Good evening and thank you for reading our live coverage of the day’s events. If you are just joining us now, here’s what you need to know.
Victorian police searching for the bodies of missing campers Russell Hill and Carol Clay have found human remains in bushland near Dargo, Marta Pascual Juanola reports. The remains are yet to be formally identified, a process police say could take some time. Mr Hill, from Drouin, and Ms Clay, from Pakenham, vanished from the Wonnangatta Valley in the state’s High Country in March last year before their campsite, damaged by fire, was discovered by others. A 55-year-old airline pilot from Caroline Springs, Greg Lynn, has been charged over their alleged murders.
NSW has confirmed a fifth person who arrived in the state in recent days is infected with the Omicron variant of concern of COVID-19. In a statement on Thursday evening, NSW Health said genomic sequencing had concluded a fully vaccinated woman from the Central Coast, who arrived in Sydney on Thursday on Qatar Airlines flight QR908 from Doha, had been infected with the new variant. Anyone who was on Thursday’s flight must get tested immediately and self-isolate for 14 days. Earlier today, NSW Health issued a list of exposure sites from shopping trips the woman took last week before recent arrivals from southern Africa were directed to complete 14 days in hotel quarantine. You can read more from Mary Ward and Lucy Carroll here.
- Sarah McPhee reports that the penalty for non-compliance with coronavirus isolation and testing requirements in NSW has been increased five-fold to $5000 for individuals, and doubled to $10,000 for corporations. International arrivals – excluding those from particular countries in southern Africa, who must complete 14 days’ hotel quarantine – will only be able to exit isolation at the end of a 72-hour period after receiving a negative result to a COVID-19 PCR test. “After exiting isolation, people must complete an additional PCR test on day six after arrival and comply with the NSW Health guidelines for recent fully vaccinated arrivals,” the state government said in a media release tonight. The negative test requirement and increased penalties will take effect at 12.01am tomorrow, December 1.
Quarantine rules have also been changed in Victoria for international arrivals, Marta Pascual Juanola and Sumeyya Ilanbey report. All international arrivals other than from the eight countries of concern in southern Africa (South Africa, Lesotho, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Namibia, Eswatini and Malawi) are required to get a PCR test and isolate for 72 hours upon landing. They also have complete additional PCR testing on days 5 and 7.
- Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly says Australia cannot keep out the Omicron coronavirus variant indefinitely, Nick Bonyhady reports. “We are committed to continue to reopen. That is the advice and decisions that were made at the NSC [National Security Committee of Cabinet] last night. And so that [is] ... a clear statement that we cannot keep this Omicron variant out forever from Australia. Eventually, it will be here. Most importantly now we do what we can to slow down that introduction and all of the measures that have been introduced will assist with that.”
Concerns about the Omicron strain of COVID-19 prompted the federal government to defer the planned reopening of the international border to December 15, Rachel Clun reports. About 200,000 workers and students were expected to start arriving from Wednesday, but top federal ministers reviewed the plan ahead of a national cabinet meeting today and decided to delay the reopening. Travel bubbles with Japan and South Korea have also been suspended for a fortnight. Federal health authorities are considering whether the timing of coronavirus booster shots should be brought forward in response to the Omicron variant. At present, the booster shot is administered at least six months after a person has received a second shot.
- Sex Discrimination Commissioner Kate Jenkins has released her report on the workplace culture of Parliament House. The report makes 28 recommendations for change and you can read more about it from Katina Curtis here. One in three parliamentary staffers who responded to Ms Jenkins’ review said they had been sexually harassed, and the report calls for a new code of conduct for federal MPs and their staff. Ms Jenkins has recommended the code be enforced by an Independent Parliamentary Standards Commission, and she said all parties need to push for gender parity to change the workplace culture within Federal Parliament.
- Ms Jenkins said at a press conference in Sydney earlier today that the report sets out a “practical pathway to deliver change”. “We’re asking the nation’s Parliament to do no more than it expects from all Australian workplaces. At its heart, this report describes how Parliament can create safe, respectful and inclusive working environments to ensure it can attract the best and can deliver the best for us,” she said. “The recommendations are a package; they are mutually reinforcing and complementary, and therefore should not be cherry-picked for implementation. We are recommending that the implementation is phased to ensure that immediate priorities can be progressed while new structures and mechanisms are established.”
- The Victorian government has brokered a deal to secure an extra vote for its pandemic bill, Rachel Eddie reports. Under the existing laws, the state’s chief health officer makes binding health orders under a state of emergency, but the new law proposes to transfer this power to the premier and health minister during a pandemic (as is currently the case in other jurisdictions, such as NSW).
- NSW has recorded 179 new COVID-19 cases and three deaths. Of the state’s population aged 16 and older, 94.5 per cent have received at least one dose of a vaccine and 92.4 per cent are fully vaccinated. There are 160 coronavirus patients in the state’s hospitals, 26 of whom are in intensive care. Meanwhile, Victoria has recorded 918 new cases of COVID-19 and six deaths. That’s down on yesterday’s total of 1007 cases. There are 305 coronavirus patients in Victorian hospitals. Of those, 41 active cases are in intensive care. Nineteen people are on a ventilator. Vaccination rates continue to increase: 91 per cent of residents aged 12 and up are fully vaccinated against COVID-19.
- Felicity Caldwell reports that vaccinations against COVID-19 will be mandatory for Queensland school staff and workers in both state and private schools, early childhood centres, correctional centres, youth detention facilities and airports. Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said the mandate would protect people who could not be vaccinated. “We know that children under 12 cannot access the vaccination and we want to do everything we can to protect these young people,” she said. Workers will be required to have at least one dose by December 17 and be double-dosed by January 23 in time for the start of the 2022 school term. There were no new local cases of COVID-19 reported overnight and two cases detected in hotel quarantine.
- The Northern Territory recorded no new cases of COVID-19 today, while the ACT recorded six cases.
This is Michaela Whitbourn signing off on the blog for today. My colleague Broede Carmody will be back with you early tomorrow morning.