LILYDALE & YARRA VALLEY EXPRESS EDITION Local and Independent. Not associated with any other publication in this area.
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www.LocalPaper.com.au WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 2020
COMPLETE MESS
■ THE SITUATION of local elderly residents living on their own and going weeks on end without any human contact during the COVID-19 restrictions, has been raised in State Parliament. Neil Angus, Forest Hill MLA, told the Legisllative Assembly this month that a local elderly woman was unable to get to the clothes line in her backyard, because Government restrictions had not allowed her lawn to be mowed. “The complete mess that all Victorians now find themselves in is a direct result of the catastrophic mismanagement and failures of the incompetent Andrews Government,” Mr Angus said. “Whether that be the hotel quarantine fiasco, the extraordinary failures in the contact-tracing system or just the overall negligence and incompetence of the Premier and his ministers, the Andrews Government has a lot to answer for. “My electorate office has been inundated with inquiries from constituents regarding the current disaster the state finds itself in, including countless telephone calls and emails. “Some examples of the inquiries we have been dealing with are as follows: ■ Elderly residents living on their own and going weeks on end without any human contact. Many of these people cannot go out for walks and are stuck in their homes and unable to have visitors. ■ Immediate family members being unable to attend family funerals.
Outer Eastern MP slams Government mismanagement
● Neil Angus, Forest Hill MLA
■ An older lady living on her own being unable to get her regular mowing man, who she never actually has contact with, to cut her lawns, thus leaving her unable to safely get to her backyard clothesline. ■ One lady living in a retirement village cannot celebrate a milestone birthday with her only daughter and grandchildren. ■ A family of four—mother, father and two daughters—all now unemployed due to the restrictions resulting in their businesses being permanently closed. ■ A self-funded retiree couple with an investment property where the tenants have not paid rent for months. They are unable to get any recourse and are unable to sell during these times. ■ A young woman, with a doctor’s note advising that due to a medical condition she was not able to wear a mask, being refused entry to a pharmacy where she needed to get her prescriptions filled for the medication she is on. ■ A woman with an aggressive form of breast cancer being denied the right to have a family member attend and support her during her sevenhour-long chemotherapy sessions. ■ People with holiday homes being unable to undertake maintenance checks on their properties and consequently running the risk of not complying with their insurance policy requirement that a property must be checked every six months. ■ Taxpaying small businesses and sole proprietors who are unable to get government help because they are deemed to have ‘no relationship with the government’.
Update: Zero deaths ■ Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews announced yesterday (Tues.) that there had been zero deaths in the 24 hours to Tuesday. The Department of Health and Human Services yesterday reported 42 new cases. The 14 day averages are currently metro 52.9 and regional 3.6. The Department said there were 82 cases with an unknown source located in metro Melbourne and one in regional Victoria. Mr Andrews described yesterday as a day of “hope and optimism”. Tighter enforcement of traffic between metropolitan and regional areas will be conducted by Police.
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