Victorian Health Minister Martin Foley says ‘ring of steel’ not needed for long weekend

Melbourne is not encircled in a ‘ring of steel’ this coming weekend but the State Health Minister says most urbanites will do the right thing.

Victorian Health Minister Martin Foley. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Andrew Henshaw

Altered police tactics to deter Melburnians from a long weekend in regional Victoria will work, the State Health Minister says.

With Melbourne set to end its lockdown tonight, a new approach has been adopted by Victoria Police to replace the ‘metropolitan ring of steel’ measures witnessed last year.

Police set up static checkpoints on major roads out of Melbourne following the second lockdown when the city and country were under differing levels of Covid-19 restrictions.

For the Queen’s Birthday long weekend, there will be no “ring of steel”, police instead focusing efforts on roving patrols on the main arterial roads out of Melbourne, along with back roads, and using automatic number plate recognition technology.

Health Minister Martin Foley said the ‘ring of steel’ measures were not necessary as Melbourne eases out of its fourth lockdown.

“The Chief Commissioner of Police is confident,” Mr Foley told The Weekly Times.

“(Chief Commissioner Shane Patton) thrown a lot of his team — both in the regions and metropolitan Melbourne at ways of doing this.

“VicPol went through an extensive process of review to the effectiveness of the ‘ring of steel’ over 2020, looked at how other jurisdictions around Australia and the world did it and their very strong recommendation was a highly mobile, 24/7, major routes/minor routes, in the city/in the regions approach; supplemented by licence plate recognition technology and other moves was the most effective way to go.”

Last week, Police Deputy Commissioner Rick Nugent said 200 police officers would be dedicated to monitoring the urban fringe, while another 250 would be helping enforce the chief health officer’s directions right across the state.

Mr Foley acknowledged a small number of Melburnians would try to travel to regional Victoria but said the new approach would deter most from heading to the country over the long weekend.

“Based on that sensible, real-world recommendation from VicPol, we were more than confident. Now can you always commit to 100 per cent compliance? As we have seen, well we don’t know the circumstances yet from the people (who went to) the southern parts of Queensland departing Melbourne were but we did see also some people go from Melbourne to Sydney to Auckland — clearly 100 per cent is a real issue but the overwhelming majority of people do the right thing.”

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