Originally Posted by
NZbutterfly
I didn’t see her presser today but agree it is a waste of a quarantine spot especially when Oz has so many other Aussies to get home from overseas. Also a waste of people’s money who come from Oz to NZ to see a dying relative then return to Oz. I don’t have any concerns over SYD right now. Stellar contact tracing, but that’s what happens when you actually invest in your health system.
WA I’m waiting for Clive Palmers case which is now November. I think he’s a PITA for WA but I hope he wins the border case. Early on expert advice to WA was the risk of opening borders was <1%, this was before Melbourne took off again, so I imagine the risk now is similar to that. I’m not advocating anyone opening to Melbourne just yet. I can’t see NZs nonstop flight to WA returning in a hurry either.
I wonder if early-mid November is a more realistic time frame for a bubble.
I think CPMaverick is correct that Victoria will need to have its situation under control before NZ will open to NSW. The border is still somewhat porous and there are no restrictions on border region residents on either side visiting other parts of their respective states (with the exception of travel to Melbourne). As a side bar,
the border region is enormous. I had no idea how big it was. In the far-west of NSW it extends almost as far north as Wilcannia which is ~350km from the border.
Regarding WA, they won't let residents of Tasmania, the NT and SA enter even though those places have been covid free for months so clearly they're not going to budge unless this ends up in the High Court, which it probably should.
If there is one thing I've learnt about covid it's that once a place is clear of it the residents have no interest in risking reintroducing it. I would expect NSW to follow a similar course and not open to Melbourne, or Victoria more broadly until they are at close to zero cases.