A Ballarat business owner has joined a class action compensation claim against the Victorian government over its alleged mismanagement of the state's hotel quarantine program.
Victoria's Supreme Court ruled last week the class action would proceed, after two attempts to quash it.
More than 1,300 business have registered to seek compensation, believing the escape of coronavirus from hotel quarantine led to Victoria's second lockdown from July 2, 2020.
Ballarat children's play centre Chipmunks owner Varneet Singh said lockdown periods throughout the coronavirus pandemic had almost sent him bankrupt and set back business goals.
He had planned to build 20 new centres over the past three years, but instead only has two.
"We lost all of our trade and business overnight," he said.
"It was really hard for a business like us to even survive. We lost nearly half a million dollars in profit."
Compensation hope
Quinn Emanuel partner Damian Scattini said the class action was open to any traders that experienced a financial loss as a result of restrictions.
The lead plaintiff is Melbourne restaurant and bar 5 Districts NY.
"When the Victorian government decided to run a mandatory hotel quarantine program, it took on a duty to ensure it was managed properly," Mr Scattini said.
"If the hotel quarantine program had been handled competently by the people in charge, there would not have been a second lockdown."
Mr Scattini said genomic sequencing traced coronavirus cases back to staff members in hotel quarantine breaching infection control.
"[The Victorian government] was tasked with operating hotel quarantine in a competent manner," he said.
"Instead they didn't train people properly, didn't have people using PPE as they should have, didn't supervise them… It was inevitable the virus would escape in those circumstances."
Mr Singh said he lost 50 staff members due to the long periods his Chipmunks sites in Ballarat and Melbourne were unable to operate, and with that, went many years of staff experience.
"One of the staff members had been with us for six years," he said.
"This is very hard to come by. It will take two or three years to get that any staff experience back."
Struggles continue
Mr Singh said it was a continuing battle to survive in business, with price increases and labor shortages hampering recovery.
"Everyone is suffering at the moment," he said.
"Any of these businesses will take a long time to recover, but these added pressures are pushing us backwards. We are not going forward.
"Hopefully this [pandemic] should never happen again, but if it does the government should be better prepared for it."
The class action alleges ministers and secretaries in the health and jobs departments at the time were negligent in their actions and failures to act, and the state of Victoria is liable for their negligence.
A Victorian government spokesperson said they noted the Supreme Court decision, but could not comment further as the matter remained before the court.
The case will return to court and a decision is expected to be made on a date for trial.
