This is so bizarre. What are people able to do to protest?
Threatening stage 5 lockdown if stage 4 does not "work".
BUT how can stage 4 "work"?
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This is so bizarre. What are people able to do to protest?
Threatening stage 5 lockdown if stage 4 does not "work".
BUT how can stage 4 "work"?
Thanks for this. :highfive: At exactly this time, I was thinking of starting a special Covid section about Australia, which is starting to feel important. Constance has already posted some updates, and we can easily move or copy them here.
None of this makes any sense to me when you look at the actual death toll figures in that area. I have a growing suspicion there is some sort of evil social experiment going on here. What may work in communist China may not work in the west. So it would be a matter of interest (to 'them') to find out what the limits are, how far they can push things, how much people can take.
Perhaps Australia is the ideal testing ground for this for whatever reason. One could be, an already compromised government, and two, easy test subjects - the people are not armed to resist as they are in the states.
I just posted this over here. There is something deeply wrong in Australia, no doubt about it.
*****
@12 seconds
"'sovereign citizens' - whatever that might mean". If he doesn't know what that means, he should not be wearing a uniform. Absolute disgrace.
One could even define this as 'police state'.
Melbourne Police Salivate: We will smash your windows, we will arrest you, we will detain you.
This is absolutely horrendous.
Have had several private @ from friends there and it is that serious.
Chris
This does not show the beginning but when a person is out of control, manhandling her is NOT helpful. Engaging will lead to increased violent reaction.Quote:
Posted by greybeard
IMO this is important for all of us.Quote:
Posted by Bill Ryan
There is a precedent for actions set out in 2015
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EfEkPjXU...g&name=900x900
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EfEkRD0U...png&name=small
The State of New Mexico in the USA has a similar piece of legislation.
What a curious term, "penalty units". I looked it up and it is a means by which the monetary value of the penalty is adjusted for inflation, so that the "value" of the money (so-called) collected for the penalty does not become eroded by inflation. These money managers never miss a beat.
Victoria is the vangaard to see how much pushback.
Seven Nightly News Sydney Riccardo Bosi on Victoria's lockdowns
Police brutality in Melbourne Australia for not wearing a mask
Getting used to upholding the "new normal" system.
Quote:
Posted by DelightThis does not show the beginning but when a person is out of control, manhandling her is NOT helpful. Engaging will lead to increased violent reaction.Quote:
Posted by greybeard
And YES, note the bystander filming (breaking curfew is given as reason for incident)
This is from a friend of mine in Melbourne, I emailed him after I read some stuff here on Avalon last week
Quote:
The article is effectively spot-on, and this is only what we are aware of.
We are certainly living in interesting and draconian times. This has been more evident over the last few weeks.
Effectively, we have had Martial Law imposed upon us under the guise of a medical emergency. This is the only time in the history of the world that the healthy are being locked up vs the established protocol of quarantining the sick minority. Masks are mandatory and only one (1) person is allowed in a car at a time.
Our State Government has quarantined Melbourne, but not before it increased its borders to encompass an area of 10,000 klm2 - this is just for Melbourne!
As it stands, as of today, the army has been called in to supplement the police force to stop people from leaving their house/property under penalty of A$6000 per breach for a 1st offence. A$20,000 for subsequent breaches. Only one (1) person per household is allowed to leave the house for one (1) hour per day for essential goods. Most retail businesses have been ordered to shut and staff from other businesses have been ordered to stay home. And in true Third Reich style (just like the prelude to WW2) the community has been encouraged to report offenders.
The supermarkets are rationing certain lines of goods such as canned tomatoes, paper towels, dishwashing detergent, milk etc. The quantity/variety of fresh vegetables is down from usual. Talk on the media of meat being rationed, and I suspect this will happen. Meat prices have almost doubled from a few weeks ago. The word ‘Curfew’ (just like a military operation) is on signs detailing the operating hours of supermarkets etc.
People cannot be out of their property 8.00pm - 5.00am.
Schools have been closed and education is to be remote via computers etc. Trains and buses are operating on heavily reduced schedules. No weddings are allowed.
We cannot travel more than 5 Klms from home, and road blocks are in place through the suburbs. In fact road blocks are placed on the main arterial roads/highways out of/into Melbourne to stop people escaping. Very draconian, and the pity is the police in particular don’t know the law and just enforce whatever the government dictates against the people (we do not have the awareness of the Constitution here in Australia that you have in the USA).
Cannot leave or enter Victoria without a special pass - most are turned back at the border. Total lockdown communist style.
The figures of how many are infected with Covoid19 is very suspect. According to the government, there are minimal reports of influenza, or death by cancer etc as per previous years but a lot of people are suddenly infected by the Covoid19. The figures don’t make sense.
