BORDER BLUES II

City leaders, operators urge Coasters to explore own backyard

GOLD Coast leaders and small businesses are pleading with locals to back city traders like never before after Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk blocked Queensland to NSW and ACT.

Destination Gold Coast chairman Paul Donovan said the city needed to become an “expert” at marketing itself locally: “The Gold Coast is in dire straits but we need to work with the hand dealt. We need people to holiday in their own backyards. For people on the Gold Coast to take a break and stay in our hotels. Support our local businesses.”

Hospitality boss Scott Imlach, launching a new venue, said: “We just need Queenslanders to keep exploring and supporting the businesses in their area.” Meanwhile, Tweed’s Border Skips owner Paul Abernethy (above) is dreading police plans to check every car at border checkpoints.

owner who crosses the Queensland-NSW border daily said the closure would make operating his business “nearly impossible”.

Border Skips owner Paul Abernethy crosses multiple times a day to dump rubbish at a private commercial facility in Queensland and said he couldn’t see how he could keep it up if police intended to check the identification of every driver entering the state.

He said when a new hotspot was declared with the change to declaration passes it took more than an hour to pass checkpoints.

“They stopped me once and asked if I had been in Liverpool and I said, ‘Why would I do that? We both had a laugh and he let me through. That was a fivesecond delay and yet I think I sat in Ducat St for an hour.

“I don’t know how they’re going to do it.”

Mr Abernethy said he timed his day to avoid peak hour traffic and had tested most checkpoints.

“Opening up Ducat St has helped,” he said. “I was going in (to Queensland) via Twin Towns but, ever so slowly, people caught on it was easy to cross there, and the same with Ducat St. It’s starting to get busier now.

“The M1 is full of tourists and truckies. That can be a 45 minute wait.”

He felt the Premier didn’t understand the impact border restrictions had on locals and believed it should have been shut south from Newcastle. “I’ll just have to put up with it I guess.”