Watch live: Prime Minister's press conference
Prime Minister Scott Morrison is due to hold a press conference at 10am. You can watch it live, below:
Latest updates
Police raised alarm over security guards at Victoria's quarantine hotels
By Paul Sakkal
Keeping with the issues around quarantine hotels for a moment: Senior police wrote to the Victorian Health Department expressing concern about what they assessed was the inadequacy of private security guards at quarantine hotels in the early days of the program.
Police Commissioner Shane Patton said a commander involved in the hotel quarantine operation was informed by officers that private guards were “inadequate” in their enforcement of rules for returned travellers.
Victoria Police Commissioner Shane Patton.Credit:Justin McManus
The details relayed to the senior officer were communicated to the Health Department, the controlling agency for the hotel program, Mr Patton told radio station 3AW this morning.
The police chief did not know the exact date the concerns were raised but said it occurred in the “early days” of the program.
Mr Patton affirmed evidence given by Emergency Management Commissioner Andrew Crisp to a parliamentary inquiry yesterday that the decision to use private security contractors instead of the defence force or police was made prior to a March 27 state control centre meeting.
The meeting has previously been cited as the crucial forum where the decision to use security guards was made.
Mr Patton, who was not present at the March 27 meeting but has listened to a recording of it, said Mr Crisp chaired the meeting before “ducking out”.
A defence force official then effectively chaired the meeting, according to Mr Patton.
“We’re not hiding from anything,” Mr Patton said.
Public servants under scrutiny in Victoria's hotel inquiry
By Tammy Mills
Victoria's hotel quarantine inquiry resumes today and public servants are the key witnesses.
Claire Febey, Katrina Currie and Gonul Serbest from the Department of Jobs, Precincts and Regions (DJPR) will give evidence today about the department's role in setting up and managing the program.
You might remember that Ms Serbest from Global Victoria appeared in a video congratulating her colleagues about the program.
Counsel assisting the inquiry Tony Neal, QC, has said the department was initially tasked with sourcing and contracting the hotels where returned travellers were detained.
But there was little clarity about who was in charge.
"From the very beginning, it seems there were multiple and potentially overlapping areas of responsibility between departments," Mr Neal said.
Even for the inquiry, he said it was no easy task to find out how the program's structure worked, where lines of accountability lay, how it was resourced and how it was coordinated and supervised.
A nurse told the inquiry said she did not understand what the role of the DJPR was in quarantine.
"I don't know. I met one guy who said that he was from that department and I don't know what his role was," the nurse told the inquiry last week.
Instead of preventing a spread from returned travellers into the community, hotel quarantine became ground zero for Victoria's second wave of coronavirus with experts telling the inquiry that 99 per cent of current cases in the state could be traced back to the program.
The inquiry heard this week from a security guard who caught COVID-19 while working at the Rydges on Swanston, where most of the outbreaks started.
The guard said he was not trained in infection control and told to wear the same mask and pair of gloves for an entire shift. He said he was told to hide his mask and gloves in his pockets and to do so out of sight of security cameras when he went on meal breaks.
You can watch the inquiry live, below, or in the 10.03am post.
Watch live: Victoria's hotel quarantine inquiry
Queensland police dish out fine over super-yacht's voyage from Melbourne to the Gold Coast
Queensland police have issued an on-the-spot fine to those aboard the super-yacht Lady Pamela after they sailed from Melbourne to the Gold Coast.
Melbourne millionaire Mark Simonds and his family spent 15 days on the super-yacht, making their way up the east coast, before arriving in Queensland.
The group went into hotel quarantine on Tuesday after an exemption to enter the state – originally granted to allow the yacht to have repair work – was scrapped by health authorities.
“With respect to the investigation of Lady Pamela we have issued an on the spot fine at the moment, however, that investigation is ongoing,” Deputy Police Commissioner Steve Gollschewski told reporters at a press conference this morning.
Asked if more fines were likely to be handed out, he refused to comment further.
“There remains a criminal investigation as well and that may take some time to work through.”
On Wednesday, Mr Gollschewski said a criminal investigation would focus on Mr Simonds and others on board the yacht.
Four arrested, nine fined as anti-lockdown protesters clash with police in Melbourne
By Erin Pearson
Confronting scenes unfolded in Dandenong, in Melbourne's south-east, as lockdown protesters took to suburban streets late yesterday. And, they're vowing to return today.
Four men have been arrested and almost $15,000 in fines issued after large groups of anti-lockdown protesters gathered and marched overnight. The large group carried speakers playing the national anthem and protest songs.
