Christmas bubble a gift to business

Our focus on the hospitality industry in this weekend’s Sunday Star-Times underscores the shadow that Covid continues to cast over many sectors of New Zealand business.

While those we spoke to have shared stories of remarkable resilience and innovation in difficult times, it’s also true that the optimism and gritty determination that has carried them this far is not inexhaustible.

Hope doesn’t pay the bills. Optimism can’t replace the overseas visitors who helped many of these businesses thrive. Innovation by its very nature is inherently risky. For many, the next few months could be make or break.

So what can we all do?

For those of us who have not been hit financially by Covid this summer, showing gratitude for our luck by eating out when we can afford it, buying local produce, and purchasing New Zealand-made goods and services as Christmas presents, rather than rushing for the expensive imported ones, will go some way towards helping local businesses stay open. Many of us are doing it already.

But there is an even better present that is within our power to gift them and that is the opening of a two-way trans-Tasman bubble.

It might seem like that’s beyond the power of us to influence, given that it’s a decision that is very much in the Government’s hands.

But in fact, that’s not true. If there is any lack of urgency on the Government’s side, that’s squarely on us. Jacinda Ardern and Grant Robertson are fully aware that there is zero public appetite for any risk when it comes to the borders. They’ve seen the backlash when expats tried to rush home from around the world.

They know us better than we know ourselves; they know that as a people we would rather pull a blanket over our head till Covid goes away.

It’s therefore politically far easier for the Government to keep the borders closed for now, despite the fact that Australia, like New Zealand, has been remarkably successful at combating Covid.

Perhaps we can all be forgiven for our complacency, after the economic hit from Covid was not as bad as feared. But the threat is still real. And there is also a human cost of families being kept apart.

So it is hard to understand the lack of urgency even preparing for a bubble – for instance, by developing a compatible contact tracing system with Australia so border crossings are seamless.

Given the multitude of information-sharing agreements and trans-Tasman regulatory bodies that are already in place, it is hard to see why this has not been achievable.

It’s also inexplicable that Queensland – a state that has been more successful than New Zealand at keeping its population safe from Covid – has opened its borders to Kiwi travellers, but we are refusing to reciprocate.

We should be asking why.

And we should be able to expect that the decision is made on the same basis as the rest of our Covid response, by following the science – and not political expediency.

It’s politically far easier for the Government to keep the borders closed for now.