Chants of “No hate, no fear, Nazis are not welcome here!” rang through the streets of Sunshine on 25 February as more than 500 anti-fascists and local community members marched through the multicultural, working-class suburb in Melbourne’s west.
Testimony from front-line workers at Victoria’s hotel quarantine inquiry has shone a light on the perfect neoliberal storm that unleashed Victoria’s “second wave” of infections. Much attention has rightly been focused on the deregulated, profit-driven security companies that were contracted by the state government to staff crucial roles on Victoria’s front line. But testimony from two nurses employed in the hotel quarantine program indicates that the problems were more extensive than that.
If Victorian teachers and education support staff need any vindication that schools were unsafe and should have stayed closed for face to face learning this term, they’ve got it.
More horror stories come out daily as COVID-19 rips through Victoria’s disastrous aged care system. A woman’s body was left to rot for 10 hours after she died. Another woman was found sitting alone grieving and pleading for death after her husband of 56 years died of the virus. Providers telling family members their dying loved ones are fine.
“When my school closed it was in school holidays. People found out 13 days after they were in contact with this student that they had an infectious student in their class …. They won’t tell you the student’s name, they won’t even tell you their year level.”