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Legislative Council - Fifty-Fourth Parliament, Second Session (54-2)
2020-03-25 Daily Xml
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Coronavirus

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN (15:26): We are indeed in a time of crisis. It is something that none of us could have foreseen, none of us have expected, and all of us are grappling with as we speak. We know that the information changes not just daily but hourly. We know that the guidelines change just as regularly.

As at 4pm yesterday, our borders were closed. The borders of South Australia were closed to reduce the spread of COVID-19 into our state, and this was a move supported by the opposition. Indeed, it was called for by Peter Malinauskas, the Leader of the Opposition, on Sunday. We were told this was done on the advice of South Australian health specialists, and of course it requires all people entering South Australia to isolate for 14 days from their arrival. These are essential measures that we need to ensure that the spread of this virus is contained or slowed down.

However, I want today to speak particularly about the impacts on cross-border community members. For those who do not live near a border, you might wonder who they are. These are people who live on a town or a property on one side of the border but regularly go to the other side of the border, perhaps for work, for school or for other essential daily tasks. Indeed, I used to be one of these. I lived in Strathdownie over the Victorian border but attended school in Mount Gambier. My father worked in Mount Gambier and so on.

The confusion for cross-border members of the community is immense at the moment. The border controls operated from 4 o'clock yesterday, but people are unsure how they are to obtain the exemptions if they are indeed a member of a cross-border community. The exemptions are there, but how to access them is incredibly confusing. There was advice that the health department's 1300 number included advice for people seeking exemptions. That was in relation to interstate travel bans as well as other matters. However, that number asked callers to put their request in writing with as much detail as possible about the exemption request and to email that to sacovid19exemptions@sa.gov.au.

People who live or work near or across the border and need to seek an exemption, we were told, should send it to that email address. However, if one now sends an email to that address, we receive a message: 'Delivery has failed. Mailbox unavailable.' We have now seen advice that the department is shutting down that inbox and instead that people should go to www.sa.gov.au. This site does have a section on COVID-19 with a list of topics, one of which is Australian border closure details. One follows that through on the website and instead simply gets a copy of the declaration.

This is incredibly confusing for local people and incredibly distressing. People are already concerned that their jobs are at risk, or may have partners or other family members who have already lost their jobs, and they are absolutely frantic about the ability to keep their jobs, yet this border control is so totally confusing for them and there is no clear direction of what they should be doing.

I want to take this opportunity to pay tribute to SAPOL at this difficult time. We want to pay tribute to all of the workers across many, many different service providers, but SAPOL is working incredibly hard under incredibly difficult circumstances and I want to pay tribute to them. But the government needs to provide clarity both to SAPOL and also to the many people who do live on one side of the border and yet go to school or work or other essential services across that border. I hope that the government will provide clarity soon because this is adding to the stress and distress of many regional residents.

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