Western Australia to cancel Covid powers

The extraordinary legal powers that allowed WA to close its borders and introduce some of the strongest pandemic measures in the world will finally disappear.

WA Premier Mark McGowan. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Martin Ollman

The extraordinary legal powers that allowed Western Australia to close its borders and introduce some of the strongest pandemic measures in the world will finally disappear, after Premier Mark McGowan announced a state of emergency would be lifted after 2½ years.

WA’s move means that all the states that declared a state of emergency at the start of the pandemic will have formally ­lifted that order by the end of ­October, when Queensland’s ­existing legislative emergency powers will lapse.

The WA parliament – where Labor controls both houses – will rush through legislation that will replace the state of emergency with watered-down legislation extending the few remaining Covid measures.

Mr McGowan said the replacement legislation would contain a “much more modest set of controls”, such as allowing the government to continue to require the wearing of masks in hospitals and aged-care homes and requiring people with the virus to isolate.

“As we know, Covid is diminishing, we are in a very strong and very good position as a state, and therefore we can go to a lower level of controls and measures across the community,” Mr McGowan said.

Beyond WA’s hard border closures with the rest of the country, which were central in keeping the state largely Covid-free for almost two years, the emergency powers also allowed the government to declare a ­series of short lockdowns and ­introduce sweeping vaccination mandates that covered an estimated 75 per cent of workers in the state.

Other states have been progressively unwinding their Covid emergency orders for some time. Victoria lifted its order in December, but replaced it with new pandemic laws. Those laws were renewed on ­August 29 to remain in place until October 12.

South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas lifted his state’s state of emergency after his election in March, while Tasmania’s emergency declaration ended on June 30. Queensland earlier this month introduced legislation to transition from emergency powers to a limited set of temporary and targeted measures by October 31.

NSW never declared a state of emergency, instead relying on powers under the state’s Public Health Act to implement its Covid restrictions.

While the WA opposition has been calling for months for an end to the state of emergency, both Opposition Leader Mia ­Davies and Liberal leader David Honey condemned the government’s approach to introducing the legislation.

Ms Davies said the opposition was only informed of the legislation on Monday night, and had been told that it needed to be passed by the end of Wednesday.

“It’s an absolutely contemptuous and arrogant government that brings legislation of such significance to the parliament and expects it to be dealt with in a day,” she said.

“It’s a dreadful way to treat such a serious issue and if they had any respect for the process or the opposition and the role we are supposed to play, they would be giving us more opportunity to ask questions and test this with stakeholder groups.”