Melbourne lockdown: Restrictions to ease, 25km radius to be implemented

Tight travel restrictions will still apply when Melbourne’s two-week lockdown lifts this week, but schools and cafes are set to reopen. This is what we know so far.

Melbourne’s lockdown will end on Friday, but residents are set to be restricted to travelling 25km from their homes in a bid to prevent a Queen’s Birthday weekend ­exodus to the regions.

Under a new restrictions regimen, students are expected to return to the classroom as early as Friday, with visitors to the home still banned and ­public outdoor get-togethers capped at 10 people.

Cafes and restaurants will be limited to 50 customers, while gyms are expected to remain closed. Masks will remain mandatory indoors, with density limits in offices.

The government was involved in “positive” talks with public health officials late on Tuesday night over ending the extended “circuit breaker”.

The government was on Tuesday night still working through the details of the post-lockdown restrictions, which will be finalised Wednesday morning. 

“The settings are likely to be similar to what happened for regional Victoria last week,” a senior government source said.

Face masks will still be mandatory.

Regional Victoria, which emerged from lockdown last Friday, will also open up ­further.

Acting Premier James Merlino said on Tuesday the latest hotel quarantine breach would have no impact on the lockdown length. “Nothing about today changes our plans,” he said.

Mr Merlino did, however, confirm regional Victoria would remain off-limits to people from greater Melbourne over the long weekend.

“It remains the public health advice that for a period of time we will have different settings between regional Victoria and metropolitan Melbourne and that will extend beyond any announcements we’ll make later in the week,” he said. “There’s very good reasons for that. We absolutely want to run this thing to ground and ensure that there’s no risk of this spreading out into regional Victoria.”

Meanwhile, new data reveals only 48 per cent of Victorians now rate the Andrews government’s handling of Covid-19 as “good”.

MEASURE YOUR 25KM RADIUS

The Essential Report, released on Tuesday, found community satisfaction with the state government had dropped to its lowest point since early October last year.

The new figures portray a 15 per cent drop from May’s figure, while disapproval of the Victorian government’s response has increased to 32 per cent this month, up from 12 per cent in May.

On the day the federal government opened applications for the new Covid-19 disaster payment, worth up to $500 a week, about 21,500 Melburnians lodged applications after they were forced out of work by the lockdown.

About 5500 claims have already been approved. Once ticked off, the payments are made on the next business day.

Acting Premier James Merlino is expected to unveil the new rules.

Scott Morrison said he wanted to see ­restrictions lifted in Melbourne “as quickly as possible”. The Prime Minister said any lockdown must be proportionate, targeted and temporary.

“I think that we need to get some perspective … In the UK, there are 4695 cases of Covid a day. In Germany, there are 3026. In Canada, there are 1620. In France, there’s 6563. In Japan, there’s 2510. In Italy, there’s 2346. And in the United States, there’s 14,845.

“In each of those countries, people are dying every day. In this country, you know what the case numbers are,” he said.

Just two cases of coronavirus were detected in the Victorian community on Tuesday.

Both are linked to current outbreaks, with the new infections including a child linked to the West Melbourne cluster, and a worker at the Arcare Maidstone aged-care home.