By Taylah Eastwell
LOCKED-DOWN villages on Melbourne’s outer fringe are frustrated at being labelled “metro” despite being surrounded by rolling green Hills that see them fall under “regional” for almost everything else.
The announcement that regional Victoria was released from Melbourne’s sixth lockdown due to no Covid-19 case numbers left traders and residents in outer Hills communities questioning the blanket lockdown, with many of the townships not seeing a case in over a year – if ever.
Under the restrictions, metropolitan Melbourne is made up of 31 local government areas, including Cardinia and Yarra Ranges shires.
In Gembrook, over an hour and 20 minutes from the CBD, local resident Tina says the metro label is a contradiction, with “everything else” deemed regional.
“For lockdown we are considered metro, but when it comes to postal delivery we are considered regional. We can’t get metro rates, we have to pay regional rates and wait longer for delivery,” Tina said.
Tina described the label as frustrating. “It gives us no benefit for anything else,” she said.
Owner of Cockatoo’s Brunch on McBride, Elise Turnedge agrees, saying she has “no idea” why the fringe township is considered metro.
“Metro should be whatever is on a normal train line. You can’t catch a train here, you can’t even catch a bus to Fountain Gate from here.
“We have no mail delivery, we have dirt roads, in every other regard we are a regional town, apart from when it matters like getting discounts on car registration and these lockdowns. Even when we order supplies for the shop, for delivery we are regional so we pay more to get things delivered than we would if we were metro, but they want to call us metro for the lockdown,” Ms Turnedge said.
“My friend runs a 40-acre farm on Tschampions Road, Macclesfield. 40-acres and they are metropolitan?,” she said.
Ms Turnedge believes cutting it off at towns with a train line would be a smarter way to go about the regional/metro divide.
“If you can catch a train from Flinders Street, then that would be metro because you’ve got more people that can get out there. If they cut it off at Lilydale, Mount Evelyn would be fine, Yarra Glen would be fine, Yarra Junction and Coldstream and all those little towns along the Warburton Highway that definitely aren’t metro would be fine,” she said.
“There’s no tourism, there’s no Puffing Billy or Emerald Lake Park, so no one is coming out here anyway. There’s no random people who might want to get on a train and go somewhere for the day. They can’t get out here,” she said.
Cardinia Shire Council mayor, Brett Owen said that while the lockdown restrictions were a state government matter, he and the council acknowledged that the shire was home to many diverse communities and he welcomed them to reach out with ideas and suggestions moving forward.
“The implementation of restrictions is a matter for the Victorian Government’s public health response,” Cr Owen said.
“Council would welcome any consideration to an application of restrictions that acknowledges the unique qualities of our shire and local communities, including an understanding of the diverse geography in Cardinia Shire.
Neighbouring towns in the Yarra Ranges are also struggling with the metro classification.
Yarra Ranges Council Streeton Ward councillor Cathrine Burnett-Wake said council wrote to the state government on 8 September last year and again on 4 June this year urging a reclassification of non-urban areas of the shire allowing them to be excluded from metropolitan Melbourne lockdowns.
“A bureaucrat from the state responded with a refusal on 30 June. It was stated that such an action was “not available” because the power to ‘split’ a municipality to partially regional/rural is not available through the Local Government portfolio under provisions of the Planning and Environment Act 1987 – but what was refused was not what the council asked for,” Cr Burnett-Wake said.
“In my view, the response did not address our request. We never asked for our municipality to be ‘split’ or redefined under the Planning and Environment Act 1987. This response purposely misrepresented our request in order to deflect. It’s self-evident that the use of Local Government Areas as boundaries for lockdown areas is simply for ease of administering the lockdown policy. There is no overreaching specific law or standard for how areas or boundaries may be defined for lockdown purposes. It is certainly not set, as the response implied, by the Planning and Environment Act,” she said.
“Lockdown boundaries have historically been set by any criteria that suits the state government at the time. The Andrews government has previously locked down specific postcode zones, and even individual apartment blocks. So, quoting the Planning and Environment Act as a reason why non-urban areas of Yarra Ranges must remain in lockdown even though they are in reality regional, is a misdirection, and a purposeful misrepresentation of the council’s request,” Cr Burnett-Wake added.
Cr Burnett-Wake said we need a “common sense and practical approach to these lockdowns”, however, so far, “we are not getting one in respect to the Yarra Ranges”.
“Our regional townships, communities and businesses are suffering, without need, for no benefit to a single resident of Victoria. This senseless damage to rural communities needs to be stopped, but instead of direct help from our elected representatives in state, we receive only obstruction and misleading answers from unaccountable bureaucrats, who use irrelevant environmental planning laws to obstruct and deny,” she said.
Member for Evelyn, Bridget Vallence has also pushed the issue in Parliament, arguing there has not been a Covid-19 case in the Yarra Ranges for nearly 10 months.
“Daniel Andrews announced that regional Victoria would no longer continue to be in Lockdown 6.0 because, and I quote, “fundamentally the function of not having cases in regional Victoria.”
“Yet, despite there not being a single case of Covid-19 for nearly 10 months, country communities in the Yarra Valley remain stuck in lockdown. It makes no sense!
“All towns across the Evelyn Electorate have been Covid free for 330 days or more (as at 10 August 2021), some towns for nearly a year.
According to Ms Vallence, Lilydale has been Covid free for 330 days, Mt Evelyn for 352 days and Silvan for 348 days.
“This proves that Daniel Andrews and Labor have kept the Yarra Valley in Melbourne’s lockdown, NOT because of public health advice, but because of bureaucratic lines drawn on a map. The outer boundaries of the Yarra Ranges Council are a three-hour drive from the CBD,” Ms Vallence said.