So far, ~150 deaths Australia wide with a population of 25 million. Sad as this is, most were in their 80-90’s and had underlying health issues.
Our State is being, in my opine, deliberately destroyed by the current Left Leaning Government and media. Any narrative giving a questioning view is immediately censored and deleted. I am unsure if it is ideology based for a New World Order or just incompetence. But either way, we are up the proverbial creek without a paddle and our rights and freedoms are being whittled away.
They are even trialing having to supply names/address as a condition to shop in certain supermarkets - for tracking Covoid19 of course. Just getting the plebs who want to eat, used to the new reality of being a slave.
Mark of the Beast is here, and a fair majority of people support it for the ‘common good’. Sad but true.
Of note is Victoria accounts for ~25% of Australia’s GDP, destroy it and Australia suffers massively.
Times certainly are interesting Bryan.
George
Thanks for starting this thread Maggie :flower:
I believe that the stage 4 restrictions has been a political move rather than a health initiated directive motivated by the Premiers agreement with the CCP (China Communist Party)
China's belt and road initiative: what is it and why is Victoria under fire for its involvement?
Source: The GuardianVictoria has come under fire from federal Coalition MPs over its agreement under China’s belt and road initiative, but what does it mean for Victoria and Australia’s foreign policy towards China?
What is the belt and road initiative?
It’s the Chinese government’s estimated $1.5tn foreign and economic policy, announced in 2013, to establish maritime trade routes across the globe and invest in infrastructure projects in dozens of countries. The projects include pipelines, ports, railways and other major infrastructure projects.
Last year, Chinese media reported 170 memoranda of understanding had been signed with 125 countries.
Why did Victoria sign an agreement with China?
In 2018, premier Daniel Andrews signed a memorandum of understanding with China’s national development and reform commission to work together on belt and road initiatives.
At the time, Andrews said the agreement was aimed at his massive state infrastructure program.
“With the biggest infrastructure program in our state’s history under way, we have the design and delivery skills China is looking for, meaning more jobs and more trade and investment for Victorians,” he said.
“In four years we have more than tripled Victoria’s share of Chinese investment in Australia and nearly doubled our exports to China. We said we’d reboot our relationship with China and we’re getting it done.”
This was followed by a framework that established a working group, with an aim to get a roadmap on the partnership opportunities between China and Victoria agreed upon by the middle of 2020. So far, no roadmap has been released.
The framework reveals the partnership is looking to go beyond Chinese investment in infrastructure, including potential partnerships on biotechnology, agriculture, food, cosmetics, and a wide variety of industries.
What does the agreement force Victoria to do?
Nothing. It is not a legally-binding agreement, but so far the Victorian government is not backing away from it.
Victoria’s treasurer, Tim Pallas, told a parliamentary inquiry this month that the state would “absolutely not” reconsider its belt and road agreement, and accused the federal government of “vilifying” China over its push for an international inquiry into the Covid-19 pandemic.
The federal government has not signed a similar agreement, instead stating that BRI projects will be assessed on a case-by-case basis, rather than signing an overarching MoU or agreeing to any roadmap like Victoria.
Why are Coalition MPs so concerned about it?
Western countries, particularly the United States, have expressed scepticism about China’s motives underlying the BRI.
“An agenda is probably the best way to describe it,” the then prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, said when asked why the federal government had delayed signing on in 2017.
“We obviously welcome Chinese investment that meets our foreign investment guidelines but we’d prefer to focus on specific projects and investments rather than engaging in generalities.”
The home affairs minister, Peter Dutton, was one of several Coalition members, including senators James Paterson and Matt Canavan, who criticised Victoria for making the deal.
Dutton described BRI as “a propaganda initiative from China” that brings an “enormous amount of foreign interference”.
“Victoria needs to explain why it is the only state in the country that has entered into this agreement,” he said.
Paterson accused Victoria of undermining the federal government’s response to China in the Covid-19 crisis.
On Sunday the prime minister, Scott Morrison, said Victoria was stepping into federal government policy territory.
“We didn’t support that decision at the time they made [the agreement]. And national interest issues on foreign affairs are determined by the federal government, and I respect their jurisdiction when it comes to the issues they’re responsible for and it’s always been the usual practice for states to respect and recognise the role of the federal government in setting foreign policy.
“And I think that’s always been a good practice.”
The Liberal opposition in Victoria has questioned why the agreement was not able to protect Victorian farmers from the 80% tariff placed on Australian barley by the Chinese government this month.
Could it lead to Chinese telecommunications infrastructure in Australia?
