Returned Qld travellers may be moved to remote mine camps

Travellers returning to Queensland from overseas may be forced to quarantine in remote worker camps, under a plan being considered by the State Government.

International travellers returning to Queensland could be sent to quarantine in remote worker camps, under a plan being considered after the transmission of the highly contagious UK strain of COVID-19, which prompted a lockdown of Greater Brisbane.

According to The Australian, stakeholders including Queensland Health and police will meet with owners of the proposed accommodation ­facilities this week to discuss how the rollout could work. Police backed the shift to the camps, some set up for workers during the development of the state’s liquefied natural gas industry last decade, when it was proposed in the middle of last year. But the proposal was abandoned when community transmission numbers declined.

Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk on Wednesday called for an overhaul of how international arrivals are quarantined, after six people tested positive for the UK variant.

Ms Palaszczuk said she would seek urgent discussions with Prime Minister Scott Morrison and her state and territory counterparts as authorities struggled to determine the cause of the outbreak at the Grand Chancellor Hotel.

“I think we need to immediately look at the way in which we are handling people coming into the country, international arrivals, and also, too, looking at the quarantine hotels,” Ms Palaszczuk said. It is understood accommodation camps for workers in the LNG sector and new coal mines are being considered as quarantine sites.

Ms Palaszczuk will likely need approval from national cabinet for the plan to go ahead, in relation to changing international flight routes.