A farmer told to fly hay to a property 25km away, another told to fly her sheep to the saleyard, and a mother barred from seeing her newborn son are among some of the bizarre stories to emerge from tough border closures in place between Australian states.
At the national cabinet meeting on Friday the prime minister, Scott Morrison, appealed to state and territory leaders to develop uniform guidelines for border communities and professions to rely on.
While larger Australian states including Western Australia, Queensland, South Australia and New South Wales all have varying policies that treat entry from certain jurisdictions differently, leaders agreed to develop a consistent approach to help the agricultural industry.
The agriculture minister, David Littleproud, welcomed the commitment, calling the issue “a flashpoint for the federation” where cross-border communities had been the victims of “arbitrary city-centric decisions”.
His comments built on pressure from the rural and regional-oriented Nationals after the NSW deputy premier and Nationals leader, John Barilaro, challenged the premier, Gladys Berejklian, to ease the tough limits for entry into the state from Victoria, asking for a travel bubble to be expanded to 100km and claiming the permit system wasn’t working efficiently.
Despite the progress towards clarity for cross-border agriculture, anomalies in border restrictions have resulted in less than straightforward solutions posed by various state governments.
‘It obviously just does not work’
Chris Taylor is a sheep farmer who is based in the north-western Victorian town of Warracknabeal, but manages a property near Euston, 25km into the NSW border.
After the property had suffered a dry winter, Taylor wanted to send 43 tonnes of hay to the property to feed the 1,500 sheep he has there.
But he could not drive the 270km to the property, and was instead advised by a NSW government official to freight the hay south to Melbourne, fly it up to Sydney and quarantine with it there for 14 days, and then freight it down to Euston – a trip of 2,150km or about eight times the distance required according to farmonline.
“I thought she was joking for starters,” Taylor said. “So 14 days later the sheep would get some feed and the hay would have a joy flight to Sydney and sit in quarantine.”
A Victorian sheep producer, Shirley Sprenger, went viral after she was told last week to put 40 sheep on a plane to get them to a NSW sale yard.
“I’m saddened for the agricultural industry that we have to experience this kind of ignorance in order to get action,” Sprenger said.
Friday’s national cabinet commitment will aim to prevent situations like this.
‘It’s very saddening for the family’
Chantelle Northfield was separated from her newborn son Harvey last week after he was flown for urgent medical treatment to Royal Brisbane and Women’s hospital in Queensland from the family’s home in the northern NSW town of Lismore.
Harvey was born with extremely low oxygen levels.
Chantelle and husband, Glen, couldn’t fit on the helicopter. They were then refused entry into Queensland because they would have to quarantine for 14 days at a hotel – a requirement resulting from the Queensland government’s decision to deem all NSW a Covid-19 hotspot.
“We would have been more than willing to do that if there was a guarantee that Harvey would be there for that long, but no one is 100% sure and the second he no longer needs such extensive treatment he will be flown back to Lismore,” Northfield said.
Australian Capital Territory
Earlier this month some ACT residents were unable to return home from Victoria.
As Melbourne entered its highest lockdown, NSW tightened border access from the southern state, including requiring permits to enter and later requiring returning NSW residents to fly via Sydney to quarantine in a hotel for 14 days.
However, this meant territorians attempting to drive home from Victoria did not qualify for the border region quarantine exemption but couldn’t enter NSW in any legal way by road.
Scenes of Canberrans trapped at the border for days were finally resolved with an agreement to let the returning drivers transit through the state, via a specific roadside stop which could be patrolled and would not risk drivers mingling with NSW residents at other service stations.
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