Tuesday, 5 April 2022

COVID-19

Mr LIMBRICK (South Eastern Metropolitan) (17:50): (1860) My adjournment matter this evening is for the attention of the Premier, I think. I say ‘I think’ because nobody seems to be able to answer who is responsible, but I will come to that. I was recently contacted by a constituent who asked what might be considered a relatively simple question: when will Victoria fully adopt every part of phase D of the national plan on COVID-19? This person was particularly distraught after suffering several unfortunate tragedies during the pandemic, and all they wanted now was to be reunited with their partner overseas. They suggested I look at a Facebook group called Partners Apart, a group solely for supporting people who are separated from their partners overseas. Sadly it has over 17 000 members. The section of phase D that was referred to was specifically the requirement for unvaccinated travellers to be allowed to return without travel caps and ideally without the cost of quarantine. The latest communication from the national cabinet on 11 March stated:

National Cabinet noted that Australia has largely transitioned to Phase D of the National Plan, with states and territories and the Commonwealth considering removing the remaining restrictions in the coming months, subject to continued public health advice.

They are not scheduled to meet again until June, so it is a little difficult to know what the plan is and advise this constituent what to expect. When my staff looked into the matter a little further it seemed that there was no government site in the country that provides transparency on what the current travel caps are for unvaccinated or unconfirmed-vaccine-status travellers. My office called the coronavirus hotline, who then transferred them to the federal coronavirus hotline, who then suggested that they contact the Department of Home Affairs, which they also did. Nobody could provide an answer to this simple question. In fact the only place my staff could find where the travel caps were listed was on the Australian High Commission, Singapore website. When my staff contacted the Minister for Health’s department seeking clarification on this they were told that immigration is a federal matter; however, on 22 October the Premier announced that from 1 November vaccinated arrivals would be uncapped and could skip quarantine but unvaccinated or unverified international travellers would be capped at 250 a week, so presumably it is the Premier who sets the travel caps. Therefore my request for the Premier is to lift the requirement for unvaccinated arrivals to quarantine at their own expense or at the very least increase the cap so that Victorians can be reunited with their loved ones.