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New Zealand's Prime Minister has declared that a trans-Tasman travel bubble would offer "huge advantages" as both countries intensify negotiations over possibly opening borders later this year.
Key points:
- Negotiations on opening borders are expected to take some time
- Both countries will need to be confident they can trace new cases
- While Australia has a virus-tracing app, New Zealand is yet to roll one out
Australia and New Zealand have earned international praise for their success containing the COVID-19 outbreak, and both governments are now seriously contemplating lifting restrictions on flights between the countries.
In a historic first, Ms Ardern will tomorrow join the Australian Government's National Cabinet meeting to discuss the proposal.
She told reporters in New Zealand that opening international flights over the Tasman could help kickstart the economies of both countries.
"There are significant advantages to New Zealand in terms of a trans-Tasman bubble not only [in terms of] domestic tourism, but equally we have a flow of people travelling between both countries, for business purposes, trade and so on," Ms Ardern said.
"So it is to our advantage, but equally Prime Minister Morrison has articulated a huge advantage for Australia."
Ms Ardern would not be drawn on the possible timing, adding that there was no chance of flights resuming in the next few weeks.
She said neither country wanted to "give away" the gains they had made in suppressing COVID-19.
But Ms Ardern said Mr Morrison had "a similar perspective" to her on when flight restrictions might be lifted.
New Zealand's Director-General of Health, Dr Ashely Bloomfield, also sounded a note of cautious optimism, saying that both Australia and New Zealand would "need to be confident in each other's [health] capabilities" before allowing flights to resume.
"If I reflect on how closely we have worked together over the last three months in trying to go in tandem — whether around the border, or case definitions, or sharing information — I'm confident we could continue that to support a trans-Tasman bubble arrangement if that's what the governments agree," he said.
Ms Ardern is expected to use tomorrow's National Cabinet meeting to lay out New Zealand's COVID-19 strategy to premiers and chief ministers in order to secure their support for resumed flights.
While the two countries have used similar tactics to fight the spread of coronavirus, New Zealand has not yet introduced a tracing app to help identify and contain future outbreaks — although it has indicated a rollout is imminent.
More than 4.4 million Australians have already downloaded the COVIDSafe app but Australian ministers have warned more people will have to sign up before the Federal Government will ease national restrictions.
Dr Bloomfield said if the border controls were lifted, the two countries would need to be confident they could trace any new COVID-19 cases.
"One of the things that will be very important if there is an agreement … that we are working very closely with our Australian counterparts about, is what those key public health pillars would need to be, around how we are testing for, identifying, and isolating cases and contacts," he said.
"[As well as] our position around contact tracing and our ability to exchange information smoothly to ensure any contacts could be followed up if they've travelled in either direction."
ABC
