Coronavirus: You need a permit to go home, Victorians told
Victorians now require a permit to enter their own state, even if they are travelling from states with no local coronavirus transmission such as WA or SA.
Victorians now require a permit to enter their own state, even if they are travelling from states with no local coronavirus transmission such as Western Australia or South Australia.
Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews announced the new system as he eased travel restrictions for regional NSW but not greater Sydney or Brisbane, allowing those stranded on the wrong side of the Murray who have not visited the state capitals, Blue Mountains or Wollongong to return home.
More than an hour after the permit scheme was due to come into effect at 5:59pm, the “Apply for permission to enter Victoria” website was still not up and running, with a government spokeswoman attributing the delay to the need for Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton to sign off on legal directions required to enforce the initiative. She said a “grace period” would apply before non-compliance with the permit requirement would be punishable with a fine of almost $5000.
The delay in signing off on the legal directives also delayed the release of dozens of Victorians from hotel quarantine, where they were being detained as a consequence of having travelled to regional NSW.
The permit system is being introduced alongside a new “traffic light” scheme that will see regions given a red, amber or green classification based on their COVID-19 status.
As of Monday, Greater Sydney and Greater Brisbane were red, regional NSW amber and the rest of Australia green.
Travel from green zones is allowed with a permit, and those from amber zones may also enter Victoria provided they submit to a coronavirus test within 72 hours of arrival in the state and isolate until they receive a negative result.
No travel is permitted from red zones without a compassionate or medical exemption.
Mr Andrews said the new system would not prevent a repeat of the New Year’s Eve border closure chaos, which saw thousands of Victorians stranded in NSW after they received little more than eight hours’ notice to return from summer holidays or face 14 days in quarantine.
“There’s nothing that can be done to prevent that. If I get public health advice to lock out another part of the country and people from that part of the country travel to Victoria, I will not hesitate to do that. I will do it in a moment,” the Premier said.
Despite this, Professor Sutton encouraged Victorians to continue to travel interstate.
“I think they should be travelling interstate. We’re all in need of seeing family, friends, loved ones, and there are important occasions that people need to get to,” he said.
Opposition Leader Michael O’Brien said the new permit system was overreach.
“It doesn’t matter if you’ve been to a green zone that’s never had a case of coronavirus in its history, you now need the government’s permission before you can come back to Victoria,” he said.
“This is a huge step. It puts the government in control of every single Victorian’s life.”
Victoria recorded its fifth straight day with no new locally acquired cases of coronavirus on Monday.
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