Ardern’s one-way bubble trouble

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, once the poster child of heavy lockdowns, is right to voice her concern about the disruption caused by a 72-hour pause in quarantine-free travel to Australia because of a single case of COVID-19 in her country. Sympathy for Ardern must be tempered, however, by the fact the trans-Tasman bubble has been one-way traffic that still prevents Australians from making an easy trip across the Tasman. New Zealanders now know how Australians feel as neighbouring states make hasty decisions that throw travel plans into chaos and can leave people stranded far from home.

This time it is the federal government adding fresh uncertainty to an arrangement that had promised restoration of free movement around the Pacific. Health Minister Greg Hunt announced the new restrictions after a woman tested positive on Saturday to a highly infectious South African variant of COVID-19. She had been in hotel quarantine in Auckland and returned a positive test a week after her release. In October last year the Australian Department of Health declared NZ as a low risk of COVID-19 transmission to Australia. Since then, NZ passengers have been free to travel to Australia, quarantine free, provided they have not been in a COVID-19 hotspot in the preceding 14 days. Australia defined a hotspot using a three-day rolling average of three locally acquired cases a day. The situation in NZ clearly did not breach the rules as they were first applied. But fear about more contagious forms of the virus has seen the rule book thrown away.

Ms Ardern contacted Scott Morrison to express her disappointment. For a trans-Tasman bubble to work, she said, people needed confidence that “we won’t see closures at the borders that happen with very short notice over incidents that can be well managed domestically”. As a result of a single positive test, NZ has become entangled in Australia’s cross-border frustrations that, until this week, the commonwealth had been keen to criticise.

Since Monday, arrivals to Australia from NZ have been required to quarantine for 14 days in government-arranged accommodation at their own expense. Despite the equally low numbers of infections in Australia, travel remains restricted across much of the continent. Queensland has a permit system in place that rejects visitors from the Greater Sydney area, including the NSW central coast and Wollongong. Victoria requires all visitors to get a permit under a traffic light system that puts the Cumberland Council area of Sydney out of bounds. Visitors to Victoria from other areas of Greater Sydney must apply for an orange zone permit, agree to a COVID-19 test within 72 hours of travel and remain in self-quarantine until receiving a negative result. Visitors to Western Australia from NSW and Queensland must self-quarantine for 14 days and present for testing on day 11. Visitors from Greater Sydney, Wollongong and the central coast are not permitted to enter South Australia unless they are an essential traveller or exempt person. Visitors to SA from Brisbane must quarantine for 14 days.

Border closures are a near-impossible challenge for tourism operators and people wanting to travel. A consistent national framework is needed. NZ could be included, but it should be two-way traffic, with Australians free to cross the ditch.