Deputy Premier talks up quarantine facility during visit to Wellcamp Airport

Deputy Premier Steven Miles says there are big advantages to a purpose built quarantine facility, such as the one being proposed at Wellcamp.

Toowoomba businessman John Wagner says international traveller quarantine arrangements will likely continue “for quite some time”, underscoring the need for a new quarantine facility in Toowoomba.

Mr Wagner’s comments come off the back of news Avalon Airport, owned by Lindsay Fox’s company Linfox, is in negotiations with the Victorian and Federal Governments for the establishment of a quarantine hub near Geelong.

Mr Wagner said he thought “the lights have come on down in Victoria”.

“They’ve got a major issue there and (Mr Fox) thinks he can help the Victorian Government like we think we can help the Queensland Government.

“Clearly what has happened in hotel quarantine, particularly in Melbourne, has been a disaster.”

Mr Wagner further elaborated on his family’s plan for a 1000 room demountable quarantine facility next to the Wellcamp Airport runway, saying every worker at the facility would be vaccinated.

Deputy Premier Steven Miles said the two big advantages of a purpose built facility were proper ventilation around rooms – “so you don’t have the hallway or corridor effect that we’ve seen in recent outbreaks in hotel quarantine” – and the employment of a stable, full time workforce.

“Some of them could stay on site and that would further reduce the risk, but just allowing people to work full time in one location also reduces the risk if you think about hotel workforces.”

Mr Miles said the ball was now in the Federal Government’s court, with the state providing more details on Friday.

“We’ve put forward a lot of information, we’ve answered a lot of questions,” he said.

“And now its really up to the Federal Government to decide whether they will act to keep communities safe.”

When asked about community consultation, Mr Miles said the site would be a national facility run by the Federal Government.

“You need to ask them how they intend to engage with the community on that,” he said.

“We’ve put forward this as a proposal to avoid having to shut down whole cities for four or five days like we’ve seen in Perth and Brisbane and Melbourne and Scott Morrison really needs to consider how many times he wants to see that happen before we put in place a more effective quarantine regime that’s able to deal with these new more infectious strains.“