‘I have to’: WA Premier Mark McGowan’s Covid-19 promise

Mark McGowan is sticking to a vow he made despite the West Australian Premier’s defamation trial with Clive Palmer being delayed.

The West Australian Premier has vowed to quarantine for seven days after testifying at his defamation trial despite a judge ordering a delay to proceedings that will mean the state’s hard border will be down by then.

Mark McGowan and billionaire Clive Palmer are suing each other in the Federal Court in NSW and the Premier must travel to Sydney to testify in-person.

Mr Palmer has already testified and Mr McGowan was due to give evidence on Saturday, but the court issued a notice on Tuesday announcing the matter would instead return to court on March 7 due to the change in border restrictions.

WA’s hard border is set to come down on March 3, but Mr McGowan told reporters he would still quarantine upon his return home to ensure no one could claim the situation had been manipulated for him.

“This is outside my control. This was initiated by the court. That’s the court’s decision and I don’t have any control over that,” he said.

“I’ve decided that I’ll still do the quarantine period afterwards – even though I’m not required to – just to remove any argument that somehow this has been manipulated in my favour.”

WA Premier Mark McGowan says he will still quarantine even though he is not required to do so. Picture: Colin Murty/The Australian

During his quarantine period, there will be a national cabinet meeting, so Mr McGowan said he would try to join via video.

“If I can’t Zoom into that, I’ll come out of quarantine with the appropriate PPE, attend the national cabinet meeting and then go back into quarantine,” he said.

“Whilst I’m in quarantine, I’ll be working.”

Attorney-General John Quigley will also travel to NSW for the trial, but he was unlikely to go into quarantine, Mr McGowan added.

“I’m the one who is held accountable for these things ... I have to do that in order to set the right example,” Mr McGowan said.

Asked about reports Mr Palmer might be unwell with Covid-19, the Premier said he wished the mining magnate “all the best”.

Clive Palmer had guests on-board his $40m super yacht in Sydney during the trial. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Dylan Coker

Justice Michael Lee said in his reasons for the judgment that with the hard border coming down “the cost and inconvenience of a weekend sitting no longer exists”.

“My only reason in taking the highly unusual step of sitting on the weekend, and thereby causing inconvenience to court staff (and myself), was so that when Mr McGowan and Mr Quigley returned to WA on the evening of February 28, they would then have a sufficient period by which they could quarantine for 14 days until the next sitting of the Legislative Assembly on March 15,” he said.

“But the world has now changed, or at least WA has.”

WA recorded 263 new cases overnight, including 258 local infections.

Three people are in hospital, but none of them are in intensive care.

An outbreak at the Aboriginal community of Jameson has also risen to four infections.

It brings the total number of active cases in WA to 1315.

This is our WA COVID-19 update for Tuesday, 22 February 2022.
For official information on COVID-19 in WA, visit https://t.co/gIGAhoGbvOhttps://t.co/iFTTSS3ZeFpic.twitter.com/Mvym7KwjDe

— Mark McGowan (@MarkMcGowanMP) February 22, 2022

Other states have started easing restrictions, such as ditching the use of masks, but Mr McGowan said their circumstances were completely different.

While the eastern states had been through “hell” and “horrendous pain” for months, WA was now going to experience “some discomfort”, he said.

“Victoria has been through 200 days of lockdown, NSW around 100 days of lockdown. We went through 12 days,” he said.

“Obviously, we’ve had a much better experience by a country mile than the main states of the east.

“We are now going into Covid with very high vaccination levels.

“Whilst they’re off the peak over east, we are going into it, so that’s why we have to have some restrictions in place to control the spread and make sure that we don’t have mass hospitalisations like they’ve had in the east.”

Originally published as ‘I have to’: WA Premier Mark McGowan’s Covid-19 promise