COVID message to NSW & Victorians

[ricktas]

We were lucky Rick. We were far too slow to close the border to NSW. (Political reasons - we were very fast closing it to Victoria where the other party is in government.) Anyway, we seem to have got away with it, but doing the wrong thing over and over and trusting to luck only works until it blows up in your face. (Ask Gladys.)

But the part I don't get is why we (the "we" is an "any state we" now) why we tolerate the airlines' habit of letting absolutely anyone travel regardless of whether they have the appropriate permits. Time and time again we see the airlines deliver people to Perth or Launceston or Adelaide or Melbourne despite those people having no permission to enter the state, and quite often having Covid. If you take an overseas flight (back in pre-pandemic days when overseas travel was a thing), the airline will not even let you get as far as the customs and immigration desk without demonstrating that you have a ticket, a valid passport, and a visa. No visa and they don't let you anywhere near the plane. But those same airlines are perfectly happy to let any Tom Dick or Harry fly into Perth or Brisbane from New South Wales. The state police forces can't do anything about it because the South Australian police (for example) have no jurisdiction in Sydney.

Now the Spirit of Tasmania people check your pass while you are still on Victorian soil. No pass, no travel. What's wrong with the airlines?

It makes no sense. Consider the airline that flew those two Covid-infected women from Sydney into Melbourne the other day: not only do 46 other passengers have to do 14 days isolation, so does the flight crew. And they have to deep clean the aeroplane. And they have to fly the pair straight back again the next day and contaminate another aircraft.

It is rather mind boggling. The Spirit of Tas is Tas Govt owned, so I would believe our (Tas) govt has the right to say who can travel and who cannot.

The Airlines, being both private business and Fed Govt legislational control under CASA and ATSB, including the running of airports. it is the Fed Govt that needs to step up and do something. Given that the Fed Govt cannot organise a decent vaccine rollout, their logistical skill base is so obviously lacking that trying to do something about a few people getting on planes, is in the too hard basket. Meanwhile the states are dealing with this daily and have no way to stop it as they have no operational control over the airports.