WA government gave $8m to Live Nation Entertainment to subsidise Coldplay concerts

The Western Australian government has paid millions of dollars to Live Nation Entertainment and its subsidiaries over the past four years, including $8m to subsidise two live concerts by Coldplay.

The band performed twice at Perth’s Optus Stadium in November, events hailed by the WA government as a “major tourism coup”.

The state Labor government under Roger Cook has steadfastly refused to disclose how much it paid Live Nation Entertainment, an S&P 500 multinational headquartered in Los Angeles, which last year recorded a net profit of US$563m (A$834m) and claims it “produces more concerts, sells more tickets, and connects more brands to music than anyone else in the world”.

Government documents seen by the Guardian reveal that $8m was paid in relation to the appearances by Coldplay, who are promoted by Live Nation Entertainment and form part of its extensive stable of stars.

In response to the Guardian’s questions, Tourism WA said the Coldplay concerts in Perth injected “tens of millions of visitor spend” into the state’s economy and the decision to award Live Nation $8m was made after “a rigorous assessment, cost benefit analysis, review and approvals process, including review and approval by the Tourism WA Board, Treasury and final sign off by the minister for tourism and premier”.

Other documents tabled in state parliament reveal the WA government paid entities now within the Live Nation group grants totalling more than $3.5m to cover financial losses caused by cancelled concerts during Covid.

The WA government’s contribution adds to the $16m previously reported by Guardian Australia given to Live Nation Entertainment or companies it owns by federal, NSW and South Australian governments.

Most of the grants across all states were paid to local entities acquired in recent years by Live Nation Entertainment, which last year recorded a net profit of US$563m.

In WA, Mellen Touring Pty Ltd and Mellen Promotions Pty Ltd, which trade as Mellen Events, received almost $1.74m between them in 2022, answers to questions on notice in the WA Legislative Council show. Zaccaria Concerts and Touring Pty Ltd received more than $1.81m in the same year.

All those companies were represented by a lobby group called Live Events WA (LEWA), the parliamentary answers show. LEWA’s president is Brad Mellen, founder and director of Mellen Events, who sold a majority share of the company to Live Nation in 2021. LEWA’s vice-president is John Zaccaria, who sold a majority share of his company – now trading as Face to Face – to Live Nation last year.

A dominant industry player

Australia is one of more than 40 countries where Live Nation has been amassing venues and local ticketing companies.

Australian live music industry operators have previously criticised the practice of governments funding events run by multinational corporations such as Live Nation, as well as its vertically integrated business model, in which it owns or manages venues, represents the artists and holds exclusive ticketing rights through Ticketmaster.

Live Nation controls some of the country’s largest live music venues, including Melbourne’s Festival Hall and Palais Theatre, Brisbane’s Fortitude Music Hall in Brisbane and Adelaide’s Hindley Street Music Hall.

In Perth, Live Nation’s subsidiary Mellen Events holds a multimillion dollar lease with the WA government to stage outdoor concerts in Kings Park, with an audience capacity of more than 6,500.

That lease came up for renewal late last year and tenders were called for in December, three days before Christmas.

On 20 March, Cook was Mellen Events’ VIP guest for a sold-out Tom Jones concert at Kings Park and was taken backstage to meet the 83-year-old star.

A spokesperson said the premier had contact with many WA business people and a broad range of Western Australians.

“Any invitation accepted by the premier is declared in his register of interests, as per government policy,” the spokesperson said in a statement.

The government has twice been asked in parliament how many applications had been received for the Kings Park contract, but declined to answer, saying the information was “commercial in confidence” as the tender process had not concluded.

Cook’s spokesperson said tender processes for government-supported events were run at arm’s length of the premier and tourism minister, in accordance with procurement policies.

The WA government will also pay the Live Nation subsidiary $4.65m over the next three years to run a commercial food and wine event in the Margaret River. Mellen Events was also awarded a $2m contract to stage a music festival associated with the solar eclipse in April 2023.

Both contracts were awarded through standard competitive procurement processes, Tourism WA said, and were subject to random annual audits.

In the US, it is estimated that Live Nation concerts and events account for 32.2% of the country’s total industry revenue. On the ticketing side of business, market domination by Ticketmaster is believed to stand at about 70%.

The US Department of Justice and 30 state and district attorneys general have alleged in a civil antitrust lawsuit that Live Nation relies on “unlawful, anticompetitive conduct” to exercise monopolistic control over the live events industry, at the cost of fans, artists, smaller promoters and venue operators.

“The result is that fans pay more in fees, artists have fewer opportunities to play concerts, smaller promoters get squeezed out, and venues have fewer real choices for ticketing services,” the US attorney general, Merrick Garland, said in a statement on 23 May.

“It is time to break up Live Nation-Ticketmaster.”

In statements posted on its website, Live Nation said the lawsuit would do nothing to reduce ticket prices and service fees for concerts, that its net profits proved it did not wield monopoly power, and there was more competition than ever in the live music industry.

In March Australia’s arts minister, Tony Burke, announced a parliamentary inquiry into the struggling live music industry, after a spate of cancelled music festivals.

Asked about Live Nation’s activities in Australia at an inquiry hearing in Canberra on Friday, the chief operating officer of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) said the commission was following the US lawsuit closely, but declined to confirm or deny if Live Nation was under investigation in Australia.

“The market circumstances and the factors impacting the US are slightly different than in Australia,” Scott Gregson told the inquiry.

“That said, we do see some consistency in behaviours that are part of that DOJ investigation and action and the type of things that we hear in Australia, and we have, both previously and on a continuing basis, look at matters as they come into us through our competition law lens … If your question is, do we receive similar issues? Do we look? Are we watching the DOJ action? Yes is the answer to all of those.”

Live Nation and Mellen Events did not respond to the Guardian.