Police were called to George Andrews Reserve in Dandenong after close to 100 people - mainly young men - spread through nearby streets.
In one piece of footage protesters scream "f--- off" and call officers "f----ing dogs", "c----" and Nazis as six officers bring a person to the ground. Another officer is then seen pointing a canister of pepper spray at the gathered group.
Police were forced to block off roads and can be heard in footage posted online calling for the group to move.
An image from video footage posted online of the clash with police at Dandenong.Credit:
A police spokesman said four men were arrested on scene for failing to provide identification and for breaching the Chief Health Officer’s directions. A further nine people were fined $1652 each for breaching the stage four lockdown restrictions.
- A 28-year-old Dandenong man was charged with assaulting and resisting police, failing to state his name and address and breaching the Chief Health Officer's directions.
- A 19-year-old Dandenong man was charged with using threatening words, failing to state his name and address, and breaching the Chief Health Officer's directions.
- A 22-year-old Dandenong man was charged with failing to state his name and address and breaching the Chief Health Officer's directions. All three were released pending summons.
- A 43-year-old Dandenong man was also charged with failing to state his name and address and breaching the Chief Health Officer's directions. He was bailed to appear at Dandenong Magistrates Court on December 11.
Bird's eye view of Melbourne in lockdown
If you're wondering what the streets of Melbourne look like during its stage four lockdown, here's a bird's eye view from photographers who took to the sky yesterday.
These are usually some of the busiest roads and crowded places in the city ...
An aerial view of the Nepean Highway.Credit:Getty Images
The Bolte Bridge.Credit:Getty
Federation Square.Credit:Getty
William Street in Melbourne's CBD.Credit:Getty
See the full photo gallery, here.
Prison trainer believed to be latest case in Brisbane Youth Detention Centre cluster
By Matt Dennien
A prison officer, who is Queensland's latest coronavirus case, is believed to be connected to the cluster linked to the Brisbane Youth Detention Centre which emerged last week.
But health authorities are yet to confirm the connection.
Commissioner for Queensland Corrective Services, Peter Martin, said the man, who is about 60 years old, was a “senior and experienced trainer” who went home after developing a sore throat on Friday afternoon before his symptoms developed.
He returned a positive test on Wednesday night forcing all prisons south of central Queensland, which house about 7000 of Queensland's 9000 inmates, into a stage four lockdown and 25 close contacts into isolation.
“I’m optimistic and confident that we’re doing everything we can at the present time to isolate and test all of those people, both recruits and also colleagues,” Mr Martin said.
Deputy Premier Steven Miles told reporters that while no “clear link” had been found between the man and the recent youth detention centre cluster, the man lived in Forest Lake and worked at the Wacol training centre, which are both at the centre of contact tracing efforts.
Air New Zealand reports $NZ454 million loss
Air New Zealand has swung to a $NZ454 million ($416 million) net loss after being crushed by travel restrictions.
"It is clear that COVID-19 is unlike any other crisis the aviation industry has experienced," Air New Zealand's chief executive officer Greg Foran said in a statement.
The airline suffered a 74 per cent drop in passenger revenue from April to the end of June.
Air New Zealand is the latest airline to report big losses due to the pandemic.Credit:Bloomberg
Air New Zealand's domestic capacity was back to 70 per cent of pre-COVID levels in June and August, well ahead of many other domestic markets. Qantas is currently flying at around 20 per cent of pre-COVID levels domestically, while domestic flights in the United States are at around 55 per cent.
However, Air New Zealand said it does not expect passenger demand to return to 2019 levels until 2023 at the earliest.
"In the airline’s 80-year history we have faced many challenges and emerged from each one stronger than before," Mr Foran said.
"We entered this crisis in an enviable position, and with our core domestic network, I believe we are better positioned for recovery than many of our airline peers."
Queensland genomic sequencing can't provide definitive link to Melbourne virus
By Matt Dennien
Final genome sequencing results have not been able to “definitively link” Queensland’s latest COVID-19 cluster and one sparked by two women who travelled back from Melbourne last month while infected with the virus, the state's chief health officer Dr Jeannette Young says.
Although the virus strains acquired by one of the women and the first case detected at the Brisbane Youth Detention Centre last week match “almost perfectly” the results are not definitive, she said.
Dr Jeannette Young.
“Although they match almost perfectly, there’s only one very small change - one nucleotide change between the two which suggest they are linked - the particular strain has shown very little mutation,” Dr Young said.
“We can’t say definitively that those two cases are linked … so that’s where we’ll have to leave that one.
“We’re still looking to see whether through contact tracing work, we can find any link between the two clusters.”
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2020-08-27 00:08:00Z
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