Covid Victoria: Parents, schools call for a boarding student permit to cross border
Farming families and boarding schools are calling for a border crossing exemption for students left stranded by Covid restrictions.
Southern NSW families and Victorian boarding schools are calling on the state government to treat interstate boarding students equally to city boarders, and allow them to see their families during the school holidays.
Hundreds of children who live in NSW and attend boarding school in Victoria risk being blocked from returning to campus if they choose to travel home.
The current Victorian Government border pass permit system does not allow boarding students who live in NSW to cross the border into Victoria, even for the purpose of education.
The permit application site states: “Exemptions are only granted in exceptional circumstances.
It is unlikely you will be granted an exemption for work or education, non-emergency or discretionary relocation, non-urgent medical purposes or recreation.”
Jo Pincott’s two children, Emily, 16, and James, 14, attend Geelong Grammar school and are stranded in Victoria this weekend, unable to be with their family when the school shuts down for an “exeat” weekend.
“The school campus remains open for those that have absolutely nowhere to go,” Ms Pincott said. “They are not coming home. They are bitterly disappointed, as are we.
“Some students will be allowed to go back home to metro Melbourne, and they are legally allowed to do so, yet our kids who are at minimal risk to exposure can’t.
“Yet we are out here west of Wagga, on a farm at Galore, an hour from Wagga and 40 mins from any nearby town.”
She said last year, when they faced similar issues due to hard borders imposed first by NSW then Victoria, there were exemptions granted so boarding students could travel from low-Covid-risk regions to low-risk regions in Victoria.
She hopes a similar plan will be implemented as soon as possible.
“Ultimately the action needs to have been yesterday.
“My kids are strong and resilient and have been brought up on a farm with all sorts of adversity with drought and floods,” Ms Pincott said. “These kids are tough, but I think we are stretching their resilience.”
Ali Newton’s two children, who also are ordinarily at Geelong Grammar, will be back home at Wagga Wagga this weekend to ensure “their mental health is put first”, despite the struggles they might have returning to school.
“If we don’t get this permit, they might miss the rest of the term,” she said.
“I understand that essential workers are important but so are family units and that’s what upset and frustrates me the most."
She is joining the call for the simple and more permanent solution of a boarding student’s border permit.
“It’s disappointing that it’s 18 month on and there’s no guidelines or permanent situation that they can rely on our have faith in.
“If there was a permit in place we wouldn’t have all of that stress and anxiety,” she said.
Frogmore farmer and mother Sue Braid has a daughter also boarding at Geelong Grammar’s Timbertop campus and is pushing for border exemptions to allow her family to be together during the school holidays.
Mrs Braid has written to Premier Daniel Andrews, citing concern that she couldn’t be there for her child in an emergency.
“Even if our child got sick at school, I can’t go and pick her up — there is no exemption.
“It’s extra pressure put on parents, technically we’re caregivers but we’ve seen examples when the government haven’t given permits when it is a life or death situation,” she said.
She said the simple solution would be to reinstate an category when applying for border permits for boarding students.
“It would be nice if Vic government could do what they did last year — it worked well, let’s do it again,” she said.
Isolated Children’s Parents’ Association federal president Alana Moller said they were continuing to advocate on behalf of the affected families to see a set of national guidelines put in for future lockdowns.
“We’re asking for something to put in place on a national level so parents have a consistent and certain set of guidelines so they know what will happen in those situations,” she said.
Mrs Moller said the uncertainty had some parents moving to capital cities to be closer to their children, or some cases where there were teenagers forced to quarantine for 14 days by themselves.
She said it was “incredulous” that there was still no reliable framework 18 months on from the beginning of the pandemic.
“We’re not asking for flood gates to be opened, we’re talking about a small number of children that are geographically isolated.
“Surely something could be arranged for that small number of children to alleviate the stress and anxiety they are feeling,” she said.
Ms Moller said they had been working closely with relevant ministers since September last year and are hoping to have something concrete as soon as possible.
Ballarat Grammar director of boarding Chris van Styn said they were in talks with the government to clear up the rules around bringing in students stranded outside of the border bubble.
“It’s probably a situation that I think is going to be a bit fluid over the next 24 hours,” he said.
“We’re hoping to bring some kids back over the border over the weekend, and we want to do it safely and in the right way.”
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