No more than is already here in the 4G networks that use Huawei today.
The US secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, told the Sky News Outsiders program on Sunday that communication channels could be severed if Victoria allowed China to fund telecommunications infrastructure in Australia.
He said the US would “not take any risk to our telecommunications infrastructure, any risk to the national security elements of what we need to do with our Five Eyes partners”.
“We’re going to protect and preserve the security of those institutions, so I don’t know the nature of those projects precisely, but to the extent they have an adverse impact on our ability to protect telecommunications from our private citizens, or security networks for our defence and intelligence communities, we will simply disconnect, we will simply separate,” he said.
The US ambassador to Australia, Arthur Culvahouse, had to backtrack on the comments on Sunday, after it was pointed out that telecommunications projects in Australia are the responsibility of the federal government.
In addition to Victoria stating it has not and would not enter an agreement with China over a telecommunications project, federal legislation passed in 2018 giving the federal government veto power over telecommunications infrastructure partners effectively bans Chinese companies such as Huawei and ZTE from working on 5G and other similar projects in the future.
The former premier Jeff Kennett is interviewed here. Jeff says that the current premier is being secretive about what this agreement with China involves. We are not allowed to see it. The rest of Australia is not being informed.
The current premier states that we are exporting more goods from here than anyone else. What exactly is he exporting when the state is bankrupt, our tourism is dead, and our people are out of work? Kennett says that the Premier increased our debt by 24.5 billion. Kennett says that it is a tactical and strategic maneouvre by China who is looking for those who are weakened by financial debt.
Daniel Andrews SOLD Victoria to China
In 2017, I was told by someone who has spent over 30 years in the agricultural industry that China would be controlling all of Victoria's fresh produce by 2020. He said that all our food would be coming from China. At the time, it rang true to me because I was reading reports that the Chinese were buying up large portions of farmers land on the outskirts of Melbourne. This land has been repurposed for housing estates.
Over 20 years ago, I used to live in one of the inner suburbs of Melbourne. The suburb is called Box Hill. Box Hill city was always considered to be one of the larger-sized middle class suburbs of Melbourne and of medium density in population.
Melbourne has always considered to be a very multicultural city and I am very grateful for that. However, I went to visit Box Hill about 6 months ago and I was surprised. I could have been in any modern asian city! The landscape of the city of Box Hill had altered so dramatically with new tramways and infrastructure and brand new high rises everywhere that I almost didn't recognise it!
All the shops signs were written in Chinese. Of the shops I visited, none of the staff spoke english. It was now a very highly affluent city filled with Chinese people living and working there. I didn't see any other cultures frequenting the stores or the streets, or coming out of homes.
There has always been a trend in Melbourne for immigrants to settle in certain pockets but these are usually in the outer suburbs where it is more affordable to live, more sprawling and the population is still very mixed in its culture.
Why Is China Snatching Up Australian Farmland?
June 20, 20174:40 PM ET
At the wine tasting room of Taylors Wines in Sydney, Australia, bottles are uncorked, poured, swished, sniffed and sipped. There's a lot for employees to toast this year.
"The Australian wine sector is growing at a fast rate," says Mitchell Taylor, the winery's managing director. "And what is exciting is the top level, about 20 to 30 dollars a bottle and above, that segment is growing at 53 percent."
That's thanks, in part, to China.
Five years ago, the biggest importers of Australian wines were the U.K. and the U.S. Now that title is held solely by China, and Australia's exports of wine there are growing at 40 percent per year.
In the past year alone, Chinese investment in Australia's overall agricultural sector has skyrocketed threefold, from $300 million to $1 billion — an unprecedented investment boom.
"We're very excited about this agricultural boom that is starting to happen now, not only in the wine sector, but in so many agricultural industries," says Taylor. "And I really believe it's due to having that access of being on the same time zone as China, and being able to provide that clean, green, positive image that Australia presents."
And for Chinese companies, this presents a way to feed the world's largest and fastest-growing consumer class. "Chinese investors want a piece of that action," says James Laurenceson, economist at University of Technology Sydney.
Last year, Chinese home-buyers bought up to a quarter of the new housing stock in New South Wales. In the past few years, Chinese companies have either purchased outright or bought significant shares of the Australian ports of Darwin, Melbourne and Newcastle.
It's the same story for agriculture, says Laurenceson. "I mean, they're the ones who can see it most clearly, right?" he asks from his office above Sydney. "They're seeing Australian wine to China going up by 40 percent last year, dairy products, everything. So they see profit opportunities. And at the same time, rural Australia has this chronic shortage of capital."
