An exasperated small business advocate says it feels like the Victorian government “hates” small business.

Bill Lang, Executive Director of Small Business Australia, accused Daniel Andrews of “playing from the (Donald) Trump playbook” when it came to managing Victoria’s COVID-19 crisis.

He was asked whether he had any confidence small businesses would remain open in Victoria after the latest lockdown was lifted.

“The only thing that’s certain about what’s been going on and what’s likely to happen is that we are going to continue to see some level of incompetence,” he told Tom Elliott.

Mr Lang said it was all bluster and little substance from the Victorian government, citing schemes such as the $100 million support package for sole traders announced last year.

“Now, for many of your listeners that sounds like a lot of money, but there are 330,000 sole traders,” Mr Lang explained.

“So 33,000 of them could potentially access $3000 and, as we speak today, less than 15 per cent of that has actually been paid out because they make it too complicated, it comes after the fact, when people see whether they can apply, they find out they can’t apply.

“I just don’t understand what this Labor government has against small business people.”

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