Covid 19 -

[Polyal]

Originally Posted by Poetic Justice

Unless it was a hoax there was a statement at around 3:30 yesterday from Daniel Andrews saying he intends to notify cabinet that Victoria will enter a state of shutdown over the next 48 hours.

This was followed by an inundation from my staff wondering if they still had a job.

By 9:30pm the Scott Morrison had talked them out of it.

Seems an odd thing to publicly declare intent without knowing if you can do it?

People also need to start thinking for themselves. If they are not comfortable then act, or dont, they are not stood down until told so keep on going otherwise.

Interesting, according to our CEO mining is deemed essential, not sure who is defining that but that will burn the Greens..LOL

[Fed]

If they leave the schools open can't the parents simply decide to keep their kids at home?

[falcon_bandit]

Originally Posted by Fed

If they leave the schools open can't the parents simply decide to keep their kids at home?

That's what our family is doing as of today. Clearly the only reason schools are open is to use schools as a daycare facility to keep services running to some degree. Mass gatherings are key to the virus spreading, so my kids stay home.

[BENT_8]

Originally Posted by falcon_bandit

That's what our family is doing as of today. Clearly the only reason schools are open is to use schools as a daycare facility to keep services running to some degree. Mass gatherings are key to the virus spreading, so my kids stay home.

This is ok, but how long do you keep them home for, if this is just the beginning it could be 6 months, how do they fare when they go back and find themselves 6 months behind everyone else, then apply that theory to teens in yrs 10,11 and 12 who have exams.
Leaving it up to parents will create a divide in education, sending everyone home keeps them all on the same page and having skeleton staff in schools on modified programs allows those who need their kids looked after catered for.

The school I drive for has 3 buses catering to 34 children, today I had 3 of my 15 away with the parents saying they're scared of the virus, one of my colleagues had only 4 of her 14 attend and the third bus had 2 of 5 attend, each of these services costs the Government $700pw to maintain and as of today only half are utilising it.
The School itself was very quiet, hardly any traffic doing drop offs, so too was the other two schools I pass in transit.
This is the problem, some will just send them and some wont and its the children who'll pay the price in 6 months when the divide in level of learning becomes evident.

Don't get me wrong, I fully support a parents right to protect their children at any expense, but all facets need to be factored in by all concerned.

[falcon_bandit]

Originally Posted by BENT_8

Don't get me wrong, I fully support a parents right to protect their children at any expense, but all facets need to be factored in by all concerned.

I agree it is more of a primitive decision, and is not ideal at all.

But the wife has a multiple history of pneumonia, & currently (coincidently) has been off work for the last 3 weeks with dangerously high blood pressure. Her poor health means we can't afford to send our kids out right now in the early stages of a pandemic, and bring something home that will almost certainly kill her. Maybe there's nothing we can do, but can try?

No need to wait for a bullsh@t artist in a suit on television, to tell u what to do, and when to do it.

[BENT_8]

Originally Posted by falcon_bandit

I agree it is more of a primitive decision, and is not ideal at all.

But the wife has a multiple history of pneumonia, & currently (coincidently) has been off work for the last 3 weeks with dangerously high blood pressure. Her poor health means we can't afford to send our kids out right now in the early stages of a pandemic, and bring something home that will almost certainly kill her. Maybe there's nothing we can do, but can try?

No need to wait for a bullsh@t artist in a suit on television, to tell u what to do, and when to do it.

Thoughts and prayers are with you all.

[Romulus]

Originally Posted by falcon_bandit

I agree it is more of a primitive decision, and is not ideal at all.

But the wife has a multiple history of pneumonia, & currently (coincidently) has been off work for the last 3 weeks with dangerously high blood pressure. Her poor health means we can't afford to send our kids out right now in the early stages of a pandemic, and bring something home that will almost certainly kill her. Maybe there's nothing we can do, but can try?

No need to wait for a bullsh@t artist in a suit on television, to tell u what to do, and when to do it.

There's the problem, the bullsh@t artists in the suits on television aren't telling you what to do. Not one public broadcast has mentioned anything to help people like your wife (and me) advise us on how to build our immune systems to prevent or deal with this virus. I too am susceptible to pneumonia, I've had it twice. I've had to resort to 'quackery, alternative medicine' treatments to keep my immune system strong. You wont hear the CMO and other pharma owned pill pushers recommend anything that doesnt come in the form of a script. Rockefeller based medicine and treatment is a joke.

