Victoria Police issued 87 fines on Saturday to people who had breached lockdown restrictions, including a group of people who gathered at a hotel to have a party.
Police said a total of 688 spot checks were carried out yesterday. More than 30,000 spot checks have been carried out since March 21.
Some of the people fined included people who had gathered in private residences, and people who did not live together who were found in a car together with no reason for their travel.
State Education Minister James Merlino has hit out at calls from the federal government and the state opposition to reopen schools, saying he will follow the advice of the Chief Health Officer.
"Let me be very clear, particularly to the federal government who do not run any schools, we will only transition back to face-to-face teaching for all students when that is the advice of the Victorian Chief Health Officer," he tweeted. "Not a moment before."
"What we are doing in combating this pandemic is working. But the situation is very fragile. A move back too early could see a spike in cases and a need to reimpose any restrictions we may have eased."
State Education Minister James Merlino.Credit:Luis Enrique Ascui
Mr Merlino wrote he was proud of principals, teachers and support staff for doing their best to transition to remote learning classes.
State Opposition Leader Michael O'Brien is calling for schools to be reopened, arguing that children are not at risk of being infected with COVID-19 at school and are being denied a full education by the move to online learning.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison has again moved to reassure Australians only state health authorities will have access to their digital interactions through a planned contact tracing phone app.
The federal government’s app is expected to be launched later on Sunday, which allows health authorities to alert Australians if they had come close to a positive COVID-19 case by using Bluetooth data, which records digital “handshakes” with other phones.
Mr Morrison told ABC radio on Sunday morning when tracing teams had spoken to people who had contracted the virus, many of them were unable to remember the full extent of people they had been in contact with.
He said people should be comforted that only medical authorities would be able to access the data and it would only happen if they or someone they had met had COVID-19
"It doesn't know where you've been, where you might have been visiting or what shops you're at, what towns you're in or anything like that," Mr Morrison said.
Prime Minister Scott MorrisonCredit:Alex Ellinghausen
"All it knows is the other phones that you came in contact with, and that information only gets downloaded when someone gets the coronavirus and that person who has it enables it to be downloaded to that health officer."
He said it was only about "helping health officers do their jobs" and would lead to a quicker lifting of restrictions.
"No other government agency can use this information, no-one in the Commonwealth government at all, and in state governments only the health officer, not the police, not the welfare people... no where else... just the health officer," he said.
"This is another tool that we need so we can get as back to normal as much as we possibly can".
Doctors and family members of patients from the private psychiatric clinic at the centre of a COVID-19 outbreak in Melbourne are outraged by what they call "appalling" communication and a lack of transparency, raising concerns over Victoria's management of future outbreaks.
After the outbreak at the Albert Road Clinic near Melbourne's CBD was announced on Friday, another inpatient was diagnosed with COVID-19 on Saturday, taking cases linked to the centre to 15. Three are in hospital, including one in intensive care.
After an investigation into the outbreak was announced on Friday, Victorian Deputy Chief Health Officer Annaliese van Diemen on Saturday defended the state’s response.
Deputy Chief Health Officer Annaliese van Diemen defended Victoria's management of the outbreak on Saturday.Credit:AAP
“Every case that is diagnosed is contact traced … the fact that the Victorian public found out about these [on Friday] doesn’t mean that nothing has been happening since the 24th of March. It’s not the same thing,” she said.
There will be a couple of press conferences relating to coronavirus in Victoria this morning.
At 10am, State Oppositon Leader Michael O'Brien will be talking about schools. In today's Age, there is an article about how the Victorian Liberal Party is calling for schools to reopen immediately. You can read that article here.
Then at 11am, Health Minister Jenny Mikakos will be providing the daily briefing on the state's coronavirus numbers.
State political reporter Sumeyya Ilanbey will be heading out to both of these press conferences and we will be posting any information from both to the blog.
Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton says there will be additional biosecurity measures at Australian airports when international travel is reopened in the wake of COVID-19.
Mr Dutton has also confirmed Australia and New Zealand could come to an agreement to open up travel between the two countries in the “short to medium term”.
He said Australian Border Force was planning to bolster biosecurity measures at airports when travel recommences, which would be in place for years to come.
Home Affairs Minister Peter DuttonCredit:Alex Ellinghausen
“There will be an additional overlay of security, of biosecurity, I think at our airports for years to come,” Mr Dutton told Sky News.
“We need to make sure we use the technology we have available and look at assessing that threat as the human threat crosses our borders.”
He said recommencing travel to New Zealand would be the logical first step.
“You could look at an arrangement with New Zealand given they’re at a comparable stage as we are in the fight against this virus,” he said.
The two major political parties will seek taxpayer-funded wage subsidies under the federal government's $130 billion JobKeeper program to avoid staff layoffs as the economic impact of the coronavirus hits their campaign headquarters.
The federal headquarters of the Liberal and Labor parties will register to access the fortnightly payments of $1500 to avoid laying off their staff as funds dry up following the cancellation of party fundraising events.
The employees, which include administration staff, researchers, party directors and membership co-ordinators, draw their salaries mainly from political donations and fundraising, and are not on state or federal government payrolls.
Tough social-distancing measures to stop the spread of COVID-19 – including a ban on indoor gatherings — has severely hit the finances of the parties, forcing them to abandon fundraising efforts across the country, including intimate dinners with party leaders which can bring in hundreds of thousands of dollars in a night.
Victoria's political consensus on remote learning during the pandemic has crumbled, with the state opposition demanding the Andrews government immediately reopen schools to all students.
Opposition Leader Michael O’Brien said children were being deprived of a full education by Premier Daniel Andrews' edict that children who can learn from home, must learn from home.
Victorian Opposition Leader Michael O'BrienCredit:Luis Enrique Ascui
The Coalition argues children are not at risk of being infected with COVID-19 at school, and Victoria is out of step with official medical advice in its insistence on closing schools to most students for the entirety of term two.
But Education Minister James Merlino on Saturday resisted calls to change the government's policy.
“The advice to parents has not changed – if you can learn from home, you must learn from home," he said. “That is the Victorian government’s clear message. That is the Chief Health Officer’s clear message.
In case you missed it, in Friday's episode of the Please Explain podcast, national editor Tory Maguire and health reporter Rachel Clun discussed how the government tracks coronavirus recoveries, immunity periods and the future of COVID-19 testing in Australa.
Charities in Victoria are struggling to cope with an illegal rubbish scourge with op shops treated as “dumping grounds” as households clear out unwanted clothes and furniture during social restrictions.
The rising costs for clearing discarded household items is another impost on charities already hit by the closure of op shops, a crucial income stream, and struggling to raise funds for society’s most vulnerable people during the pandemic.
There has been an "alarming rise" in illegal rubbish dumping during the coronavirus pandemic. Credit:Rebecca Hallas
Shopfronts are being cluttered with dumped items despite clear signs pleading with people to stop. Charity donation bins are also being surrounded with discarded items.
Some councils have reported an increase in illegal dumping of furniture on the streets – a cost they must bear.
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2020-04-26 00:24:00Z
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