Daniel Andrews’ legacy will be forever tainted when Sydney reopens and we remain locked up

The unnecessary suffering endured by Victorians at the hands of the Andrews government will be laid bare NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet accelerates Sydney’s reopening.

Daniel Andrews’ darkest days are ahead of him.

The ignominy of being responsible for the world’s longest lockdown – 247 days and counting – will forever taint the premier’s legacy, as will the record debt he has accumulated for the state.

Victoria’s net debt has doubled and will hit $156 billion by 2024-25, well above every other state and territory.

Melbourne is the subject of international derision with videos of police overreach, deserted CBD streets and Andrews’ scaremongering pronouncements regularly going viral.

To add insult to injury Victoria is experiencing record numbers of daily cases even as restrictions cripple the state to the tune of $700m a week, not to mention the devastating societal toll including a huge surge in rates of self-harm and suicidal ideation among youngsters.

Daniel Andrews will face another test when Sydney reopens next week and Melbourne remains locked down. Picture: Daniel Pockett

Lockdown Six will last more than 80 days and has done nothing to curb case numbers; so much for all the criticism of NSW for not locking down hard and early.

On Tuesday, Victoria recorded the worst daily tally of any state since the start of the pandemic with 1763 cases from 62,189 tests.

The previous highest daily total was on September 11 when NSW recorded 1599 cases from 147,975 tests. On Tuesday, NSW had 608 cases from 85,642 tests.

The heat on Andrews will intensify considerably come October 11 when Sydney reopens. Many Melburnians have blocked out the fact that the rest of the advanced world, with varying vaccination rates, has been getting on with life with relatively minor Covid-19 restrictions in place but they won’t be able to ignore Sydney’s unofficial Freedom Day this coming Monday.

It’ll be hard to ignore the fact that we remain under strict stay-at-home orders including a curfew when Sydney households are welcoming guests and Sydney businesses are reopening en masse.

And new NSW Premier, Dominic Perrottet is likely to accelerate the state’s reopening. Perrottet will be bolder than Gladys Berejiklian in restoring freedoms and has consistently pushed back against the health bureaucrats advocating strict conditions.

NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet speaks is likely to accelerate his state’s reopening.

“It’s not the government’s role to provide freedom, people born in this country by default are free,” he said late last month.

Perrottet repeated those sentiments on Tuesday, after winning the leadership ballot 39-5 to become the 46th Premier of NSW. “I want to be the premier of a state that is open and free … we are people born in a free country,” he said.

When Victoria reaches the 70 per cent double vaccinations target by the end of the month we’ll still have draconian restrictions in place, including bans on household guests, indoor dining and gyms – all allowed in Sydney at 70 per cent.

Victorians are waking up to the fact that we are not only enduring the world’s longest lockdown but so much of the suffering has been unnecessary.

The government, backed enthusiastically by the media, succeeded in scaring people witless, so much so that they accepted the erosion of their rights and liberties in return for perceived safety. But only the deliberately dim would still believe that the state government’s decisions are evidence based.

Life in Melbourne has been put on hold by Daniel Andrews’ botched handling of the pandemic. Picture: David Crosling

We have seen again and again the so-called “best available health advice” shift on the basis of opinion polls and focus groups. The latest example is perhaps the most absurd thus far, with the state government reversing its ban on bathrooms at golf clubs.

Just a few days ago the Andrews government’s overreach extended to golfer’s bodily functions but, after an almighty backlash, the bathroom ban was lifted on Sunday.

The fact that golf was deemed dangerous and banned when the state was recording around a dozen cases a day, despite not a single case of transmission on a golf course anywhere in Australia, but allowed when the state is recording well over 1000 cases a day raises a few questions.

The golf shenanigans would be amusing if they weren’t symptomatic of a much wider problem. The Andrews government and its broken health bureaucracy has comprehensively botched Victoria’s Covid response with the harshest lockdowns, the biggest death toll and the most devastating economic and societal consequences in the country.