Annastacia Palaszczuk’s hard line on border-split families

Separated families sharing hugs and kisses across the Queensland/NSW border are putting people’s health at risk, Annastacia Palaszczuk has warned.

NSW mum Belinda Vardy gets hugs and flowers from her mother, Barbara Roberts, and father, Max, at the border barrier. As the lockdown hit, Ms Vardy was forced to travel to Queensland to support her son at school after her husband died and her other son committed suicide, and now she is stuck there.

Separated families sharing hugs and kisses across the Queensland/NSW border are putting people’s health at risk, Annastacia Palaszczuk has warned.

Hundreds of people gathered along border blockades at the southern end of the Gold Coast on Father’s Day despite a stay-at-home order for the entire NSW population.

Families have continued to catch up along the border this week and the Queensland Premier said it was up to the NSW government to police gatherings.

“It is putting people at risk,” Ms Palaszczuk said. “Queenslanders are free to go around, that is because we have zero cases and we do not have those restrictions.

“But NSW has stay-at-home orders so it is up to the NSW government to enforce those.”

Defence Minister Peter Dutton said the family gatherings on the border were “gut wrenching”.

“It is a disgrace to put people through that anguish,” he said.

Indeed, when Belinda Vardy saw her mother and father over the Queensland/NSW border ­barricade, she burst into tears.

Ms Vardy, who has lived in Banora Point in northern NSW for most of her life, lost her husband Terrence after a long sickness in April and her son Ryan, 18, to suicide a month later.

She moved to Brisbane in July to support her other son at school, leaving her elderly parents, Barbara and Max Roberts, and all of her friends behind on the NSW side of the border.

“It’s just devastating,” she said. “I had to grab a suitcase before they shut the borders down, and move in with my sister and her family in Brisbane so I could be with my son.

“My parents, who have experienced an excruciating year with the loss of their grandson and son-in-law, have also lost me to Brisbane because of the border block.

“It has been very difficult for them. There is very little support around them, and the wait for a psychologist is three to six months.”

Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk in Brisbane on Tuesday. Picture: Dan Peled

Ms Vardy met with her parents, along with hundreds of others, on the border at Bay Street, Coolangatta, on Monday to collect her mail and other essentials.

She commended the work of state governments in erecting a border bubble during last year’s lockdown, which allowed her to cross state lines to visit her dying husband in hospital. Now she is ­urgently calling on the premiers to reinstate it.

“This hard border is so draining and is affecting all of our mental health,” she said.

“What the politicians need to think about is to stop playing the political game and think about the human effect.

“I’d understand if there was any Covid in the Tweed area, but there’s no Covid here. I don’t understand why they can’t have the bubble again. It worked well the last time. I was able to visit my husband every day for the four months he was in hospital.’’

In a plea to increase Queensland’s lagging vaccination rates, Ms Palaszczuk warned that the spread of Delta from NSW was inevitable. “There has never been a more real threat than what is on our border, and that’s the encroachment of Delta,” she said.

“It is a real and present danger. We need to get vaccinated to protect ourselves, our families and our community from what would happen if the Delta (strain) takes hold in Queensland.”

Queensland has the lowest first-dose jab rate at 53 per cent. Health experts say the state’s success at keeping Covid out has contributed to vaccine hesitancy.

Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt said Queensland and Western Australia needed to “really push the vaccination program”.

“NSW has led the pack. They have done a great job,” he said.

“I know that, unfortunately … the Queensland government, the Premier, have been somewhat cooler on AstraZeneca.”