NT border restrictions: Calls to lift forced hotel quarantine to give interstate travellers room to roam

THE NT’s forced hotel quarantine should be lifted from June 5 to allow interstate travellers to self isolate in their caravans, Tourism Central Australia chair Dale McIver says, as other tourism leaders reveal when they would like to see our borders reopened.

The NT’s forced hotel quarantine should be lifted from June 5 to allow interstate travellers to self isolate in their caravans, Tourism Central Australia chair Dale McIver says. Picture: News Limited

THE NT’s forced hotel quarantine should be lifted from June 5 to allow interstate travellers to self isolate in their caravans, Tourism Central Australia chair Dale McIver says.

Ms McIver, who is also running for Territory Alliance in the election, said the NT risked falling behind other states like Queensland when the race for domestic tourists started up again if some border restrictions weren’t relaxed soon.

“If we lift the forced hotel quarantine rules drive tourists could begin to trickle in again while still quarantining for 14 days after arrival in their caravans and motorhomes,” she said.

“This would be a safe way to slowly start-up tourism again I don’t see why we couldn’t look at it from June 5 when they lift these biosecurity zones.”

NT Tourism boss Andrew Hopper said the drive market was extremely valuable, making up 56 per cent of all domestic holiday visitors last year.

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Kakadu Tourism chair Rick Allert said he would like to see NT’s borders open by July 1.

He said operators in Kakadu, which is scheduled to reopen from June 18, had a very narrow period from May to September to sustain their business and it would be made even more difficult this year because of the lack of seasonal workers in Australia.

“The pent-up demand for travel within Australia is huge and every tourism destination will be fighting hard to win that business; therefore it is imperative that the NT is opened up as soon as possible,” he said.

“There will come a time towards the end of the Dry that it will no longer be viable for us to reopen our operations fully, which would mean that we lose well over a year’s business.”

Lasseters Hotel Casino chief executive Craig Jervis said the NT should open its borders to states and territories with no community transmission to coincide with the Stage 3 of NT’s restrictions rollback on June 5.

There have also been calls to relax the NT’s border restrictions in time for southern states’ school holidays.

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Metro Hotel general manager Stefanos Vasilakis said the sooner the borders opened the better for Territory hoteliers, with Victorian students the first to finish term two on June 26.

“We hoped that we would see something by July before school holidays start,” he said.

“School holidays are a big incentive for people to travel.”

Mr Vasilakis said business had been tough and would continue to struggle unless the borders were opened – safely – to domestic visitors.

“Obviously (we should open) when it is safe for the people of Darwin to do so, but we do struggle at the moment. It’s less than half of what we were supposed to have at this time of year,” he said.

In Katherine, Riverview Tourist Village manager Fiona Younger said she wanted border restrictions to ease by July 1.

“We can’t afford to wait — things have been empty over the last few months,” she said.

In Tennant Creek, Safari Lodge Motel manager Leah Johnston said she didn’t want the borders opened until September 1.

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Chief Minister Michael Gunner said on ABC radio yesterday the NT Government was using interstate transmission rates as a “flexible trigger” to determine when it would reopen the Territory’s borders, and said if community transmission decreased significantly, the borders could reopen.

“Zero (community transmission) would be the best number but I guess what I’m trying to say is if we’re flexible, it might be that community transmission is not at zero but it’s happening in a way which it doesn’t give us the concern that it’s going to get across the border,” Mr Gunner said.