Govt cancels Hopkins’ visa after quarantine breach
Australia’s federal government has cancelled the visa of far-right British commentator Katie Hopkins.
Home Affairs Minister Karen Andrews says Hopkins will be kicked out of the country as soon as possible.
Hopkins was dumped from an upcoming series of Channel Seven’s Big Brother on Sunday, a day after boasting about flouting infection controls while in hotel quarantine in Sydney.
The provocative post came as 12 million Australians were locked down in New South Wales and Victoria.
‘‘It is despicable that anyone would behave in such a way that puts our health officials and community at risk,’’ Andrews said in a statement.
‘‘There is no place in Australia for visa holders who would deliberately endanger others.
‘‘Entry to Australia brings responsibilities and the community rightly expects better. ‘‘Those who don’t live up to the standards can expect to have their visas cancelled and to be removed.’’ Speaking on ABC News Breakfast, Andrews added that the flaunting of quarantine breaches was a ‘‘slap in the face for all those Australians who are currently in lockdown’’. ‘‘Personally, I’m very pleased she’ll be leaving,’’ the minister said. ‘‘We will be getting her out of the country as soon as we can possibly arrange that. So I’m hopeful that it will happen imminently.’’
Hopkins has previously called for a ‘‘final solution’’ (a reference to the Nazi policy of murdering Jews) and labelled migrants ‘‘cockroaches’’. Asked why she was given a visa in the first place over an Australian trying to return home, Andrews said the far-right commentator was allowed in under ‘‘established processes and procedures’’ given she was due to film a TV show.
‘‘So she came in here on the basis of potential benefit to the economy,’’ the minister said.
‘‘[But] she’s clearly not someone that we want to keep in this country for a second longer than we have to.’’
Hopkins told her Instagram followers she had opened her door to guards naked and not wearing a mask to ‘‘call out’’ Australia’s quarantine system.
‘‘What I want is the sergeant in the foyer to come up and tell me off so that I can stand there naked while he tells me off,’’ she said. She said it was her way of ‘‘calling out’’ lockdowns, which she described as being the ‘‘greatest hoax in human history’’. – Nine