Tess Hall, David Heilpern share Byron Bay Covid impacts
A coastal community already facing “many external pressures” is being torn apart by pandemic finger pointing and vaccination stereotypes.
Byron Shire
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A community already frayed by rising property prices and homelessness rates is being further torn by a vicious pandemic blame game.
The Byron Shire was facing challenges before Covid; a street count by the state government found there was a disproportionate number of homeless people among its population.
North Coast filmmaker Tess Hall said political point scoring on the Byron community, where relationships were crumbling into a void between perspectives on Covid-19, was making matters worse.
Ms Hall said residents had struggled to access vaccinations despite a recent boost on the North Coast to Pfizer availability and the addition of Moderna to pharmacies.
As of September 19, 60.9 per cent of Byron Shire residents had received one dose of a Covid-19 jab and 34.9 per cent had been double-vaccinated.
The Lismore local government area was just ahead on double-vaccination at 38.5 per cent while Ballina had reached 49 per cent.
“As a community we’re already facing so many external pressures,” Ms Hall said.
“We haven’t been given the best opportunity possible to get vaccinated and we’ve got all this media attention on Byron Bay; it is making those challenges and that conflict between people worse.”
She said she managed to get two doses of a Covid-19 jab by driving two 100km round trips to another local government area.
She hopes a government-run mass vaccination centre will be opened in the Byron Shire to help get the region up to speed.
It’s something that’s been afforded to other towns on the Northern Rivers but Ms Hall said its absence in Byron could be the result of decision-makers playing into stereotypes of the shire as “the anti-vax capital of the world”.
She said the region was split over vaccination and it was damaging relationships for many.
“I have lost friendships over this,” Ms Hall said.
“There’s a couple of clients that I’ve decided to no longer work with because of their stance on vaccination.”
She said difficulties in accessing vaccinations locally had sparked frustrations and further fuelled conflict.
“I think the fact that it’s been so difficult to get a vaccination appointment in the region has actually made the conflict worse because there’s been an extended period of time where people have had the opportunity to contemplate information from less-than-reliable sources and that’s really ramped the debate up to a point now where people, on one side of it, just seem completely deranged and not at all open to logic or reason,” she said.
“(There are) people on the other side of the debate, like myself, who believe in the science, who trust the Therapeutic Goods Administration and the processes that have been gone through to bring the vaccines to availability.
“The conflict is inevitable.”
Ms Hall said she held all levels of government accountable for the situation, including the federal vaccine rollout.
She has also called out finger-pointing and comments by some leaders who have blamed Byron residents for their lower vaccination rates.
“It’s one thing for Brad Hazzard as the NSW Health Minister to get up at a press conference and express concerns about anti-vax sentiment in the region,” she said.
“It’s another thing to be proactive and plan for that sentiment and give people the easiest option to get a vaccine which would have been to put a federal vaccination hub in Byron Bay from the get go.”
Former Lismore magistrate David Heilpern, who now works for a Byron Shire law firm, said there was nothing new about “fierce debate” in his community but he had seen friendships harmed by pandemic-related disagreements, including in his own life.
“There is real division present in this community,” he said.
He said it was “understandable” some in the community were vaccine-hesitant and he believed most didn’t hold extreme views.
“The truth is that there’s a spectrum,” he said.
He believes, however, a portion of people hold “rabidly out of control right wing” views with a “let it rip” mentality who believe there should be no lockdowns, no masks and no vaccination for Covid-19.
Mr Heilpern has a history of disagreeing with some laws set by parliament; politicians said he was “mad” when he stood alongside the Hemp Embassy’s Michael Balderstone to call for medical cannabis to be legalised 30 years ago.
He has also publicly criticised NSW’s drug driving laws and acknowledged there was a common thread of mistrust in authority within his community.
He has however dismissed claims by some that public health orders which have arisen from Covid have no legal bearing.
“The orders certainly are law and they are enforceable,” Mr Heilpern said.
“Unless they’re successfully challenged, they’re fully enforceable and they are legislation that applies to all people.”
He said there had been no such successful challenge.
“There is a big difference between saying I don’t agree with the law and saying this law does not apply,” he said.
Mr Heilpern said it would be wise to include sunset clauses in those rules to ensure the “exceptionally unusual” extra powers for police and government didn’t extend beyond what was reasonably necessary for public health.
He said the rules were “almost impenetrable” in the way they were written.
“Trying to help people through them is a real challenge,” he said.
“It gets really confusing and tortuous.”
Mr Heilpern has supported an effort by North Coast MPs who have asked for tighter restrictions on people travelling to the region from Covid-affected areas.
“I completely support the letter that was written by all the parliamentarians,” he said.
“I think there needs to be real pause for thought around allowing too many people into areas of low vaccination too quickly.”
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