Melbourne Airport chief Lyell Strambi calls on Daniel Andrews to restart hotel quarantine
The boss of Melbourne Airport has called for the Victoria’s hotel quarantine program to reopen, saying a new system could effectively manage overseas travellers. It comes after a newly developed system — which was to be overseen by Corrections Victoria and Alfred Health — was knocked back by authorities.
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The boss of Melbourne Airport says it is time for the city’s hotel quarantine system to reopen so Australians stranded overseas can return home.
Melbourne has not accepted overseas arrivals since the start of July, after quarantine breaches sparked Victoria’s deadly second wave, and the program is shut until at least October 24.
But Lyell Strambi told the Herald Sun it was “fair to question why the ban cannot be removed since new systems are in place to manage quarantine effectively”.
“I can’t see a reason why we can’t start with a couple of hundred a day right now, we’ve got more than enough capacity,” he said.
“We have been advocating a lot, we wouldn’t break cover on this without having conversations to try and get the right outcome, but I don’t know who the Premier is listening to at the moment.”
Mr Strambi’s intervention comes as the national weekly cap on arrivals is lifted from 4000 to 6000 by October 12, with the other states boosting their hotel quarantine capacity.
Scott Morrison said former top public servant Jane Halton had delivered a “very positive report” on the standards of each state’s hotel quarantine program to national cabinet on Friday.
But the Herald Sun can reveal she has been unable to get to Melbourne to assess a new system overseen by Corrections Victoria and Alfred Health clinical staff, along with police and PSOs.
Private security guards had initially manned the quarantine hotels after the state government disregarded offers of support from the Defence Force, a decision supported by Victoria Police. Several guards became infected, spreading the virus into the community and sparking the second wave.
Alfred Health chief operating officer Simone Alexander told the quarantine inquiry Victoria Police officers were providing “a mobile sort of security presence” at Brady Hotel, which is housing COVID-19 patients who cannot isolate at home.
“There was concern raised within Alfred Health that without having someone stationed on each floor, sometimes we were unable to hear escalating behaviours in the rooms or to be able to stop anyone that might want to leave,” she said.
“We implemented a floor monitor-type role in order to make sure that each floor had oversight 24/7, and that person was able to call Victoria Police or the Alfred Health team leader for assistance at any point.’’
Mr Strambi said the inquiry “should not be allowed to detract from the new system established under Corrections Victoria or hold up Victoria’s reopening”.
Victorian taxpayers are still footing a multimillion-dollar bill to pay for hotel rooms which remain empty as overseas arrivals are blocked from flying into Melbourne.
About 24,000 Australians are stuck overseas, including 4000 considered vulnerable because of financial and health problems.
Mr Morrison said he was hopeful most could return by Christmas.
He encouraged the states to consider a “common sense” model where arrivals from countries with a low COVID-19 risk could isolate at home instead of in hotels.
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