The Victorian Premier remains adamant there can be no guaranteed deadlines for when and how restrictions will be eased, which has business and the Treasurer very worried.

Although he is confident most voters are still prepared to back restrictions to get virus numbers down, Andrews does know patience will wear thin as will the economic buffer provided by Canberra.
Just as Frydenberg knows the second wave in Victoria has deflated his hopes of presenting a strongly recovering national economy or reopened state borders when he delivers his budget on October 6.
All businesses will be waiting nervously to see how serious the promise of discussions this week will be in practice.
But with the daily number of new cases continuing to fall now down to well under 100 as of Monday Victorias leader insists his approach (and only his approach) will deliver the best results.
Hes still adamant there can be no guaranteed deadlines for when and how restrictions can be gradually eased, for example. It all depends on case numbers and medical advice in an unpredictable future.
This strategy is working but its too early for us to open up right now or put forward a detailed roadmap of what that opening up will look like, the Premier declared. There is no economic benefit in doing this too fast and finding ourselves in a month or six weeks time in a situation where we dont have control of this.
He understands the community frustration and the fatigue, he concedes, but he will not allow the virus to explode again and have all the pain suffered by Victorians to be worth nothing.
Instead, he is promoting key principles underpinning an opening up that can be sustained indefinitely rather than only for a matter of weeks. Those principles apparently range from having people still work from home wherever possible to ending carpooling to enforcing mandatory face covering in all workplaces.
But there can be no “one size fits all” approach with different rules applying to different industries. And it is always dependent on medical advice and what happens to case numbers over coming months.
Christmas is coming
The most definitive timetable for now appears to be Andrews expressed wish for Christmas to be as close to normal as possible.
If we forget its a pandemic and think its a popularity contest, Christmas wont look normal at all, he said.
The second wave in Victoria has deflated Josh Frydenberg’s hopes of presenting a strongly recovering national economy or reopened state borders when he delivers his budget on October 6. Alex Ellinghausen
According to the Premier, the framework for opening up will be different to previous phases and more akin to a traffic light system. He is also suggesting the warmer weather will provide more options for bars, restaurants and cafes in terms of outdoor service that wasnt available previously.
But all businesses will be waiting nervously to see how serious the promise of discussions this week will be in practice. Many were aghast at the initial lack of consultation about how to best manage the stage four restrictions imposed a month ago,
At that time, Frydenberg intervened on behalf of business leaders to persuade his Victorian counterpart, Tim Pallas, to listen to pleas for increased flexibility. That back channel seems unlikely this week given the sharper tensions in the relationship.
Tim Piper, Victorian head of the Australian Industry Group, pointed out that Ai members had COVID-safe plans already in place, arguing the focus should be on strategies to restore confidence in the state economy.
Where they are necessary, restrictions should be narrowly sector-based, not whole-of-industry-based, and apply to businesses where there is a high risk of transmission, he said.
Industries that can operate safely and fully across Australia and that did so during most of this crisis, including manufacturing, construction and the many industries that have transitioned to working from home, should simply need to comply with COVID-safe plans without generic restrictions on numbers on site or in warehouses.
Whether the Premier is listening to such arguments is less clear.
That is even though the latest federal Treasury analysis shows more Victorians will be on JobKeeper than the rest of the country combined over the next six months, while unemployment benefits have skyrocketed in the state.
Household spending
That ride will get a lot bumpier as both federal payments are reduced from September 27. Household spending in Victoria is already down by 30 per cent relative to 3 per cent elsewhere in Australia. Employment in the construction industry has also been decimated by the decision to close down or severely restrict most building sites.
According to a household survey released on Monday by the Australian Bureau of Statistics, Victorians were less likely to shop in physical retail stores in August (45 per cent compared with 81 per cent nationally), to attend their workplace in person (30 per cent compared to 66 per cent), to send children to school or childcare (18 per cent compared with 74 per cent), or to dine in at restaurants or cafes (2 per cent compared with 50 per cent).
And that includes a more relaxed regional Victoria as well as the empty streets of suburban Melbourne and the ghost town that used to be a CBD. Happy Christmas?