And that's why China has replaced the United States as the second-largest foreign owner of agricultural land in Australia. (The U.K. is No. 1.) Two years ago, Dakang, a private Chinese agricultural company, offered to buy Australia's largest cattle ranch. The Kidman ranch makes up 2 percent of Australia's farmland – it's the size of South Carolina.
For the rest of this article, please visit npr.org
Snippets taken from parliament research papers
These were the directives given to the Chief Health Officer under the Emergency Act
People may well understand now why I have been calling for action and our sovereignty since these lockdowns began. :bowing:Public directions
Sections 199 and 200 of the Act grant the Chief Health Officer expansive powers to issue directions and set requirements to eliminate or reduce risks to public health. These powers include:
§ detaining any person or group for as long as reasonably necessary to eliminate or reduce a serious risk to public health;
§ restricting the movement of any person within Victoria;
§ preventing any person or group from entering Victoria; and
§ giving any other direction reasonably necessary to protect public health.
2-Aug
At 6pm, Victoria entered a State of Disaster and moved to Stage 4 restrictions. In a statement, Premier Daniel Andrews announced that stronger rules were being put in place in order to 'limit the movement of people – and limit the spread of [footnote the] virus across [footnote the] city'.[footnote 202] Under Stage 4, new restrictions include:
§ a curfew from 8pm to 5am, with the only reason to leave home during these hours being work, medical care and caregiving;
§ Night network suspended, with public transport services reduced during curfew hours;
§ exercise limited to a maximum of one hour per day and no more than five kilometres from home;
§ study at TAFE and university must be done remotely, with schools returning to remote and flexible learning;
§ closure of early childhood services; and
§ no weddings in Melbourne.
These restrictions will remain in place for at least six weeks, until Sunday 13 September.[footnote 203]
3-Aug
A follow-up statement from the Premier on 3 August announced new restrictions for businesses and workers. As part of Stage 4, three lists have laid out changes to businesses and workers to limit people moving around the state for work:
§ The first list confirms businesses and workers that will continue to operate. Included are supermarkets, grocery stores, bottle shops, pharmacies, petrol stations, banks, newsagencies, post offices and frontline response workers.
§ The second list details businesses which are to cease operations by Wednesday 5 August at 11:59pm. Among these are retail, manufacturing and administration operations.
§ The third list outlines that food production, waste collection and supply chain logistics industries are permitted to operate, but under significantly different conditions.[footnote 204]
Penalties and enforcement
Penalties for failing to comply with directions are set out under section 203 of the Public Health and Wellbeing Act 2008. Non-compliance may result in a fine of up to $20,000 for persons and $100,0000 for bodies corporate.[footnote 205] The Premier made these penalties explicit when the first round of public gathering restrictions was announced.[footnote 206]
On 28 March 2020, further regulations were issued under the PHW Act for infringements of the emergency measures.[footnote 207] These offences included refusing or failing to comply with emergency directions (sections 200 and 203(1) of the Act), public health risk power directions (sections 190 and 193(1) of the Act) or a Chief Health Officer direction to provide information (section 188(2) of the Act); and hindering or obstructing an Authorised Officer (section 183 of the PHW Act).
The DHHS delegated enforcement of the PHW Act to Victoria Police, enabling police officers to issue on-the-spot infringement notices carrying a penalty of ten penalty units ($1,652) for individuals and 60 penalty units ($9,913) for bodies corporate. In its submission to the COVID-19 Senate Select Committee, dated 13 May 2020, the Victorian Government reported 43,829 completed COVID-19 police checks, with 2,894 fines and 833 warnings issued.[footnote 208]
Victoria Police have conducted several operations enforcing the directions:
§ Operation Sentinel, to enforce staying at home, restricted activity and isolation directions as per the State of Emergency declaration, involving 1,200 police by July 2020.[footnote 209]
§ Operation Nexus, to enforce health directions over the Easter long weekend.[footnote 210]
§ Operation Ribbon, to respond to family violence.
§ Operation Shielding, redeploying Protective Service Officers.
§ Operation Benessere, implementing the lockdown of nine public housing towers from 4 July.[footnote 211]
Significantly, the Public Health and Wellbeing Regulations 2019 were amended on 22 July, to insert 'fail[footnote ure] to comply with a requirement in relation to face covering' as an infringement offence. It prescribes a $200 penalty for non-compliance.[footnote 212] In line with these regulations, the Premier announced on 20 July that 'the Victorian Government has placed orders for 1.37 million reusable fabric masks from five Victorian manufacturers'.[footnote 213]
Roadworks in Victoria to be undertaken in 2020/2021. People are reporting that they can hear roadworks being carried out day and night.
Attachment 44040
Please see this link: Victraffic