The 3 Best Illegal Things To Do in Melbourne

by Sean Goedecke (subscribe)

You know what they say – if you're not committing a crime, you're not having a good time. But how can you break the law without worrying about, well, the law? Luckily, Melbourne still has a few laws on the books that might get you laughed at but won't get you imprisoned. – so lace up your punk boots, put on your strapless dress, and let out your inner criminal.



Change a Light Bulb

Let's start with something you've probably done a hundred times: changing a lightbulb. Funnily enough, unless you're a licensed electrician, it's illegal to change a lightbulb in Victoria. This doesn't just apply to public buildings, either; it's actually against the law to change the lightbulb in your own home. This one's probably a leftover from the days when having an unlicensed electrician change your lighting was a good way to burn the entire neighbourhood down.




Suffice to say you're unlikely to get charged for doing it today, but even if you do, the penalty's just a $20 fine. Hardly worth worrying about.

Wear Your Pink Pants

Here's another Victorian law: it's illegal to wear pink pants after noon on Sundays. It's hard to fathom the original point of this – were pink trousers only worn in churches? Was the idea to avoid offending churchgoers returning to their homes? Either way, find your best pair of hot pink short pants and strut the afternoon away like the hoodlum you are.

Cross-Dress Without Straps

Like the pink pants one, this is likely to get you some strange looks. For men only: if you appear on the street in a "dress without straps", you're breaking the law. No restrictions apply to other items of women's clothing, fortunately, so feel free to cross dress in anything with sleeves.



Presumably the early days of Melbourne were full of men walking around in dresses with straps – but take the straps off and you'd become a dangerous degenerate.

You're probably thinking of ways to break the law that are far more fun, but these are by far the safest. There are plenty more crazy Australian laws, too – if you're a cab driver, for instance, make sure you've got a bale of hay in the boot at all times. Bar owners are required to stable, water and feed the horses of their patrons. Melbourne is truly a city of opportunity: even people who don't drive cabs or own bars are free to break the law in hilarious ways.

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Why? Because there's a criminal inside all of us.

When: All day, all night.

Where: Anywhere you can get away with it.

Cost: Free.

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