{"id":244715,"date":"2021-10-29T07:29:31","date_gmt":"2021-10-29T07:29:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=244715"},"modified":"2021-10-31T07:32:08","modified_gmt":"2021-10-31T07:32:08","slug":"dan-andrews-power-grab","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=244715","title":{"rendered":"Dan Andrews Power Grab"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\">Victorians could be fined up to $90,000 and jailed for TWO YEARS just for not wearing a mask or protesting lockdown under law that allows him to invoke pandemic restrictions at will<\/h2>\n<h1 style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>Kevin Airs for Daily Mail Australia \u2013 Oct 26, 2021<\/strong><\/h1>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Premier will be able to call state of emergency at will without doctors signing off\u00a0<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Pandemic restrictions can be imposed even if there are no cases in Victoria<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Anyone protesting against lockdowns or breaching mask rules faces huge fines<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Individuals can be jailed for two years or fined $90,500 for breaking new laws<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>New powers will allow Premier Dan Andrews to impose a state of emergency any time he likes &#8211; and Victorians face $90,000 fines or two years in jail if they protest.<\/p>\n<p>Under the legislation, opposition MPs fear the premier could use public health orders to target individuals on age, gender, sexual orientation, political belief, or activity.<\/p>\n<p>Health minister Martin Foley insisted the new legislation was designed to be transparent, but it was savaged by the opposition as &#8216;an attack on democracy&#8217;.<\/p>\n<p>Under the new bill, the premier will be able to declare a pandemic even if there are no cases, and can extend the state of emergency for three months at a time.<\/p>\n<p>The sweeping new pandemic laws which were tabled in parliament on Tuesday free the premier from having to get doctors to sign off on public health orders<\/p>\n<p>And the premier would be able to declare a state of emergency and bring in new restrictions on public life whether or not his chief health officer\u00a0agrees.<\/p>\n<p>The premier would also make the final call on implementing lockdowns, mask mandates and quarantine requirements.<\/p>\n<p>Victorians could be fined up to $90,000 or jailed for two years if they breach health orders and knew &#8211; &#8216;or should have known&#8217; &#8211; they were putting others at serious health risk, while companies face fines of up to $455,000.<\/p>\n<p>Legal experts have warned the new bill does not have a sliding scale of crimes and treats all breaches with the same seriousness, raising concerns some could face a jail term for minor breaches like not wearing a mask.<\/p>\n<p>But Mr Foley insisted every incident would be judged for its own seriousness.<\/p>\n<p>&#8216;Each case would have to be determined on its merits by an appropriate judicial officer,&#8217; he said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8216;It is a very high benchmark and it\u2019s for the most egregious and deliberate offences that cause significant public harm.&#8217;<\/p>\n<p>The dramatic escalation of the premier&#8217;s powers came under fire from the state opposition, which branded Mr Andrews &#8216;drunk on power&#8217;.<\/p>\n<p>&#8216;Victorians are today witnessing the most extreme, dangerous and excessive laws ever brought before our state,&#8217; Liberal leader Matthew Guy said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8216;Daniel Andrews is attempting to sideline the Victorian chief health officer and grant himself unchecked power.<\/p>\n<p>&#8216;Why would the government pass such extreme legislation if they didn&#8217;t intend to lock us down again?<\/p>\n<p>&#8216;This is the most extreme law of its kind anywhere in Australia.<\/p>\n<p>&#8216;Placing so much power in the hands of one person, not the cabinet, not the parliament, but in the hands of the premier alone would be unprecedented.<\/p>\n<p>&#8216;We see these laws as an incredible attack on democracy.&#8217;<\/p>\n<p>Mr Andrews dismissed the criticism as &#8216;political games&#8217; and insisted the powers were simply those that the opposition had been calling for.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailymail.co.uk\/news\/article-10131491\/amp\/Covid-Australia-Victorians-fined-90-000-jailed-two-years-new-laws.html\">Continues \u2026<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Victorians could be fined up to $90,000 and jailed for TWO YEARS just for not wearing a mask or protesting lockdown under law that allows him to invoke pandemic restrictions at will<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39262,"featured_media":244711,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[105,22,29],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-244715","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-coronavirus","category-Health","category-The_New_World_Order"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244715","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/39262"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=244715"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244715\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":244716,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244715\/revisions\/244716"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/244711"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=244715"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=244715"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=244715"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}