Hard lockdown to extend as Daniel Andrews prepares to unveil Victoria’s road map out of restrictions
Premier Daniel Andrews is close to revealing the fate of Victorians in his blueprint out of lockdown, but not much is set to change, with Melburnians likely to remain housebound for weeks to come. These are the restrictions expected to change — and which ones will stay for weeks to come.
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Melbourne is set to remain in hard lockdown for weeks to come.
A day after pitched street battles between police and anti-lockdown protesters, Premier Daniel Andrews is set to unveil a heartbreaking blueprint for the state’s recovery. It will include alarming new modelling which warns the number of new COVID cases is falling too slowly to trigger an easing of restrictions.
— Watch Premier Daniel Andrews’ update above at 12pm and follow live coverage here
The modelling, seen by the Sunday Herald Sun, warns Victoria will not be in a safe position to re-open on September 14 when stage four restrictions were set to expire.
Instead, current restrictions will be extended for weeks with some slight reprieve for singles, a relaxing of exercise rules, and a limited increase in work conditions for some sectors all possible.
However there would be no imminent change for millions of Victorians across metropolitan Melbourne and a very real chance that most Victorians will continue to work from home until next year.
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And unless there is a dramatic drop in case numbers Victorians will be unlikely to return to classrooms at the start of term four.
In regional Victoria, where just six new cases were recorded on Saturday, a return to stage two restrictions could come sooner.
With 76 new cases, and 11 deaths recorded across metropolitan Melbourne on Saturday, senior government figures said the government had hoped to see case numbers in the single digits before reopening the economy.
That could be at least six weeks away, with the modelling by the University of Melbourne showing case numbers were halving on average every 18 days.
That would mean Victoria could be at an average daily increase of 30 by early October, 15 by mid-late October, and single-digit increases by November – a trigger for a significant easing of restrictions.
Victoria has not recorded a single-digit daily increase in new cases since June 13.
The modelling warns that easing restrictions when there are as few as 25 daily cases would lead to a 60 per cent chance of forcing another lockdown before Christmas.
“We know this is a health problem in the first instance — we can’t begin to repair and rebuild until we aggressively suppress this virus,” Mr Andrews will say in a statement on Sunday.
“Today we will give all Victorians a pathway forward to achieving a ‘COVID normal’. Case numbers will continue to guide our actions to reopen Victoria steadily and safely.”
No other state has eased restrictions while case numbers remained in double figures.
Queensland had a weekly average of just over one case a day, NSW had under 4 a day, and South Australian had just one case in the week before restrictions were eased in those states.
It is understood any easing of restrictions would be guided by case numbers instead of dates.
Mr Andrews said his focus was now on ensuring Victorians could celebrate Christmas ion a manner “as close to normal as possible”.
Businesses and industry figures said they feared today’s announcement, which follows a week of consultations with the state government in which they pushed for an immediate reopening of some sectors.
A traffic-light system will be used to determine how businesses and industries can operate when restrictions ease.
Mr Andrews will unveil the system and which traffic light will apply to each industry following ongoing cabinet crisis council meetings on Saturday.
Industries were assessed on their COVID risk, the movement of workers and the economic value of reopening.
Mr Andrews said he did not want businesses to open again and then have to close in a few weeks. And if you opened at these levels, that is exactly what would happen,” he said.
“It would be five minutes of sunshine and then a third wave that arguably will be even more devastating than the second. We just have to find a way to be as steadfast as this virus.
“The tail of the second wave is a stubborn thing. We are seeing the numbers come down.”
A leaked working document that outlined the government’s plans for easing restrictions revealed a plan to make significant changes only after Victoria had recorded two weeks of zero community transmissions.
Chief Health Officer Professor Brett Sutton on Saturday conceded that may not be possible.
“I’m not sure when we’ll get to that point. We’re aiming for it. There’s no question we’re aiming for it. We may or may not be able to get there,” he said. “We are just getting to a position where we get low enough numbers that we can sustain those numbers at the lowest possible level.
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