Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews says restrictions could be eased quicker than expected in regional Victoria because of the low number of active cases in country areas.
There are 82 active cases in regional Victoria and, from midnight Sunday, country areas will move to Step 2 on the Government's road map for reopening the state.
Step 2 includes changes to outdoor gatherings and some face-to-face learning, but the Government has been criticised by industry groups for not relaxing restrictions on businesses fast enough.
Today Mr Andrews said regional Victoria's case numbers meant country areas could soon be in a position to move to the third step in the reopening plan.
"I think the second and third step, there's every chance we can take those together," he said.
"[But] I don't want to be building up expectations — it's all got to be done on the data."
To meet the requirements for Step 3, regional Victoria needs to average fewer than five cases a day and no cases from unknown sources in a two-week period.
Regional Victoria is currently averaging five cases a day and has had 11 cases of unknown origin in the past fortnight.
Under Step 3, hospitality businesses could have outdoor-seated patrons and there would be no restrictions on the reasons for leaving home.
The case for Geelong
During Sunday's announcement of the road map for reopening, Mr Andrews said Geelong might need to wait longer than other parts of regional Victoria to reopen if case levels remained high.
But today he said he was confident that would not be necessary.
"It's not like Geelong's [got] 50, 60, 70 cases, as they did some some time ago and, on that basis, there's actually some confidence that we'll be able to move all of regional Victoria [to looser restrictions] together as one," Mr Andrews said.
In the past week, active cases in the City of Greater Geelong have dropped from 40 to 15 and the Government is confident a second outbreak in Colac has been contained.
Traces of coronavirus have been found in wastewater from Apollo Bay, south-west of Geelong, but so far all tests have come back negative.
Nine tests are outstanding.
Stimulus in budget
Federal Treasury estimates Victoria's second lockdown is expected to cost between $10 billion and $12 billion.
Mr Andrews said this year's budget, which will be handed down next month, would include measures to ease the state's recovery from the recession.
"It will be the biggest program of stimulus and economic investment that this state has ever seen," Mr Andrews said.
"We've got a really big package of investment, focused on skills, focused on trying to make sure that we make good decisions fast for the purposes of business development and investment."
