Tory Shepherd: Pandemics, global unrest, climate change – governments have sat on their hands

Australian governments knew what they should be ready for, but time and time again have trusted luck instead, writes Tory Shepherd.

One year, three months and almost two weeks ago, Australia’s first COVID-19 case was confirmed.

“Australia has world-class health systems with processes for the identification and treatment of cases, including isolation facilities in each state and territory,” Health Minister Greg Hunt said at the time.

And yet here we are, without sufficient quarantine facilities to bring Australians home.

We escaped relatively unscathed from the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) outbreak in 2003. About 200 Australians died from H1N1 (swine flu) in 2009.

A Federal Government review of Australia’s response in 2011 warned about the dangers of cruise ships. It also said accommodation for people who should be quarantined was an issue, with a need for better plans for future pandemics.

And yet Australians in India, where the pandemic is raging, face prison if they try to come home.

An Australian Health Management Plan for Pandemic Influenza was published in 2014 and updated in 2019.

“No quarantine premises are available and use of hotels is problematic,” it says.

And yet here we are.

The Army, Police, Security and Heath officials escort individuals into COVID 19 quarantine at the Peppers Hotel on Wakefield Street, Adelaide, SA. Picture Emma Brasier.

Over successive governments of both persuasions, there have been countless warnings from exercises, countless reports of where we might fall short, and countless recommendations for better preparedness for a pandemic.

Australia has so far escaped the worst ravages of the coronavirus, thanks to swift government actions and public willingness to (mostly) understand the necessity of those actions, to suffer lockdowns and changes to our way of life. We have also been lucky. We have the luck of distance, of isolation, and of being an island continent.

When Donald Horne wrote The Lucky Country in 1964, he meant it as a warning, not praise. We were “a lucky country run by second-rate people who share its luck”. We were coasting, he warned.

Australia is a vastly different country now, but the problems plaguing the quarantine system and the vaccine rollout show that we are, in some ways, still coasting. Our governments have lacked insight, foresight, and urgency.

As humans, we all know what it’s like to put off something important in favour of something urgent. We put off cancer scans and we procrastinate about budgets as we struggle to stay on top of everyday lives.

But governments have the responsibility and the resources to grapple with the future as well as the present. They are held back by political imperatives and short-term thinking.

This is true everywhere, of course. The urgency of election cycles trumps the importance of long-term prepar­ations, despite clear warnings of approaching disaster.

The ageing population? Too far over the horizon. An incrementally growing threat from China? Out of sight, out of mind.

So, to climate change. More than a century after the first warnings about greenhouse gases were sounded, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was established in 1988. The next year, prime minister Bob Hawke appointed Australia’s first ambassador for the environment.

Parliamentary papers show Australia set its first emissions reductions targets in 1990, three decades ago.

In 2007, prime minister John Howard announced his “cap and trade” emissions trading system, giving emissions an effective price for the first time.

And yet here we are.

We have suffered bushfires, floods and hotter summers, but we are still only shuffling towards a solution. One step forward, two to the side.

Again, through successive governments – governments too scared of (or scarred by) a “carbon tax”, too intimidated by rogue backbenchers to forge ahead.

For years, experts have warned that the next pandemic was on its way. That it was a matter of “if, not when”. And for years experts have warned that climate change is already happening, and that urgent action is needed to avoid disaster.

So here we are. Distracted by our hip pockets, by personalities and politicking, and our daily lives.

And when we think about these things – if we think about things – we’re just hoping we’ll stay lucky.