Has the Premier bought Queensland a very expensive white elephant?
With huge changes to quarantine rules for international arrivals, the once essential quarantine facility at Toowoomba’s Wellcamp Airport seems past its used-by date – and one of the state’s top docs says the millions could have been much better spent.
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IT’S the multimillion-dollar taxpayer-funded facility that looks starkly different now compared to when it was announced amid a storm of politicking and a different Covid-19 variant almost five months ago.
The Wellcamp quarantine facility, formally known as the Queensland Regional Accommodation Centre, will boast 250 beds for unvaccinated international arrivals and another 250 for people who require a suitable place to isolate come next month.
The centre, which has been built by Wagner Corporation on the company’s land adjacent to its Wellcamp airport, will offer 1000 beds by the end of March – weather pending.
But fast forward five months from the fanfare of August’s announcement – when Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk flew to Toowoomba to reveal her government was going it alone – and Queensland is expected to hit its 90 per cent double vaccination milestone within a matter of days.
From Saturday, vaccinated overseas arrivals will no longer need to quarantine in Queensland and residents wanting to jet set finally can.
This means international students – who the government had long-spruiked as being the first cohort to stay at Wellcamp – will no longer need to quarantine if they’ve had the jab.
After both the Premier and Health Minister Yvette D’Ath handballed questions to Steven Miles in recent weeks, the Deputy Premier this week revealed how Wellcamp would operate and who would be providing health services.
He also revealed Queensland now has a quarantine commissioner (two years into the pandemic).
The government has been scrambling to finalise plans ahead of the opening that was scheduled for mid-January.
It repeatedly refused to answer questions from The Courier-Mail in recent weeks, instead pointing to an update that would be provided.
But amid assurances the facility is good value for taxpayers, the government is still refusing to reveal the cost which is rumoured to be north of $200m.
The project didn’t go to tender with Wagner Corporation having undertaken a market-led proposal and presented a price to the government.
Wagner Corporation chairman John Wagner has previously said it would cost less than a third of similar facilities in Victoria and the Northern Territory.
While saying he believed it was good value for the taxpayer, Mr Wagner this week said he didn’t want the cost disclosed.
Asked whether he ever saw a time when the cost would be made public, the chairman said: “That’s a matter for ourselves and the government to discuss but I really feel quite strongly that we bid it, and we don’t want people knowing what our commercial deals are.”
He said it was like any commercial deal.
“They’re commercial-in-confidence.”
The Deputy Premier last Sunday maintained the cost was commercial-in-confidence and on Thursday said it was “incredible value for money”.
“At the moment they are in hotels facing the same dangers that we saw with quarantine hotels and prior to when we put them into hotels, they were occupying hospital beds, which are just about the most valuable thing in the state right now,” he said.
“Even more valuable than rapid antigen tests.”
The Premier flew to Toowoomba on August 26 last year to declare her government was going it alone, in a jab at the federal government.
As the deadly Delta variant ravaged Australia and hotel quarantine facilities experienced virus leaks, Ms Palaszczuk said it was time for a regional facility.
Her announcement followed months of political tit-for-tat between the state and commonwealth, with the federal government having claimed Queensland’s Wellcamp plan was light on detail and wasn’t costed.
It also caught many by surprise including local mayor Paul Antonio and the Prime Minister.
“I’m quite sure he does now,” the Premier told reporters when asked if Scott Morrison knew about the facility on the day of the announcement.
It’s understood Toowoomba Council largely had nothing to do with the facility except license the plumbing.
Since August, many have questioned the state government.
AMA Queensland president Chris Perry this week said while the body supported the idea of purpose-built quarantine centres, it had a lot of questions about Wellcamp that were never answered by the government: how it would operate, and where its staff would come from.
“It’s unclear what Wellcamp will be used for now that there is no requirement for (vaccinated) international arrivals to quarantine for a fortnight,” he said.
“But with the health budget so tight and ramping at hospitals out of control, we certainly could have used this money spent on Queensland hospitals.”
Opposition Leader David Crisafulli has wanted the cost to be disclosed.
“If it’s such a good deal for Queensland and for Queensland taxpayers, release the figure,” he said.
“The Deputy Premier keeps saying it’s a cracking deal, he just doesn’t want to tell us what the cracking deal is.
“It’d be like turning up at an open home and the real estate agent saying we’ve got an amazing pool in the backyard.
“You can’t see it, but it’s an amazing pool.”
While Ms Palaszczuk said in August that she hoped the government would be able to use the Wellcamp Airport for domestic flights, there are no flights planned.
All unvaccinated arrivals will now be bussed from Brisbane while asymptomatic Covid cases requiring accommodation will be able to drive themselves, as will people who need to isolate.
Aspen Medical will provide health services to those on site, and Compass Group will deliver non-health related services.
The cost of both those contracts is also unknown, with Mr Miles on Thursday saying it was within “the program budget”.
Taxpayers have never been informed what that budget is.
It’s not clear why health services were outsourced but the state’s health system has been under immense pressure during the last year with ambulances ramped for hours across the state and exhausted staff now bracing for a peak in cases.
While the Home Affairs department this week refused to say how many exemptions had been granted for unvaccinated non-Australians to arrive via Queensland since December 1 last year, the commonwealth has asked the state government to retain its 350 international arrivals cap per week.
Asked why all 1000 beds were then required at Wellcamp, Mr Miles on Thursday said there were many Queenslanders currently in hotel isolation with authorities expecting people to continue needing somewhere to quarantine.
“Those numbers will go up and down over time, as they always have and the facility itself, as I outlined, is constructed into pods of 250 that can be activated and deactivated and used for different purposes at different points in time according to the health response to the pandemic,” he said.
Chief health officer John Gerrard this week cast doubt over whether all 1000 beds would be required, saying it was speculation when asked at a press conference.
Ms Palaszczuk late last year said all 1000 beds would be needed.
Mr Wagner this week said the government had not yet indicated whether it would lease the facility beyond a year and could not disclose when the lease started, citing commercial-in-confidence.
After the government vacates, the chairman said the Wellcamp entertainment precinct was the most likely use for it.
“We’ve got numerous ideas about what we can and can’t use it for,” he said.
“The reality is until we see how long it’s required we don’t need to make that decision.”
Mr Wagner said hotel quarantine hadn’t been successful.
“And I think what this facility does – it takes pressure off hotel quarantine and there will be other variants,” he said.
“That’s becoming quite obvious now.
“If we were to get another strain of Delta equivalent this facility will be invaluable.”
But with the Premier this week saying international arrivals were “probably more likely to catch the virus in Australia at the moment”, whether the Wellcamp facility will be required this time next year remains to be seen.
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