Council staff to help monitor people who should be in COVID-19 quarantine

Hundreds of local government staff will join police and health officials to crack down on people refusing to obey virus quarantine rules.

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Hundreds of council staff, armed with local knowledge and intel, will join forces with police and health officials to crack down on people flouting coronavirus rules.

The State Government has asked for an estimated 170 council environmental health officers to help monitor cafes and restaurants, pubs, cinemas, indoor sporting facilities, gyms, play centres, museums, galleries and beaches to ensure people are adhering to social-distancing and shutdown rules.

A parking Inspector marks a car at Glenelg. Council workers will be brought in to help police and health officials enforce quaratine rules for people who are meant to be isolating. Picture: AAP / Keryn Stevens

The officers will be able to enforce the laws, with SAPOL, because councils have also been told to use council staff to monitor compliance.

Additional support has been sought as Premier Steven Marshall urged South Australians to be kind to each other as he emphasised the pandemic would last “months, not weeks.”

And the state Opposition has vowed to introduce laws to get tough on people who give frontline workers a hard time during the COVID-19 crisis.

Local Government Association SA chief executive Matt Pinnegar told the Sunday Mail, the council officers had broad powers to direct people and businesses to comply with social-distancing rules and guidelines from health authorities.

“This includes the power to direct that facilities or businesses be closed or evacuated,’’ he said. “As the closest government to communities, councils are well positioned to monitor compliance at a local level.”

Two people wear surgical masks in Adelaide. Picture: Tracey Nearmy/Getty Images)

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Mr Marshall said social-distancing had been successful so far. But he said he was concerned about stories of people yelling at others when they thought social-distancing measures were being ignored.

“They could be members of the same family,” he said. “We need to be kind. We can be vigilant but also be respectful and calm.”

Labor leader Peter Malinauskas has vowed to introduce laws to Parliament this coming week that would mean anyone convicted of assaulting a frontline worker, if they knew they had COVID-19 or suggested they had the virus, could get 10 years’ jail. Mr Malinauskas said the laws, which would cover frontline workers including police and emergency services, nurses, doctors, retail and public transport workers, would send a strong message of deterrence.