INDEPENDENT Mildura member Russell Savage sided with the Steve Bracks Labor Government back in the late 1990s on a promise that Labor would return the passenger rail to Mildura.
It was a deal struck in good faith, but the promise was never honoured by the then Victorian Government.
More than 20 years on, there was a sense of deja vu this week as independent Member for Mildura Ali Cupper accused the current Andrews Labor Government of backflipping on a “good faith” commitment struck before a vote for a nine-month extension to Victoria’s state of emergency (SOE).
Having linked with Upper House Member Fiona Patten’s Reason Party, Ms Cupper announced the government had agreed to amendments to SOE extension provisions that could have applied different rules in regional Victoria, rather than hit the bush under blanket lockdowns.
Ms Patten, in a decisive crossbench vote, said “yes” to the SOE extension on Tuesday night on the back of that good faith assurance, only for Victorian Health Minister Martin Foley to say next morning that the government had made no such commitment.
It’s House of Cards stuff, straight out of the Netflix series starring Kevin Spacey, only it’s very real for regional Victorians.
To her credit, Ms Cupper did not take the betrayal of faith lying down during her speech in parliament on Wednesday afternoon.
Put it this way — if Savage was angry back at Bracks in the late ’90s, Cupper was savage at the current Victorian Government on Wednesday.
But now we are here. With nine more months in a state of emergency under Daniel Andrews.
Should we be worried?
Sadly, yes, for the misplaced trust that our own independent member placed in the Andrews Government this week has long been broken for many Victorians.
While there are legitimate health reasons behind the need for an SOE to remain in place, the continued overreach of those powers during this pandemic by Andrews is what people, particularly in the bush, fear.
Many have already simply upped and left. We have friends in Mildura who have just moved back to Adelaide, deciding after the last snap five-day lockdown to put their home on the market. It’s sad, but the latest lockdown was a bridge too far for them and they packed up their family last weekend and put Victoria in the rear-view mirror.
Our friends claim South Australia is like a different place, not consumed in anxiety and fear or daily press conferences. It’s a common sentiment from many people who live or have holidayed interstate.
And then there are the Victorian businesses, who feel like they are walking a tightrope with this new extension of the SOE.
The Council of Small Business Organisations Australia’s Peter Strong said this week the SOE extension sent a clear message: “Do not have any confidence, anything could happen in Victoria.
“It means businesses can’t plan with certainty, if there’s one case the whole state could be shut down,” he said.
“It depends on what mood the government’s in, it doesn’t depend upon medical advice, it doesn’t depend on consultation.”
Reports this week revealed an average of roughly two companies collapsed in Victoria every day in February and we could be bracing for an insolvency cliff when JobKeeper ends in March.
At a community level, the uncertainty is also proving crippling, with events continuing to be cancelled at an alarming rate.
Even the Red Cliffs centenary celebrations have now been put on hold due to the extra layers and layers of red tape and government restrictions. A proud community will now have to celebrate its 100th year in a different year, if at all.
Fortunately, some local events are pushing ahead, including Mildura’s Show and Shine at Easter, but restrictions are making it extraordinarily difficult for organisers, who may be forced to close off half the CBD.
Hopefully they can find a way, because the danger is once these long-standing events that are worth millions to a community are lost, many may never return.
And then there is local footy, where crowd limits and other restrictions are causing all sorts of concerns for Victorian leagues and clubs.
Here in Sunraysia, we have the crazy situation where crowds on the Victorian side of the river will be limited to 1000, with only players and officials allowed on the playing surface, while in NSW crowds of up to 3000 will be allowed in and parents can even have a kick at half-time with their kids.
Why the difference?
Why is Victoria’s health advice so different to other states’?
Or why in Victoria is it presumably safer to play cricket on a beach among thousands of people in Torquay than it is to set foot on a footy ground in Irymple on a Saturday afternoon?
When it comes to the SOE extension, this is the wildly inconsistent policy-making that Victorians are petrified of continuing under the government’s watch.
For me, banning kids from having a half-time kick at country footy is all optics, a reminder of control, for there can be no other rational reason. Certainly no reason that sits under health advice, for otherwise such bureaucratic nonsense would exist in other states. It doesn’t.
The issue for the Premier now is winning back the trust of many Victorians, and not just the #westandwithdan crowd.
Other states are not mutinous when it comes to public health advice, but I fear many jaded Victorians are increasingly becoming that way, which is a dangerous place to be.
The backlash on social media to the nine-month SOE this week was predictable, but it speaks to a mood of the state we’re in.
Trust has been broken — just ask our state member — but Andrews can begin winning it back over the next nine months with proportionate use of his powers when outbreaks inevitably occur.
Shutting down cafes in Merbein when there is one coronavirus case in Carlton can no longer be the way forward.