[DOC]

Originally Posted by BENT_8

This is ok, but how long do you keep them home for, if this is just the beginning it could be 6 months, how do they fare when they go back and find themselves 6 months behind everyone else

Not sure for all, but my daughter and her colleagues have been spending nights and days preparing to homeschool and could now switch over to schooling the students from home with skype at the drop of a hat.

So as for education, it can be done all uni's are doing this as well, at best it seems scomo is dicing with teachers health over keeping others going to work at best.

[Yellow_Festiva]

Originally Posted by DOC

Not sure for all, but my daughter and her colleagues have been spending nights and days preparing to homeschool and could now switch over to schooling the students from home with skype at the drop of a hat.

So as for education, it can be done all uni's are doing this as well, at best it seems scomo is dicing with teachers health over keeping others going to work at best.

Yes, great if you are older and have tech savvy, English speaking parents.

In reality - Students in year 4 and below will probably do very little till school is back unless they have a parent capable and willing to sit by them and do everything with them one to one.

Can you imagine a 5-7 year old logging into Skype and teaching themselves or following the instructions online?

I was sitting in on HS classes last week trying to debug the online learning platforms and even years 8-10 were struggling.

Half of them were fooling around on other sites, not bothering with the classes - which is exactly what will happen at home.

This year is going to be a compliance nightmare for education. Passing a class is based on hrs sat per year. With no way to monitor what has and has not been sat at this time some tough decisions will need to be made.

I think they should switch the Summer 6 week holidays to now and hope that in the next few months things settle down and come Dec / Jan students only get 2 weeks.

That is the ONLY way we can keep compliant and ride the year out and start 2021 schooling year as per normal.

[aussiblue]

Now this is really serious https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/coron...id=mailsignout
"Australia's biggest brewers are warning the country could run out of beer for three months".

[cheap]

Originally Posted by aussiblue

Now this is really serious https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/coron...id=mailsignout
"Australia's biggest brewers are warning the country could run out of beer for three months".

Was at local bottle-o last night, it was very busy, staff mention yesterday was busier than either Christmas and New Year Eve, sales up 60%.

I suspect it will get even busier once GovCo cash payments make their way into people's hands.

[Tonz]

gov & teachers ...poor sods will get ridiculed if they shut down and also if they dont. Shopping centres will have influx of roaming school kids...oh joy

[DOC]

Originally Posted by Tonz

gov & teachers ...poor sods will get ridiculed if they shut down and also if they dont. Shopping centres will have influx of roaming school kids...oh joy

With 170+ ? countries shutting schools, it is only going to take a few kids taking C19 home to the parents before the sheite hits the fan and people scream why were these schools not closed sooner.

[Bossxr8]

Originally Posted by Poetic Justice

Personally quite frustrated at the lack of cohesion between State & Fed govts - they ought to be on the same page whether rightly or wrongly.

From 3:30pm yesterday afternoon to 9:30pm the Vic govt announcing plans to shut down and then back pedalling at the behest of the PM is wildly unprofessional (lack of a better term) and smashing confidence in people.

I agree. This is not the time for mixed messaging. At this point it should be the federal government running the show, and not the states deciding to do something different.

All it it doing is creating confusion.

[Franco Cozzo]

The messaging from VIC and Federal Government is a bit confusing, yesterday afternoon the statement released by Daniel Andrews seemed more strongly worded then this morning he's parroted Scomo and the Federal Government.

Yesterday it was a case of are any of us going to work? Now it's a case of hospitality/fitness/entertainment is out and the rest of us are fine.

Speaking of which I went to a cafe for lunch this afternoon at about 12:30 - business as usual except no seats and tables out front, got a sanga then sat in my car.

[Yellow_Festiva]

This disaster is just showing the tip of the iceberg.

Many that have never applied for benefits MUST do so over the counter to get their reference number. CRN or something (I don't think I have one either).

It flies in the face of advice... Keep your distance, stay home etc.

This all has to be done online and over the phone... With one caveat.....

If you are ever caught rorting the system or providing false documents or misleading information then it's 6months prison and $10k fine plus a ban from any benefits for 5 years.

We can't have lines hundreds long for weeks.

What a joke.

Centrelink and My Gov sites both down, numbers not working.

200k hospitality workers predicted out of a job in the following months.

And it's only the first day.....

Sent from my LG-M700 using Tapatalk

[Franco Cozzo]

The old boy works at Centrelink - 500m long line at his office.

They operate at snails pace that joint so it's going to take months to get through the system, they can't even manage the work they had prior to this **** storm.

