Matthew Abraham: The burden falls on the many small shop owners and their dwindling staff

Are we also going to have big cotton buds shoved up our noses whenever we get a sniff, for the rest of eternity, asks Matthew Abraham.

Chief public officer Nicola Spurrier. Picture: Tom Huntley

The heritage White Bay power station in the Sydney suburb of Rozelle once burned coal. Now it chews through wishful thinking.

Sydneysiders have been argy-bargying about what to do with the World War I-era dinosaur since before it closed in 1984. Think of it as their version of North Adelaide’s LeCornu site.

In a recent newspaper article on the never-ending debate, Jamie Parker, state member for Balmain and former local mayor, said: “White Bay is the graveyard where thought bubbles go to die.”

If only Adelaide had a graveyard where thought bubbles go to die.

If we did, we could park last weekend’s thought bubble from SA’s chief medical officer Professor Nicola Spurrier there, along with the statue of King Neptune, Cowley’s pie cart and the Mad Mouse.

In an exclusive Sunday Mail yarn from Brad Crouch, Professor Spurrier argued that using the annoying QR codes should become a permanent feature of everyday life, even after the COVID-19 pandemic eases. Assuming it ever does.

She said the permanent use of QR codes would be a “game changer” in allowing SA Health to track future disease outbreaks, made more likely because of – wait for it – climate change. Oh for crying out loud. Are we also going to have big cotton buds shoved up our noses whenever we get a sniff, for the rest of eternity?

“You can imagine if and when COVID resolves, it would be hard to convince people to have the energy to keep scanning but certainly it is a total game changer for our contact tracers,” Professor Spurrier said.

I recently deleted the Commonwealth Government’s COVIDSafe app from my phone. Prime Minister Scott Morrison touted that as a “game changer”, remember?

The COVIDSafe app touted by Prime Minister Scott Morrison as a “gamechanger” cost a lot and did very little. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Gary Ramage

It’s a dud, costing $17m all up, or around $1m for each of the mere 17 COVID-19 cases, nationwide, it’s helped track down.

By contrast, the Marshall Government’s QR code scanning system is pretty damn good. Simply open the mySA Gov app on your phone, point it at the square squiggle, and it logs your location on the SA Health servers, with all personal data deleted after 28 days.

But it’s also a pain in the bum. It imposes another regulatory burden on businesses and community groups, already expected to be a civilian police force tripping over COVID red tape.

Big businesses, small shops, pubs or any outfit using the QR code face substantial fines for not enforcing compliance by otherwise law-abiding citizens.

It took less than 24 hours for Police Commissioner Grant Stevens to prick the chief medical officer’s QR code thought bubble. He promised when the code system was launched it would be a one-off to deal with the COVID pandemic and plans to keep his word.

Professor Spurrier, a public servant in the very best sense of the word, did admit it’d be hard to convince people to “have the energy to keep scanning”. The novelty’s already wearing off.

While many shoppers scan the code at the supermarkets, many also sail off into the aisles without bothering. The temptation to chase after them and yell “Hey, scan yourself in, you numpty” is overwhelming.

I’ve yet to see a COVID marshal at a supermarket ensuring all customers do the right thing, or confront customers who fail to scan the QR code, even though that’s stipulated under SA’s emergency powers, now inexplicably extended until May 31. Who can blame them? They’d probably get a mouthful of foul abuse for their trouble, or worse.

The burden falls on the many small shop owners and their dwindling staff, who at least try to politely remind customers to QR scan.

The result? Rather than relaxing and browsing in shops, people now frequently stand at the doors and peer in, before moving on. That is poison to any shop.

Instead of forcing every single shop in major shopping malls – thousands of them from Colonnades to Harbour Town to Munno Para – to have a QR code sticky-taped to their shopfronts, why not simplify the process?

Why not just have QR codes at the entrances to the malls, with a COVID marshal keeping watch? Scan once and shop ’til you drop.

It’s worth a try. Not all thought bubbles need to go down like lead balloons.