QR data proves citizens obeying Victorian Covid-19 lockdown laws

The number of Victorians checking in at venues using QR codes each day roughly halved as soon as the state’s sixth lockdown was imposed.

A man scans a playground’s QR code in Melbourne’s Brighton in August. Picture: David Crosling

The number of Victorians checking in at venues using QR codes each day roughly halved as soon as the state’s sixth lockdown was imposed, and have remained relatively steady over the ensuing six weeks.

The data, requested by The Australian from the Victorian Health Department, shows an average of 4.9 million check-ins occurred each day in the five days before the state went into lockdown at midnight on Thursday August 5.

That Thursday had the highest number of check-ins of any day since August 1, with 5.4 million, as Victorians rushed to visit venues before they were forced to close indefinitely.

Check-ins fell the following day, with three million on Aug­ust 6, and an average of three million over the following week.

In a sign many check-ins were related to permitted work, there was less activity on weekends, with just two million on Sunday August 8, and 2.1 million on Sunday August 29.

The release of regional ­Victoria from lockdown on Friday August 10 coincided with ­increased activity, with some 4.2 million check-ins that day.

Despite considerable anecdotal evidence that people are becoming increasingly tired of lockdowns, there was the exact same average number of check-ins in the fifth week of the lockdown as there had been in the first week, at three million.

A Health Department spokes­man urged Victorians to continue to assist contact tracing efforts by checking in everywhere. “It’s great to see authorised workers and daily shoppers maintaining their check-in habits during lockdown,” he said.

Traffic across Melbourne has been about 40 per cent down on pre-lockdown levels.

Premier Daniel Andrews on Thursday refused to lift the city’s 9pm to 5am curfew, saying the restriction helped curb the spread of Covid. “The curfew works. We have definitely seen less movement on our public transport networks and on our roads during curfew hours,” he said. “We know from contact tracing interviews that people are breaking the rules. A fair bit of that activity was in fact occurring during curfew hours.”

He also announced a ban on construction workers travelling from Melbourne to regional Victoria and vice versa for work.