Key points:

• The Howard Springs facility could begin taking people as early as this month
• Commercial and charter flights will fly direct to the RAAF Base in Darwin
• 29,100 Australians overseas have told DFAT they want to come home

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Thousands more Australians stranded overseas will be able to get home sooner under an expansion of quarantine processing in Darwin.The ABC understands the Howard Springs Facility, 25 kilometres south of Darwin, will process about 1,000 international returnees a month on a fortnightly rotation of 500, beginning within weeks.

A mix of commercial and charter flights will fly direct to the RAAF Base Darwin, with passengers immediately taken to Howard Springs for 14 days' mandatory quarantine.

It is understood there will be eight flights, run by Qantas, starting as early as next week — four from London and four from India.

Flights from London will cost $2,000 per person while flights from India are expected to be less, at around $1,000.

The flights will be underwritten by the Federal Government.

People will be flown back on Qantas Dreamliners which will carry 200 passengers per trip.
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To meet increased medical requirements for the Howard Springs centre, extra doctors, nurses and other staff will be hired from across Australia to boost the surge capacity of the Darwin-based National Critical Care and Trauma Response Centre.

It is expected returnees will have to pay for their stay at Howard Springs. Those unable to pay will be offered HECS-style loans.

Under current arrangements for domestic quarantine at Howard Springs, individuals pay $2,500 each and families of two or more pay $5,000.
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The first group of Australians to return home on specially chartered Qantas flights will finally be leaving London later today. The flight is the first of eight, which have been chartered to repatriate about 5,000 Australians now stranded in Europe, India and South Africa.

But a total of about 32,000 Australians that want to return home are believed to still be stranded overseas.

Madeline Curtis, who is scheduled to be on the first flight, said she is just waiting to overcome one last hurdle. "We're still actually waiting last minute for the results of the COVID test."

The Qantas 787 leaving London's Heathrow airport on Thursday, London time, will carry 175 passengers to Darwin.

Ms Curtis will be travelling with her husband Noam and their six-month-old baby, Benji, if their test results come back negative. "We're super excited," she told Fran Kelly on RN Breakfast. "We've been trying to get home for a couple of months now. The flight should land in Darwin on Friday and passengers will then isolate at the new Howard Springs facility before returning to the community.

People in the UK who have been identified as "vulnerable" by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) have been prioritised for the flight.
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International arrival caps to be increased
The prime minister said National Cabinet had also agreed to increase the cap on international arrivals.

Western Australia will accept an additional 140 passengers a month from November and Queensland will accept an additional 150 Aussies.
South Australia and the ACT have also agreed to ongoing support.
Tasmania has also offered to take overseas Aussies but does not have an international airport.

"If we needed to stand that up in order to achieve what we have set out then we will certainly do that. (Tasmania) is our first stand-by option. I want to think Premier Peter Guitman for working with us to achieve that," Mr Morrison said.

"It will be similar to what we have done in the Northern Territory."
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International flights into and out of Melbourne are expected to restart later this month, in a move which will also ease the capacity constraints on Australians returning home from overseas.
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Melbourne Airport is nominally the country's second-busiest gateway, and the extended closure put pressure on other states – primarily New South Wales – to shoulder the load of 14 days in hotel quarantine under the federal government's cap on arriving passengers.

That currently sits at just shy of 6,300 passengers per week, with Sydney taking in 2,950 passengers per week, followed by around 1,000 each at Brisbane and Perth, and 600 at Adelaide.

Darwin was recently added to the list, hosting the return leg of Qantas flights from London and India with a dedicated quarantine hub for arriving passengers.
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