Daniel Andrews setback on coronavirus pandemic powers

The Andrews government faces an uphill battle to pass legislation that would see its coronavirus ‘state of emergency’ powers extended for nine months until December.

Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews in Melbourne on Tuesday. Picture: David Crosling

The Andrews government faces an uphill battle to pass legislation that would see its coronavirus “state of emergency” powers extended for nine months until December, after key upper house crossbencher Fiona Patten said she would not support it.

The government secured its last state of emergency extension in September only after it reduced the time from 12 to six months and persuaded Greens leader Samantha Ratnam to return to parliament from mat­ernity leave to vote with Ms Patten and the Animal Justice Party’s Andy Meddick in favour of the legislation.

On Tuesday, Ms Patten indicated her support for the latest bill might be more difficult to secure, saying she wanted to see “COVID-specific” legislation, rather than a blanket granting of ongoing emergency powers.

“Come December this year, we’re still going to need to quarantine people coming from overseas, we’re still going to need to ask people to self-isolate after they’ve had a test. This is not going to end at the end of this year, so what will we do? Go back and extend the state of emergency? No,” the Reason Party leader said.

“We understand the government needs to have powers to provide some restrictions, but to do it in a heightened state of emergency is not the answer.”

Opposition leader in the upper house David Davis said the proposal to extend the state of emergency for nine months was “another grab for power by Daniel Andrews … We say nine months is too long. We say that is a grab for power. Month to month or three-monthly extensions are much more justified.”

Mr Davis said any request for an extension of emergency powers should be accompanied by the release of documents detailing the health advice on which coronavirus restrictions are ostensibly based.

“Every single health order is subject to a documents motion from the chamber to say ‘deliver up the briefs, deliver up the background documents’, and the government has refused point blank to release its justifications for each and every order,” he said.

The Premier’s confirmation he would seek a nine-month extension of the state of emergency came as he announced the maximum capacity for private and public sector office workers would increase to 75 per cent from Monday.

The change represents an increase from the current limits of 50 per cent for private sector workers and 25 per cent for public servants.