James Campbell: Victoria stands alone in how it has handled the pandemic

Heading into week two of their latest lockdown, for Victorians the ‘we’re-going-to-get-through-this’ spirit of the Blitz is so last year, writes James Campbell.

Writing a national political column is hard at the moment because even though we can’t leave, more and more we seem to be less and less one country.

It isn’t just the wildly popular internal border closures which make visiting interstate such a lottery that have divided Australians.

The different way we have experienced the pandemic is changing how we see the world.

And increasingly those differences divide neatly into Victoria and everywhere else.

Canadian politics has long had the useful shorthand “ROC” to distinguish Quebec from the Rest of Canada.

The way we’re going we’ll soon need ROA to distinguish us (your faithful columnist is a Victorian) from the rest of youse.

People queue for the Covid-19 vaccination at Sandown Racecourse in Victoria. Picture: NCA NewsWire

It isn’t just the absence of masks that hits us when we venture forth into the ROA.

Or the fact that compared to Melbourne’s stricken CBD, things seem normal in the centres of the capital cities.

Or even the damage to our collective psyche by being isolated in our homes for half a year.

It’s the fact in the ROA people aren’t scared stiff of the coronavirus or being locked up by the government, the way they are here.

As you can imagine, there’s only one story in the People’s Republic of Victoria at the moment: the seven day citywide lockdown now into its second week.

To say we’re over it would be the understatement of the century.

The “we’re-going-to-get-through-this” spirit of the Blitz was very 2020.

We’re dirty that this is happening to us again and we’re looking for someone to blame.

The Victorian government has done it’s best to point the finger at someone — anyone — else.

Ministers have been at pains to refer to the case that triggered the current economic disaster as a South Australian outbreak.

They’ve also been quick to blame the outbreak and lockdown on the slow vaccine rollout.

And to hold their hands out for more money from Canberra, it goes without saying.

Victorian Health Minister Martin Foley announces the extension of lockdown restrictions. Picture: Getty Images

Is there anything to this charge? Well, yes and no.

Yes, in that the more people are vaccinated the less likely it is that a large number of them will get sick.

But as I keep pointing out we still have no guarantee that a completely successful vaccination program will end the lockdown madness.

Asked on Saturday if the fully vaccinated could expect to be able to move around Australia, the Victorian Health Minister Martin Foley said it was still too early to start having those sorts of conversations.

If you can’t promise people they’ll be able to go to Noosa let alone London if they get jabbed, is it any surprise people until now haven’t been in a hurry to get vaccinated?

Like the good comrades we are, Victorians are now lining up in their thousands to get the jab, many more thousands than in other states.

The reasons are obvious. Firstly, we have a real outbreak, however tiny.

Secondly, because it seems logical the lockdown madness is going to end the quicker we all get vaccinated — although as I just pointed out, there’s no guarantee that will happen.

The third reason is there’s nothing else to do: getting vaccinated is now one of only five legal reasons to leave the house.

A woman walks through Mebourne’s usually bustling Royal Arcade on Saturday. Picture: Getty Images

At the start of last week I would have bet that the only thing more predictable than the Victorian government’s demand that Canberra immediately put its hand in its pocket was that Canberra would look mean-spirited by refusing and that it would eventually fold, but not before it paid a price with Victorian voters for looking hardhearted.

It might still end up playing out that way. But I’m not so sure now.

I might be wrong but the obvious incompetence of our government’s handling of the current outbreak, the fact that for the first time serious people in epidemiologist world are starting to publicly question the over-reaction of this lockdown, and the equally curious fact that these problems just don’t seem to happen in Sydney, is starting to permeate the collective mind of the Victorian public.

It’s taken the Morrison government a while, but it seems to have finally worked out that the best way to belt the Victorians is to keep comparing the state to NSW.

It doesn’t even need to be too aggressive about it. Just stare into the camera with a bewildered look and ask why are these things happening in Melbourne and nowhere else in the ROA.

The Victorian government wants to compare us with London, or Delhi or New York or wherever the latest overseas coronavirus debacle is unfolding.

It doesn’t want to talk about why life has basically remained unchanged everywhere in this country.

Crazy theories are circulating about the health of Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews, who was injured in a fall. Picture: NCA NewsWire

It hasn’t helped them these past few months that their best salesman, Chairman Dan himself, has been absent.

The question of when the Chairman will return from his convalescence has been the subject of a great deal of speculation in the past few weeks.

Indeed, nothing better illustrates the strange place Victoria has become in the past year than the feverish way Victorians have become obsessed with the health of their leader.

Every journalist in the state has been inundated with outlandish tales of what really happened to Dan and how bad his injuries really are.

It’s the sort of stuff you’d expect from the population living in an old-school Central American republic, not an English-speaking democracy.

It’s just another example of how different Victoria is becoming from the ROA.

Originally published as James Campbell: Victoria stands alone in how it has handled the pandemic