all previously been certified by a qualified engineer, or inspected and cleared by WorkSafe and EnergySafe Victoria. 

The remaining issues were an unsafe staircase not available to the public, a generator not excluded from public access but having temporary fencing built around it at the time of inspection, and inadequate drainage for an unspecified wash station. 

The Esoteric team stated that all issues could have been resolved within an hour by their onsite builders.

Esoteric organisers claimed they had been in meetings with the council to get it over the line until the final hour. However, as the sun set, Event Organiser Sam Goldsmith addressed a crowd that had reportedly waited up to 12 hours in 32-degree heat, many in cars and some dropped off by buses, that the festival was cancelled. 

Speaking to Farrago, a ticket holder to the Esoteric Festival  recalled the moment they found out the event was off, ‘Tired from the heat and confused by the lack of communication, I just walked back to my car and sobbed.’ 

‘We all had so much mentally, emotionally and financially riding on this weekend.’

Mr McConville claimed that ‘The local council had indicated to [Mr Goldsmith] that they would give him permission to let [patrons] in on-site for one night, being that there were toilets and there was water and there were 44 food vendors and shelter’ 

‘The event manager said, ‘give me it in writing that you are requesting that, and that he won’t be held liable if there’s an accident’, their lawyers wouldn’t allow that.’ 

This left thousands stranded, with the council reportedly not supplying any options for camping in the closest regional town of Donald. 

Punters who spoke to Farrago highlighted what it was like after they eventually reached the small town of Donald, ‘It was like the apocalypse, so many others, just like us, sitting in the streets with nowhere to go.’

The community group Donald 2000 and local residents worked tirelessly over the next few days to support punters by opening up access to local public toilet facilities and supplying food and shelter. 

The Department of Transport and Planning’s (DTP) review 

The Department of Transport and Planning (DTP) has reportedly launched a review into the POPE permit process. While no official statement has been made, the timing raises questions about the role regulatory ambiguity played in the festival’s collapse.

While neither side was without fault in the cancellation of Esoteric, the drawn-out and disjointed path to that decision highlights a bureaucratic system in need of urgent reform. There were no winners last month in Donald, but it was the food vendors, punters and the local community who were the ones that bore the brunt of this bureaucratic mess. Without meaningful change, Victoria’s events industry faces yet another threat to its survival.