CW visited the campgrounds at Exhibition Park, where thousands have descended upon Canberra to participate in more COVID-19 vaccine mandate protests this weekend.
It’s Friday morning, and from the procession of cars and cacophony of horns, cheering and chants heard outside the main gate at EPIC, add some tyre screeching and you’d think Summernats had returned to Canberra.
Just outside we meet Michael Simms, a Canberra disability worker who, since 15 November 2021, hasn’t been able to work due to his vaccination status.
We jump in a car and are taken on a tour of the expansive campgrounds, where tents, campervans and cars stretch as far as the eye can see.
There has been an explosion of campers coming in from across the country this week ahead of large protests planned for Commonwealth Park and Parliament House tomorrow, Saturday 12 January.
“It’s expanded a lot since I first came here two days ago,” Mr Simms said.
Once inside, a pervasive sense of warmth and friendliness is immediately noticeable. A festival atmosphere permeates the showgrounds; the mood is upbeat and positive, with crowds of smiling faces lining the streets waving to cars passing by and saying hello to anyone walking past.
Mr Simms is one of the 1.4 per cent, or several thousand, of ACT residents aged over 12 who remain unvaccinated, and has been involved with the Convoy to Canberra anti COVID-19 vaccine mandate protests since they began at the start of last week.
In that time, he’s seen one rowdy day of protests where the police used pepper spray.
“Neither side were violent, I don’t feel, the police or the people,” he said. “One little incident happened, but that was it.”
Being unable to work due to his vaccination status, Mr Simms said his issue lies with the mandates specifically: “not the vaccine in particular”.
“My family are vaccinated, all my friends are vaccinated, all my work colleagues are vaccinated; there’s no hate there, it’s just I don’t want to get it, and I want to go to work,” he said.
“There are clients at my job who are unvaccinated, and that’s okay, I can see my work colleagues after work, I can hang out with them on the weekend … it’s just the fact I can’t go to work.
“That’s my main fight here, the mandates.”
Having been involved with the protests for over a week now, Mr Simms estimates 90 per cent of people he’s spoken to are skilled professionals who have lost their job over refusing to get a COVID-19 vaccine.
“The Canberra Noticeboard think everyone here is a bum, but most people here worked until not long ago when they lost their jobs.
“They’re schoolteachers, they’re nurses, they’re disability workers; they’re the occupations that have lost their job … It’s not people living off Centrelink coming for free food.”
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