Quarantine will be scrapped because Wellcamp Airport lacks air traffic control tower

The lack of a key piece of infrastructure is the reason why the Palaszczuk Government’s second quarantine hub proposal at Toowoomba is likely to be binned.

A Toowoomba Wellcamp quarantine camp that would house returned Australians, Pacific Island workers and international students will likely be scuttled because the nearest airport has no air traffic control tower.

The Courier-Mail understands the Commonwealth received Queensland’s latest detailed proposal on Friday with no warning, and has this raised questions so far around long travel times to Brisbane hospitals, who would own the facility and who would fund a necessary $100 million air traffic control tower.

It’s understood while large aeroplanes are physically capable of landing at Wellcamp Airport, insurance policies will not allow airlines to regularly land at airports with no control tower.

Wellcamp Airport at Toowoomba. Picture: Mark Cranitch

It comes after Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk reacted to “interesting” new Commonwealth guidelines, issued Friday, that would disallow federal funding for facilities not close to an international airport or within an hour’s drive to a tertiary hospital, which would likely rule out Wellcamp.

Speaking at Labor’s state conference on Saturday, Ms Palaszczuk described the new guidelines as “interesting” because quarantine was a Commonwealth responsibility.

“If you set the criteria, you can design it, you can build it, you can operate it, you can

own it, the lot,” she said.

“Because the fact is, quarantine is a Commonwealth responsibility.”

Ms Palaszczuk said a regional quarantine centre “could be built right now with planes landing next door if only (Prime Minister) Scott Morrison could answer a simple question: do you support it or not?”

“Our Quarantine Centre would help stranded Australians get back from overseas, allow Pacific Island labour to help our farmers and give our universities a small cohort of students who also support our tourism and hospitality industries,” she said.

“Jobs are at stake.

“Victoria is OK. Why not Queensland?

She said Queensland was “not proposing construction of an international space station” as federal Labor leader Anthony Albanese suggested the Toowoomba Base Hospital could be used to care for COVID patients.

Originally published as Quarantine will be scrapped because Wellcamp Airport lacks air traffic control tower