Dubbo businesses oppose mandatory Covid vaccination opening plan

Business owners in regional NSW have lashed out at the government’s approach to reopening the state for only vaccinated people after months of crippling lockdowns but insist they are not ‘anti-vaxxers’.

A group of Dubbo business owners have joined forces to lash out at the NSW Government’s approach to reopening the state for vaccinated people after months of crippling lockdowns.

The state is on track to have 70 per cent of people aged 16 and over fully vaccinated in coming weeks and the government has said when that number is reached, from October 11 unvaccinated people will not enjoy the same freedoms as those who have had the jab.

Dubbo business owner Andrew Bassett outside his gym.

Award-winning Dubbo entrepreneur Andrew Bassett is one of more than 100 business owners who oppose the plan and to unite those with concerns, he has worked with other community members to create Facebook group called ‘Dubbo businesses all welcome jabbed and not jabbed’.

The group has 140 businesses as members and Mr Basset, the owner of Fitness Focus, said many felt too scared to speak publicly about their concerns because they feared being attacked or labelled as anti-vaxxers.

Many of the business owners, already hit hard by years of drought and the recent mice plague, worry about how they will enforce and police the ban on unvaccinated people if they choose to reopen.

“I don’t have the staff … I’m not going to have members to pay the bills when we can open only at a small capacity … what business, especially those who have been closed, can allocate a staff member to stand at a door and check ticks,” Mr Bassett told The Dubbo News.

“Businesses have had a lot of sleepless nights thinking about all that ‘what ifs’ that could happen.

“I’ve paid all my taxes, done everything by the book, contributed to society, helped a number of local organisations and supported many individuals who needed help with life and businesses, so to be now be told that 30 to 40 per cent of my staff can’t work and thousands of kids and adults cannot access my facility is a massive kick in the guts.”

Dubbo state Nationals MP Dugald Saunders says businesses have a choice not to open if are not comfortable serving only vaccinated customers. Picture: Facebook/Dubbo Regional Council

Mr Bassett said business owners like him also felt uncomfortable with turning unvaccinated patrons away because they likened the policy to a form of discrimination.

“My clients choose us because we welcome everyone … we have never discriminated against anyone based on their race, religion, sex, gender, health status or life choices,” he said.

The Administration Agency owner Louise Mathieson said business owners like her had been “bullied and hammered” for speaking out against the government’s policy to reopen initially for the fully vaccinated.

“I am by no means an ‘anti-vaxxer’ which I am labelled … both of my children are vaccinated,” she said.

“What I am confronted with is aggression and hostility when asking questions or pointing some glaring inconsistencies out.

“Businesses are being used by the government to mandate vaccines by proxy. Businesses have been coerced into backing the vaccine campaign as they have been told, like everyone else, that it’s the only way to open their businesses up.”

Like Mr Bassett and other business owners, Mrs Mathieson said she felt as if businesses were being asked to discriminate against unvaccinated customers.

“Turning good staff and paying customers away because they fit into a certain demographic of society is the definition of bigotry, just like I would not deny anyone a job or service based on their religion, gender, race …. I should not be forced to regarding the vaccinated or unvaccinated,” she said.

Red Earth Natural Healing Centre owner Susie Webster said at her business “there has never been judgement to anyone who enters and there never will be”.

“The vaccine is not mandatory to have, I have chosen my right not to have it, which doesn’t mean I am anti-vaccine,” Mrs Webster said.

“The government says I can’t work, which is the right of all people to earn a living. To be able to help our clients who are desperate, it should be our clients and customers choice to decide if they want to see us for their health concerns or enter our premises … it all comes back to people having a voice and choice over their bodies and lives.”

Taylah Semmler, owner of The Sweat Shed and Nourish Bowl in Dubbo, has vaccination concerns.

Mrs Webster’s business will open for half of a week with one vaccinated staff member at the helm if the government pushes ahead with its 70 per cent plan, she said.

“We already have enough empty shops around town and there will be more if this goes ahead,” she said.

“Small business has suffered enough in the last two years … we have run at a loss even with the government handouts. We have stock sitting on our shelves that is not being turned over … we still have rent, insurance, electricity, worker’s compensation and phone bills still to pay with no income.”

Dubbo state Nationals MP Dugald Saunders said he was aware there were some businesses who had concerns, however said the government was doing its best to balance the need to restart the economy and ensure public health and safety.

Despite opposition from some businesses, Mr Saunders said any staff working in business when NSW reached the 70 per cent milestone would have to be double vaccinated, along with customers.

“Now that means if that’s not something you’re able to do, or want to do as a business, maybe you don’t reopen at 70 per cent or you keep trading as you are now without contact with customers,” he said.

“If you are not double vaccinated you won’t be able to go to the hairdresser, if you are not double vaccinated you won’t be able to go to a cafe and sit there.

“That is what the ruling will be for that three, four, whatever week period it is between the 70 per cent double vaxxed and above the 80 per cent double vaxxed.”

NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian. Picture: Joel Carrett/Getty Images

While more freedoms will be given when 80 per cent of adults are expected to be double vaccinated by the end of October, NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian announced on Monday that unvaccinated people would not enjoy the same freedoms until December 1.

Mr Saunders said “employers have a responsibility to all employees to provide a safe workplace”.

“If you are worried about being accused of being discriminatory, don’t open your store, don’t open your business or keep doing what you’ve been doing at the moment which is not having to deal with customers and not having to discriminate,” he said.

“We want people back but we don’t people coming who are not vaccinated and can spread and put us all at risk.”

In communities where lockdowns had already been lifted for every resident, Mr Saunders said once the state hits the 70 per cent double-vaxxed milestone unvaccinated people would be stripped of some freedoms they currently enjoy in those areas, such as going to a cafe or the gym.

“In a few week’s time if they are not double vaccinated that will not be available to them,” Mr Saunders said.

“There will be a public health declaration on this.

“There is no simple scenario for every single business, that’s the reality.”

Taylah Semmler, the owner of The Sweat Shed gym and Nourish Bowl health food store in Dubbo, said she was “pro choice” and disappointed the governments had caused “confusion, depression, fear of loss of income, small business closures and division in communities”.

“My concern is loss of business due to customers not wanting to be in the same facility as unvaccinated people, because of the fear the government has placed around the unvaccinated,” she said.

“How are we to decide what is right and safe to enter another persons body?

“If we are having a vaccine status, why don’t we have a health status then? Wouldn’t it make more sense to have a status that says ‘I have a healthy immune system, I don’t drink, I don’t smoke, I exercise, I eat healthy, I take care of myself’?