Luxury hotels beckon for quarantined travellers

RETURNED travellers placed into forced isolation could be shipped to luxury Geelong hotels as accommodation providers are transformed into quarantine centres.

The State Government confirmed it has secured hotels across the Geelong region where Australians returning from overseas will be forced to self-isolate for 14 days.

The announcement followed the rollout of Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s tough new isolation rules which came into force at midnight on Saturday. Under the restrictions anyone who returns to Australia will spend two weeks selfisolating in the police-guarded accommodation before they return to their homes.

The rules were enforced after some returned travellers were found to be flouting selfisolation restrictions. The vast majority of Victoria’s 769 confirmed COVID-19 cases are linked to overseas travel, with just 21 cases thought to be acquired through community transmission.

About 470 passengers were due to arrive at Melbourne Airport from overseas yesterday, on seven flights from Qatar, Canada, China, New Zealand and Chile. Tourism minister Martin Pakula could not confirm where in Geelong the returned travellers would be quarantined, but said the initiative would save lives.

“We have secured in the vicinity of 5000 hotel rooms, including some in the Geelong region, to accommodate Australian travellers returning from overseas,” Mr Pakula said. “Offers of many more thousands of beds in Victoria have been made to us, so there is no risk of any shortage.”