Coronavirus: Daniel Andrews free to answer Covid questions, says inquiry chief

The former judge overseeing the hotel quarantine inquiry has given Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews the green light to answer questions on the disastrous program.

Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews on Wednesday. Picture: Getty Images

The former judge overseeing the hotel quarantine inquiry has given Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews the green light to answer questions on the program that unleashed the coronavirus into the state.

Jennifer Coate AO clarified that the board of inquiry was “not a court” at an extraordinary sitting on Wednesday as she announced the Premier had granted a six-week extension to the reporting deadline.

She said “those who are being asked questions publicly about matters” were free to give ­answers.

“Under law, unlike a court, there is no general restriction or prohibition which would prevent a person from commenting publicly or answering questions to which they know the answers on matters which are the subject of examination by this board of ­inquiry,” she said.

Ever since he announced the probe on July 2, Mr Andrews and his fellow government ministers have refused to answer questions on hotel quarantine, claiming to do so would cut across the work of the inquiry.

The probe is examining whether every single case of the coronavirus currently in Victoria can be linked to hotel quarantine, which saw private security companies recruited to guard returned travellers instead of Victoria Police officers.

Reports that security companies subcontracted the work to cheaper operators with lax infection control standards and guards having sex with guests will be ­examined by the inquiry.

Opposition legal affairs spokesman Edward O’Donohue said Ms Coate’s clarification meant it was time for Mr Andrews to come clean.

“When Daniel Andrews is asking Victorians to work together, the least he can do is be honest about how this disaster, the largest public policy failing in Victoria’s history, came to pass,” he said.

On Wednesday, Ms Coate acknowledged that the inquiry’s delay would cause “frustration and distress” but said she took comfort there were no returned travellers currently in Victoria.

“I also understand that, to the extent there are any people in quarantine in Victoria, that process is substantially different to and under different departmental management than the hotel quarantine program into which I am inquiring,” she said.

Ms Coate said she wrote to Mr Andrews on Monday requesting a six-week extension in light of the state of disaster declaration and the six-week stage-four lockdown: “This inquiry, of such magnitude and importance, must not suffer from being rushed through a less than thorough process.”

Ms Coate further said there had been a “variance in compliance” of government departments and entities in handing over evidence to the inquiry and some of the 106,000 documents already received had been redact­ed for privacy reasons.

“Despite requests by the inquiry legal team and detailed protocols about how categories of documents were to be electronically provided, there has been a variance in compliance among departments and entities with how this has been done,” she said.

Ms Coate said relevant ministers could be called to appear before the inquiry as well as witnesses from the most senior levels of government and from private entities. “I am acutely aware, as are those assisting me, of the community need to have a thorough understanding of what has happened in the quarantine program and the ramifications.”

The new report deadline is Nov­ember 6, with the first public hearings, which were to start on Thursday, to begin on August 17.