Coronavirus: Melbourne Airport chief urges key states to ‘lead way out’

Melbourne Airport’s CEO wants NSW and Victoria to lead by example in the COVID crisis and reopen their border.

Melbourne Airport chief executive Lyell Strambi. Picture: Andrew Henshaw

Melbourne Airport boss Lyell Strambi wants Victoria and NSW to show the rest of the country the way out of the COVID crisis by reopening their border when cases fall below 20 a day.

The outspoken CEO said while not quite there yet, Victoria was getting close to the point where it could reopen with an effective suppression and contact tracing regime in place.

He also called for the state to again allow international arrivals to quarantine in Melbourne to ease pressure on other cities.

Mr Strambi said hard lockdowns and border closures had been effective in reducing COVID cases but the economic costs were huge and long-term.

“There’s no reason why NSW and Victoria should be waiting until Christmas (to open up),” he said. “As soon as Victoria gets its act together, gets the numbers down, we should open up and we should do it as quickly as possible because we can lead the way forward.”

As Australia’s two biggest states in terms of population and economies, NSW and Victoria could provide a road map for the rest of the country out of the pandemic, he said. “We do need connected economies. We can’t live in splendid isolation. It just doesn’t work,” said Mr Strambi. “I think Queensland in time will see the light. We are seeing the ­economic damage being done in Queensland by the closed border, and with that comes huge ­hardship.”

With no overseas travellers allowed into Melbourne, and border closures reducing domestic travellers to a trickle, the airport’s passenger number had plunged from 100,000 a day to about 1000.

Although the business, owned by Australian Pacific Airports, could be sustained for years, Mr Strambi said other businesses were not so fortunate.

“The long-term damage … to Melbourne is very scary and the worry for me is it’s just going to get worse,” Mr Strambi said.

“People come to Victoria for the events and the wonderful ­culture that is Melbourne. If coming out of this means a big ­proportion of those coffee shops, bars and restaurants are gone, then it is going to be no fun to visit.”

Despite a disastrous run of hotel quarantine failures contributing to the second wave of COVID, the government had “turned things around” with the Department of Corrections now running the program.

Mr Strambi said there was no reason not to allow international arrivals into the city, and help bring back those Australians desperate to return from overseas.