Melbourne chef slams ‘insane’ decision to keep worker vaccine mandates
A top Melbourne chef has slammed the Victorian government’s “insane” decision to remove vaccine mandates for hospitality customers but not workers.
A top Melbourne chef has slammed the Victorian government’s “insane” decision to remove vaccine mandates for hospitality customers but not workers, against its own health advice.
David Masters, who has worked at several of the best fine dining restaurants in the country, has been out of a job since the vaccine mandates were introduced last year and is now “cleaning toilets and garages for cash”.
The 42-year-old and his partner have been forced to move in with his parents in rural Victoria to save money, after making the decision not to get vaccinated against Covid-19 for a number of personal reasons — including the fact that the vaccines were no longer protecting against transmission of the virus.
“When we discovered that it’s not doing that, we needed to weigh up whether we feel at risk of Covid or not — we’re both fit and healthy, nonsmokers, relatively young, so we didn’t want to take it,” he said.
But Mr Masters said the “biggest kicker” was his two-year-old daughter.
“I want our daughter to grow up knowing she’s got full autonomy of her body,” he said.
“I felt that as a role model for her, I’m not setting a good example if I’m only taking it to keep my job. Mandating a medical intervention to me was a step too far.”
Mr Masters said it was clear vaccine mandates “don’t make sense” given the shots do not prevent transmission.
“I would have thought an honest medical community or government would have said, we put the mandates in [under that belief] but once it was known the basis for the mandates was futile, when there’s no justification for them, a responsible government would abolish them overnight,” he said.
“Their reasons for continuing [the mandates] are strange. I feel it’s more of a punishment.”
On Wednesday, Health Minister Martin Foley confirmed Victoria would ditch most Covid-19 rules from 11.59pm on Friday, but would buck other states in keeping its sweeping worker vaccine mandates, which require critical workers such as healthcare staff, teachers, aged care and truck drivers to be triple-vaccinated.
Others such as hospitality, office and construction workers are required to have had at least two doses.
Chief health officer Brett Sutton told Mr Foley in his most recent advice, dated April 7, that worker vaccine mandates should be mostly scrapped “at the earliest reasonable juncture”, given Victoria’s high double-vaccination rate of 94.5 per cent.
“At this stage of the Covid-19 response, public health measures are increasingly becoming the responsibility of individuals, employers and event organisers with less reliance on rules and regulations imposed by the government,” Prof Sutton wrote.
“As part of this shift, I advise that vaccination mandates for patrons and some workforce requirements move away from Orders in a stepwise manner.”
Mr Foley has denied he ignored his own health advice, but is yet to fully explain the reasoning behind the decision — which has been criticised by some health experts and the hospitality industry.
“We’re left to speculate on why the Health Minister has chosen to maintain the mandate,” University of Sydney vaccine expert Professor Julie Leask told The Age on Friday.
“The coercion would have done its work by now, if it was going to. I don’t think continuing the mandate will achieve any high vaccination rate because it would have done that already. It would have got the people it was going to motivate over the line already.”
Mr Masters said the decision to allow the unvaccinated back into pubs and cafes and patrons, but “not allowing us to work makes absolutely no scientific sense whatsoever”.
“Why, when these insane policies are announced, will no one point out the obvious?” he said.
David Limbrick, Victorian Senate candidate for the Liberal Democrats, has also slammed the decision saying it “makes sense to no one”.
“Ridiculous that unvaccinated can go to restaurants and pubs from Saturday, but because they’re not allowed to work, they won’t have any spare money to actually do that,” he wrote on Twitter.
I still remember when the justification for mandates was to stop transmission. We need to remember how quickly they used emergency powers to create a social underclass and how so many who are supposed to care about “social justice†and “human rights†cheered it on. https://t.co/JsLlriD4ZQ
— David Limbrick 🌸 (@_davidlimbrick) April 22, 2022
“I still remember when the justification for mandates was to stop transmission. We need to remember how quickly they used emergency powers to create a social underclass and how so many who are supposed to care about ‘social justice’ and ‘human rights’ cheered it on.”
Speaking on Thursday, Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews said it was his “hope” he would not need to extend the state’s pandemic declaration order when it expires in July.
“I certainly hope so,” Mr Andrews said.
“I don’t know what independent expert advice I’m going to get in the days leading up to the 12th of July. It’s my hope that we don’t need [an extension], or we need something less than that, or we need some other arrangement. That would be terrific.”
While Covid-19 vaccination does not completely prevent transmission of the virus, it reduces the chance of serious illness or death, according to health authorities.
Some studies also show vaccines do reduce transmission in households to varying degrees, Prof Leask notes.