Annastacia Palaszczuk issues ‘please explain’ to PM on visitor entry

The Palaszczuk government criticises moves to allow thousands of visitors into Australia ahead of citizens stranded overseas.

Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Dan Peled

Queensland’s Palaszczuk government has criticised the Morrison government for allowing thousands of visitors into Australia ahead of citizens stranded overseas for up to a year by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Ahead of an expected fiery ­national cabinet on Friday, Queensland Deputy Premier ­Steven Miles said new figures showing a third of arrivals into Australia in December had ticked “visitor” on their entry card had raised serious questions of “lax border controls’’ by the federal government.

“Scott Morrison says the border is closed but continues to let thousands of people in ahead of Aussies stranded overseas,’’ he told The Australian.

Figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics showed 10,640 incoming passengers were self-described visitors — including about 2500 citizens, some coming home for Christmas — as the number of Australians registered as seeking help in returning hovers at about 40,000. Among those stranded are 5000 Australians deemed vulnerable.

Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk is expected to question the Prime Minister at national cabinet over efforts to help Australians stranded overseas after she and state counterparts last month demanded more information be provided over the bona fides of returning resident and business arrivals.

The row over interstate billing for hotel quarantine will also be raised on Friday, with Western Australia joining Queensland in refusing to pay a NSW bill for $7m for quarantining returned West Australians.

Premier Mark McGowan has “officially responded” to the $7m bill that NSW sent WA by shredding it in a video posted on Facebook. “WA will not be paying,” he said. “The NSW government thinks they can be above everyone else. But we are all Australians, and we all have a duty to help safely process returning ­Australians.”

The decision follows a similar move by Mr Miles, who last week ripped up the $27m bill sent by the Berejiklian government to cover costs for hotel quarantine of 7112 Queenslanders in NSW between March and October. Queensland says it will not bill NSW for the ­estimated 6000 NSW residents who quarantined at Queensland hotels during the same period.

Mr Miles said the costs should be covered by the federal government, which under the Constitution has responsibility for quarantine. He said NSW was now billing Queensland taxpayers to cover the quarantine costs of some of the “visitors” who gave officials a Queensland address of a hotel where they intended to stay or that of a relative or friend.

“If they give NSW a Queensland address, he (Mr Morrison) tells NSW they can bill Queensland taxpayers,’’ he said.

“The address might be the hotel they’re staying at, or a friend or relative, but why should Queenslanders pay because Scott Morrison can’t implement his own border closure properly?

“This is a government that used to boast about the harshness of their border control regime, but it seems they’ve lost control of the border completely. The invoice they have sent us has no justification, no break-down of who these people are.”

Victoria is understood to have agreed to pay its bill from NSW.