‘History is repeating’: Lisa Wilkinson SLAMS Gladys Berejiklian for Sydney’s ‘confusing’ lockdown – as The Project hosts accuse NSW of not learning from huge mistakes made in Melbourne’s outbreak
- NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian under fire over Sydney coronavirus lockdown
- Came under fire on The Project for handling of crisis as cases continue to soar
- Accused of making same mistakes as Daniel Andrews in Victoria a year ago
- Echoed calls for less confusion and better communication in health messages
Gladys Berejiklian has been slammed over her handling of Sydney’s latest coronavirus outbreak and her refusal to use the word ‘lockdown’.
The Project co-host Lisa Wilkinson and fellow panelists didn’t hold back in a scathing attack of the New South Wales premier on a day her state recorded 38 new cases, the highest number of daily infections since the first wave of the pandemic.
Ms Berejiklian came under fire for her ‘confusing’ stance and was accused of repeating mistakes made by Victoria counterpart Daniel Andrews during the state’s horror Covid-19 wave a year ago, which saw Melbourne plunged into a 112-day lockdown.
Residents in Sydney and surrounding areas have been urged to limit their movements further and avoid mingling while those in the Fairfield, Liverpool and Canterbury-Bankstown areas have been ordered to not leave home unless necessary.
Ms Wilkinson is among millions of Sydneysiders approaching their third week of lockdown after it was extended until at least July 16.
She accused the premier of badly communicating the severity of the outbreak to millions of Sydenysiders, leaving residents baffled about whether they were in lockdown as cases continue to soar.
Sydney is battling to control its latest coronavirus outbreak as the city approaches its third week of lockdown (pictured, a woman in Bankstown where residents are urged to not leave their homes)
‘Right from the beginning of this, Gladys Berejiklian was refusing to call it a lockdown and that was the most important moment of communication,’ Ms Wilkinson told the program.
‘We all knew, and still know, that the Delta variant is so much more transmissible and she never adopted a stance that made it look like she was taking this even more seriously than Dan Andrews was, because she had every reason to.’
‘She had the Prime Minister at the same time saying, “Gladys is the gold standard of how you do these sorts of lockdowns”.
‘Sydney has kind of been confused and it’s no surprise to anybody that the numbers are the way they are.’
Panelist Peter Hellier agreed there was mass confusion.
‘It’s a word I’m hearing a lot from my Sydney friends – confused.’
Sydney-based The Project co-host Lisa Wilkinson (pictured) was scathing of the NSW Premier on Thursday night
Co-host Waleed Aly acknowledged health officials are doing their best but expressed concern about the similarities between the current Sydney crisis and last year’s debacle in Victoria.
‘What amazes me about this is the way that history is repeating and lessons don’t seem to have been learned,’ he said.
‘It reminds me so much of the situation in Melbourne last year where you had people from low-income areas with insecure work that couldn’t take time off to get tested or whatever it was.
‘And it was only after the outbreak reached those points where people went, oh my God, that is a bit of a problem, and especially there with multicultural communities,
‘The Victorian government was poor at it and it became a problem and I think now we’re seeing the NSW government is poor at it and I don’t understand why lessons aren’t being learned?
‘Is it just too hard or they aren’t watching to see what the lessons are?’
NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian (pictured) came under fire on The Project for not taking the outbreak seriously enough
The Project panelists echoed calls for less confusion and better communication in public health messages (pictured, residents stocking up on essentials in Bankstown
The panelists’ calls for less confusion and improved communication in the government’s messages were echoed by Canterbury-Bankstown mayor Khal Asfour earlier in the segment.
‘We’ve had this pandemic on our shores for 18 months. I think the messaging is right, and they’ve got the material,’ he told the program.
‘I think they’ve just had a bit of a problem in getting it out there to the right people.
‘Community leaders are locked down at home. Our mosques, our churches, our places of worship are locked down.’
‘We’re a very faith-based community out here and it’s very hard for people to hear these messages from their faith-based leaders and I think it’s important that when that’s occurring that the government needs to double down on their efforts and make sure that people are getting the right message.’
All The Project panelists (pictured) agreed that the NSW Premier was repeating mistakes made by Victoria counterpart Daniel Andrews during the state’s horror Covid-19 wave a year ago