Hundreds of Australian protesters took to the streets over the weekend in defiance of COVID-19 lockdown restrictions and mandatory mask laws.
The protests, organised by a varied coalition of fringe online groups, saw at least 200 demonstrators breaching Melbourne’s stage-four lockdowns to rally in the city’s CBD on Saturday, despite warnings from health experts. A handful of smaller rallies also took place in Sydney, Brisbane, Adelaide, Perth and Byron Bay.
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Victoria Police officers arrested 17 people at the Melbourne rallies and issued more than 160 infringement notices for breaches of the Chief Health Officer’s stay-at-home directions.
The state is currently facing some of the strictest lockdown measures in the world, including restrictions on movement, nightly curfews and legal requirements for citizens to wear a face mask any time they leave their place of residence.
Hundreds of people attended the Melbourne protests on Saturday—many of them without masks—to express their opposition to these restrictions, accusing the Victorian Government of contravening individual freedoms and impinging on civil rights in the exercise of their state of emergency powers.
Protesters chanted “freedom” and “human rights matter” in the face of a large contingent of riot police and mounted officers, while a number of demonstrators also seized the opportunity to rally against 5G, vaccinations, and “child trafficking and pedophilia”. Some brandished QAnon signs.
The protests turned violent at multiple points as police clashed with protesters in intermittent melees. One man was arrested for punching a police officer—authorities placing him in handcuffs and fitting him with a mask—while more than a dozen others were taken into custody throughout the course of the day.
It wasn’t until mid-afternoon that the rallies finally dispersed, after more than 160 people were hit with fines.
“Despite all the warnings, it was disappointing to see individuals turn out to protest in the city today, putting the lives of Victorians at risk,” Victoria Police said in a statement. “As a result of the protest, a police officer received lacerations to the head after being assaulted by an individual who was in attendance.
“Our investigations into this protest will continue, and we expect to issue further fines once the identity of individuals has been confirmed.”
Three people were also arrested in Sydney, at one of several protests around Australia that were held in solidarity with those in Victoria.
The Victorian Government extended the state’s stage four restrictions—which were initially due to last six weeks and end on September 13th—by an extra fortnight on Sunday, announcing a “slow and steady” roadmap out of lockdown. As per that plan, curfews, strict limits on social interactions and restrictions on movement will remain in place in Melbourne until at least October—subject to a sustained drop in daily cases.
Many have criticised the measures as being gratuitous, heavy-handed and frustratingly slow, with a number of experts demanding more clarity on the data that informed the government’s decision.
Catherine Bennett, chair in epidemiology at Deakin University, told the ABC there was a risk people would disengage with the restrictions if they were stuck in stage four longer, especially if the Government could not give data-driven explanations for enforcing such stringent measures.
“Our data showed us that we started not only flattening the curve but started to push it down with stage three [restrictions] plus masks before we even saw the effects of stage four,” she said. “I think we only had to go through stage four this time because people weren’t fully engaged with stage three … [and] it worries me that stage four will start to look like stage three again in terms of the effectiveness of it.”
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