[Yellow_Festiva]

Originally Posted by Franco Cozzo

The old boy works at Centrelink - 500m long line at his office.

They operate at snails pace that joint so it's going to take months to get through the system, they can't even manage the work they had prior to this **** storm.

They need to offer full time work to any Centrelink worker that has left in the last 2 years.

That's a start.

Then they need to keep the offices open earlier and later through to Saturday and half day Sunday.

The current model struggled as it was. Increase customers by 500% and they need to look at the service side of things.

But this will not be suggested till next week with our 'She'll be right mate' attitude....

[Franco Cozzo]

Originally Posted by Yellow_Festiva

They need to offer full time work to any Centrelink worker that has left in the last 2 years.

That's a start.

Then they need to keep the offices open earlier and later through to Saturday and half day Sunday.

The current model struggled as it was. Increase customers by 500% and they need to look at the service side of things.

But this will not be suggested till next week with our 'She'll be right mate' attitude....

They've got the staff who work in other roles who specialise in different fields going to help with claims as well to try get it moving quicker. They weren't meeting their own policy obligations with how they process claims, so they just extended them out another month, and still don't meet their own policy obligations.

MyGov is down, it's effectively under DDOS with everyone trying to use it at once.

Government is like a very large corporation, they're locked to existing policy and procedures, they don't maneuver to changing market conditions very well, it's like trying to turn a massive ship.

Anything outside of the norm happens at glacial pace.

[BENT_8]

My 19yr old went to Centrelink this morning to provide ID to progress her claim she's had in progress since last week, was there at 9am, line hundreds deep, got to the front, sorry, no face to face interviews ring the hotline which has now crashed.
Multiply that x1000's..

[Yellow_Festiva]

Originally Posted by BENT_8

My 19yr old went to Centrelink this morning to provide ID to progress her claim she's had in progress since last week, was there at 9am, line hundreds deep, got to the front, sorry, no face to face interviews ring the hotline which has now crashed.
Multiply that x1000's..

What a debacle... They couldn't put up signs saying what they can and can't do??

[xxx000]

Finally the government is, or will be, being forced to put significant money back into government services.
Many services were struggling before the virus. Now that's all been highlighted

[five 7]

NZ is going into total lock down in 48 hours for one month.

[MITCHAY]

Seeing the footage of the Centrelink queues is extraordinary considering this is only the beginning of it all. Depending on how long this goes on those of us that are in a good financial position now may find themselves in the line later on.

[.:4:.]

Work was pretty much dead for me today. The cbd was a ghost town. I had no call outs and the 28 floor building i was working in just doing a lighting run, as the place was near empty and has been for days, as none of the bathrooms lights etc are being turned on, next to nothing was out. One bloke i work with foolishly too last week off, work said take another week. Our projects team are just about to finish a job and the next couple of jobs have been put on hold, so they all will probably be forced to take leave, and most have very little leave up their sleeves. Im probably the last person work will ask to take time as im the most experienced service guy, and breakdowns still happen. One lady im keen on runs the front desk for one of my clients, all their staff are working from home. She still has to come in and take the few calls she gets in a day and divert to whoever the call is for. No orginising catering for meetings or whatever other duties her job used to entail. Its a bit extreme at the moment how quickly things have downturned.

[zipping]

Sorry to hear that Bent_8

Tough days ahead, brutal when downturn this strong

ty for the heads up early in thread boson (realised shut down coming after some research), even so the downturn is brutal.

Every CEO/COO and CFO be barely sleeping atm trying to keep people employed and get the financials right.

[b0son]

Originally Posted by zipping

ty for the heads up early in thread boson (realised shut down coming after some research), even so the downturn is brutal.

Even with a little foresight, it still takes the wind out of your sails when it's announced. We were in a bit of a panic over the weekend. One of my dad's friends sent him a essential vs non-essential categorisation document, presumably out of the UK, and while it's not necessarily of any relevance here, it did leave us a little calmer as to whether we could keep operating.

If nothing else though, when Chinese clients complain about the impact of our lockdown on their delivery dates, it's fun to remind them who is ultimately responsible....

[zipping]

Only catching up on news now.

Shocking to see the Dem's blocking (atm) the stimulus bill, playing politics at a time like this is insane to throw in more uncertainty.

In good news 3M will start producing 35 million ventilator masks a month (hoping some get here)

[b0son]

Originally Posted by zipping

Shocking to see the Dem's blocking (atm) the stimulus bill, playing politics at a time like this is insane to throw in more uncertainty.

I'm going to stay up and watch the Dow Jones....

[Cav]