Palaszczuk standing firm over reopening of border with NSW
QUEENSLAND Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk says she won’t open her state’s borders until community transmission of COVID-19 has been eliminated in NSW.
The comments threaten to further inflame a spat between the two states over border restrictions, with NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian declaring she wants state borders to open as soon as possible.
“(The) border restrictions will remain in place while there is active community transmission in NSW and Victoria,” Ms Palaszczuk said yesterday.
“It would be absolutely negligent of me to lift those restrictions with that community transmission happening down in NSW and Victoria.”
NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian has been urging closed states to open their borders “as soon as possible”.
“I don’t want to be able to say to people, ‘I’m allowed to go to Auckland before I can go to Brisbane,’” she said on Sky News yesterday.
“I’d really like to see those borders come down because just that trade, and commerce, and flexible workforce across the states would boost our economy no end.” The Premier said that increasing domestic tourism was essential to the COVID-19 economic recovery.
“The sooner we can do that the better in a safe way. So the sooner the borders come down the better,” she told Sky News.
Queensland’s border closures will be reviewed at the end of the month. It was possible that the state’s borders w would be reopened if rates of COVID-19 cases acquired in t the community continued to d drop, but only on the advice of the state’s Chief Health Officer, a spokesman for Premier Palaszczuk said.
Premier Berejiklian yesterday admitted that it would not be possible to eradicate the virus in NSW.
“Given the size of our population, I don’t think we can (eradicate it),” she told Sky News.