WHAT SORT OF SOCIETY HAVE WE BECOME?

The Queensland government’s pandemic behaviour is without question the greatest economic and human failure of any modern-day Australian government

ONE of the great joys of growing up in northern NSW in an uncomplicated era like the 1980s, was the carefree lifestyle we now took for granted.

There were no restrictions, no lockdowns, no police checkpoints, no dictatorial governments watching your every move. It was just a simple, no fuss existence that seems like a thousand years ago, compared to what we’re enduring today.

It was nothing to jump in the car on a Thursday morning in Grafton, grab a few mates, and head to the Gabba dogs, a four-and-a-half-hour drive on a road that was nowhere near as good as it is today.

It was nothing to jump in the car on a Wednesday morning and head to Lang Park in Brisbane for a State of Origin game.

It was nothing to jump in the car on a Saturday morning and head to the Gold Coast Turf Club for a race day, or go to Pacific Fair to do some shopping.

It was nothing to jump in the car on a Friday afternoon and head to the Gold Coast for a night in Surfers Paradise, ending up at Bombay Rock or Twains nightclub, listening to Madonna’s Holiday or Billy Idol’s Flesh for Fantasy.

My point here is that there were no borders. Just an imaginary line at Tweed Heads that separated NSW

Watch The Front Page on Sky News, Sunday-thursday at 11pm from Queensland. We were Australians, not from NSW or Queensland.

And the good folk of northern NSW, from Grafton north, had much more in common with southern Queensland than Sydney.

Geography brought us together, not against each other, like now.

Fast-forward to today and we’ve let the lunatics run the asylum on our pandemic response and it’s people living and working around the Tweed Heads-coolangatta border that are the victims.

Those easy, breezy, sunfilled days of the 1980s are just a memory. Today we’re run like Germany in the 1930s.

Those haunting images from Father’s Day of families torn apart by draconian border restrictions and having to hug each other across barricades will be forever etched into our memories.

What sort of society has this country become when we allow our political decisionmakers to dream up such rubbish?

What sort of a society have we become when we are denied the opportunity to hug our loved ones on a day when everybody should be able to be

Families gather on Father’s Day at Coolangatta. Picture: Richard Gosling

wrapped in the warm embrace of a mother, father, son or daughter?

What sort of a society have we become when we stop people earning a living under the guise of “we’re all in this together and we are keeping you safe’’.

When the post-mortems are written on the Great Pandemic of the 21st century, there will be a chapter on the lack of empathy and compassion shown by heartless Queensland Health bureaucrats and the emasculation of our politicians.

Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk has allowed Queensland Health bureaucrats to wage a jihad against good people who simply want to live their lives normally.

She will argue that she’s kept Queenslanders safe and her hardened followers will rejoice in that message.

But at what cost to the

southern Gold Coast economy and the mental health of those who have been separated from their families?

At what cost to the many thousands of people who live in northern NSW and derive most of their income from the southern Gold Coast?

The teachers, the bakers, the landscapers, the truckies, the nurses. Those who have been denied the opportunity to work because some random, power-drunk bureaucrat hasn’t got the courage to make a good decision.

My mother Maxine turned 80 on Thursday, consigned to a lamington and coffee with her wonderful partner, George, because they’re in lockdown.

Under normal circumstances, we’d make a big deal of a milestone like that, and she’d be feted with a big party of family and friends, especially after she lost her darling son, Daryl, just 53, a

few months ago.

So we got her on the phone, sang her happy birthday, gave her a beautiful watch, and wished her all the best.

That inconvenience pales in comparison to the many people who are suffering right now, separated from their loved ones by border closures.

We’re told once the vaccination rates get up to 70 per cent or 80 per cent, all this madness will stop.

Don’t hold your breath. For some inexplicable reason, the Queensland Government is so in awe of itself, and it believes it can prevent the deadliest, most aggressive form of virus – the Delta strain – from entering the Sunshine State.

It’s without question the greatest economic and human failure of any modern-day Australian government.

But get used to it. They’ve been elected to 2024. Google Stockholm syndrome. That’s what you’ve got happening right now with this insanity.

What sort of a society have we become when we stop people earning a living under the guise of “we’re all in this together and we are keeping you safe”