NSW and Western Australia may be butting heads about who’s shouldering the economic burden of the pandemic, but the fiscal war of words will mean little to residents who’ll be able to move freely between the states from midnight tonight. Christmas dinner is on for separated families who’ve spent much of the year in limbo; WA tourism operators fear it’s too little, too late, given Queensland got a two-week head start on securing interstate bookings.

South Australians still can’t cross their western border, although the state will welcome international travellers from tomorrow. Victorians, though, are free to go west, while Tullamarine airport’s arrival halls got a taste of the new “COVID normal” when the first international arrivals since July 10 touched down from Sri Lanka.