Federal Minister for Finance, Matthias Corman, pulled no punches when speaking at a Chamber of Commerce and Industry WA breakfast this morning.
He told the business leaders WA's hard border, together with the lack of community transmission of Covid-19 for six months, effectively left his home state unprepared for a second wave of the pandemic, should it come.
Speaking at the event, he observed that the hard border gave Western Australians an "inflated sense of security."
He went on to say “We haven't really set up the systems and processes to minimise the risk and to respond to it as swiftly as we can on the basis that we believe our border is going to keep us secure. Well, it might, it might not. I mean, if the virus comes in, given where the system is at, I worry that we're not going to be in as strong a position to deal with it as swiftly as possible.”
He called out Western Australia for its complacency, because of the hard border, pointing out that businesses lacked practice and experience to live with the threat of the virus in the community.
He contrasted the state of affairs in WA to that in Canberra, which has no active cases and has had no community transmission for more than two months.
“I've been in Canberra — zero active cases in Canberra, zero locally acquired transmission — but in any business you go into there is certain procedures. Any cafe, any restaurant there is certain procedures.
I don't see that anywhere in Western Australia. “We can't assume that the virus is not going to find its way in, even with that hard border. And if it comes in and we haven't got the systems in place that they've got in place in NSW, in ACT, in other jurisdictions domestically, then we could be taken by surprise in a pretty nasty way.”
The West Australian revealed exerts of Cormann's speech at the CCIWA Federal Budget Briefing breakfast event this morning.
Cormann also blasted the decision to keep the border closed to other "safe" jurisdictions and rubbished Premier Mark McGowan's assertion that WA "was in the best position" of all Australian States and Territories.
“It is not true. The three jurisdictions that are in a less advantageous position than us are Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland in that order,” Mr Cormann said.
“Why would we feel uncomfortable having a free exchange of people with those jurisdictions that are in as good or better a position as us makes no sense to me whatsoever.”
I understand the politics of State border closures, I understand the sort of short-term populist elements,” he said.
“But what I can't understand rationally is why a business in Kununurra that has a long track record of servicing clients just across the border in the Northern Territory is not allowed to move across that border and come back without going into quarantine. “It makes no sense to me at all. I mean, the Northern Territory has been on zero cases for months.”
A video of Cormann's speech is available on CCIWA's website.
Kym Anderson
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