Northern Victoria Region
Mr QUILTY (Northern Victoria) (12:14): (1729) My constituency question is for the Minister for Health. We are two years into this state of emergency. In Yarrawonga last week I was approached by a local who was caught up in the mandate lunacy. She is unwilling to get vaccinated or to have her children vaccinated. She contracted COVID-19 in November and was able to get an exemption from the mandates to keep her job, but this expires shortly. She has pulled her children from school and is homeschooling them and is now looking at being unable to work to support her family. Let us be clear: she is one of the lucky ones. Her employer accepted her exemption, and she has been able to continue working. Many thousands of northern Victorians have lost their jobs and their homes for failure to comply while the state struggles under a massive labour shortage. Minister, why at this stage of the pandemic, with vaccination rates at 95 per cent and with the virus running freely through our community and this place, are you forcing this woman and thousands like her out of work?