Tweed River, shire boundaries: How leaders feel about border checkpoint options

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The army was set to arrive to assist police at the Queensland border. Queensland Police officers are pictured at the checkpoint in Griffith Street, Coolangatta. Picture: NIGEL HALLETT

A group of Northern New South Wales MPs have banded together to push for border check points to be moved to the Tweed LGA boundaries, however not everyone is in favour of the move.

A number of proposals have been suggested over the past week. Here is a summary of what they are and who’s supporting them.

Proposed options:

Tweed River at Chinderah

The Tweed River where it separates Chinderah from Banora Point. Picture: Caroline James

A proposal was made to move the border check points south to the Tweed River at Chinderah earlier in August.

The move was supported by Gold Coast mayor Tom Tate, who agreed the move would allow most workers in the Tweed to access their jobs in Queensland.

The proposal prompted Richmond MP Justine Elliot to launch a petition for the Queensland checkpoint to be moved, which now has upward of 20,000 signatures.

However Tweed MP Geoff Provest said the proposal would “divide us at a time we most need unity”, pointing out key issues in regards of the southern Tweed accessing the police station, hospital and major shopping centre.

Cross Border Commissioner Jame McTavish and Tweed Councillor James Owen have also spoken against this option.

Tweed LGA boundaries

Police at the Queensland border on the Gold Coast Highway, Coolangatta. Picture: NIGEL HALLETT

On Wednesday, a group of political leaders proposed the hard borders could be moved to the Tweed LGA boundaries as a pilot with the potential to be expanded to surrounding LGAs on its success.

The move is supported by Tweed mayor Chris Cherry, Mr Provest, Ballina MP Tamara Smith, Lismore MP Janelle Saffin and Ballina Shire-based MLC Catherine Cusack.

The group unanimously agreed to support and empower Mr Provest to make urgent representations on their behalf to the NSW Premier and Deputy Premier to engage the NSW Cross Border Commissioner, in conjunction with Regional NSW and Tweed Shire Council, to develop a proposal to establish a pilot cross border community zone around the Tweed LGA.

Member for Richmond Justine Elliot. Photo: Liana Walker

Cross Border Commissioner James McTavish spoke against the proposal and said it would just move the problem rather than solve it.

“While the creation of a community zone or a border bio security zone does appear to address some of those problems, it shifts the problem elsewhere,” Mr McTavish said.

“Tweed Hospital services the Northern Rivers, Tweed Police services the Northern Rivers.”

Tweed Mayor Chris Cherry said she acknowledged there would be a “cliff face” at some point.

“The economics of it is fewer people who would be impacted at that point than at the northern border,” she said.

“The numbers are 16,000 people travelling across the border for work while 1800 cross the southern border.”

Although Justine Elliot was not at the meeting due to being a federal politician, she said she supported the proposal by the state MPs.

“The pressure is on both Geoff Provest and his government and his premier to actually deliver on a check point for our region,” she said.

Ballina

River Street, Ballina. Photo: Marc Stapelberg

Ms Elliot initially proposed an intrastate border zone which could encompass as far south as Ballina.

Speaking to the Tweed Daily News on Wednesday, she commended the move for a Tweed LGA boundary, however remained supportive of that border zone to be expanded to surrounding LGAs.

“What we’ve seen is that they’re putting forward a pilot program in terms of moving the check point and to look at that going further south,” she said.

“I support that.”

When questioned about the legalities, Ms Elliot proposed two solutions; one that New South Wales could create a public health order exclusion zone that mimics the Queensland legislation, and two, special constables from Queensland and New South Wales police along with the army could be used to enforce the boundary.

“We have thousands who need to get over the border today,” she said.

“That’s why this proposal is the only way forward.”

No move, says commissioner

Cross Border commissioner James McTavish said he believed the best move would be for the border position to stay the same and for Queensland to change their entry conditions to allow border residents to pass, similar to how they initially were when the hard border was reinstated.

“In terms of the legislated order frame work, it’s certainly doable, but there is a simpler solution available,” he said.

“That is to reinstate the arrangements for border zone residents in place a couple of weeks ago to allow them to go to work and readily access goods and services in Queensland and fulfil much of their daily life.”

Byron mayor weighs in

Byron mayor Michael Lyon.

Byron mayor Michael Lyon said he supported the idea of the pilot to relocate border checkpoints to the edge of the Tweed Shire.

Mr Lyon said he felt it was more pressing, however, for the state government to consider ending stay-at-home rules for the region, which has no active Covid-19 cases.

“More important locally, in the Byron Shire is having this lockdown lifted,” Mr Lyon said.

“We don’t have any cases, we don’t have fragments in our sewer.

“Therefore, we need to balance the needs of people with the risks of leaving lockdown.

“I think the balance … has shifted in favour of lifting lockdown.”

Fragments of the virus were detected in Byron Bay’s sewerage in July and again last week but Mr Lyon said sewerage monitoring has since returned clear tests.

He said while moving border checkpoints would impact Byron residents to some extent, the Tweed and Coolangatta twin towns with their larger population were “severely impacted by the current situation”.

“I’m supportive of investigating that option for the greater good,” Mr Lyon said.

“Given there are no cases in the Tweed, indeed in the Northern Rivers more broadly, and the extent of the impacts on this region I think, for the good of our neighbours, we need to seriously consider it.

Byron was on alert in July and last week after Covid-19 fragments were detected through sewerage monitoring, but the program has since returned negative results for the shire. Picture: Liana Boss

“There will be local impacts which will be unfavourable for people that live in Byron who work in Tweed and vice versa … so we need to carefully consider this.

“However it’s undoubtedly the case that far, far more people are being impacted to a larger extent at the border.

“I think it’s is a worthwhile exercise, given the nature of the population spread on the border versus what like further south.”

Mr Lyon said it was important for the matter to be considered “in good faith” without “political pointscoring” and to that effect, it was “encouraging” to see a “multi-partisan” approach with this proposed pilot.