Internal Passports? How Very Soviet

[davidgillon]

Unfortunately I'm not making it up. Boris and his chum Gove have decided that the way to ensure they don't have 7000 heavy goods lorries queuing through Kent to get to Dover is to stop them entering Kent unless they have a "Kent Access Permit". To make it worse, the system to issue them, and do all the other new post Brexit customs stuff, won't go into public beta until late November, or possibly December, despite needing to be live on 1st January. This is all part of their strategy for insuring we won't have an internal border through the Irish Sea come Brexit going live. Whoops.

I'm particularly worried that given Gove's involvement, as Education Minister he expressed a wish for all schools to be 'better than average', they'll have forgotten you can't get to Medway (where I live), without going through Kent, and that they won't have scaled Smart Freight, the new export control software suite, for all the traffic trying to get into Kent without actually wanting to go to Europe.

Twitter is finding #KentBorder a source of great hilarity. My personal contribution was to declare that it was time for the Cinque Ports to reassert their traditional leadership and international dominance.

*Headdesk* *Headdesk* *Headdesk* *Headdesk* *Headdesk*

Comments

[lilysea]

I have no problem at all with internal passports or permits to reduce the spread of COVID - since COVID Australian citizens/Australian permanent residents can't legally enter many states in Australia without a permit arranged days or weeks ahead of time (for my state the turn around for entry permits is currently around 6 business days from the date of your application) [1], and you can only get a permit if you meet the criteria and haven't been within a COVID "hot zone" within the previous 14 days.

But what you describe seems utterly nonsensical...

[1] "The G2G PASS initiative

A State of Emergency has been declared for the whole of Western Australia (WA), and Directions have been given by the State Emergency Coordinator under the Emergency Management Act 2005 (WA) which prevent a person from travelling into WA unless they are an exempt traveller, and which impose quarantine requirements on persons who are permitted to enter WA.

A State of Emergency has also been declared for the whole of Tasmania, and Directions have been issued by the State Controller under the Emergency Management Act 2006 (Tas) requiring non-essential travellers into Tasmania to quarantine for 14 days.

The G2G PASS is an initiative of the Western Australia Police Force (WA Police) in response to the Directions in force in WA. Working closely with the Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development, the Department of Transport, and supported by Nous Group and GenVis, the G2G PASS was built to help WA Police Force manage and enforce the Directions in force in WA whilst ensuring the impact on essential services and the WA economy is limited. Some people really do need to be on the road, and an entirely digital solution is the best way to make that happen quickly and efficiently.

Capability has been added to G2G PASS to allow for management of travellers into Tasmania in accordance with the Directions in place in Tasmania."

[davidgillon]

Yeah, I've been looking at the Australia situation with a "Seriously?" side-eye for a while. It's the not letting the Aussies stuck abroad back in that's seemed particularly harsh, though there's been more than enough internal idiocy to go round.

[lilysea]

It's the not letting the Aussies stuck abroad back in that's seemed particularly harsh, though there's been more than enough internal idiocy to go round.

We ARE letting people back into Australia - it's just that we can only cope with so many people in the quarantine hotels at any one time without letting COVID escape out into the general community

We just reached 160 days since our last case of community transmission in my state, and that's because of the quarantine hotels, and because we're slowing the number of returnees to a manageable number

We could let more people back in if the Federal government chipped in some money, but at the moment the states are paying for all the quarantine of overseas returnees [even tho legally it's a Federal responsibility] and the states only have so much money...

though there's been more than enough internal idiocy to go round.

...I've been regarding Britain's response with abject horror.

Letting people go on overseas holidays during a pandemic!

and come back and not quarantine at home for 14 days!

Subsidising people to go to restaurants when there is community transmission!

Getting Serco to stuff up doing COVID tests!

[davidgillon]

We ARE letting people back into Australia - it's just that we can only cope with so many people in the quarantine hotels at any one time without letting COVID escape out into the general community

What I can't understand is there's a simple solution, open up the Bare Bases: Scherger, Learmonth and Curtin, which should immediately gives you accommodation for about 6000 in reasonably remote locations. At least two of them have even been used as detention centres in the past and they have the runways to take international flights.

...I've been regarding Britain's response with abject horror.

So have we!

[lilysea]

What I can't understand is there's a simple solution, open up the Bare Bases: Scherger, Learmonth and Curtin, which should immediately gives you accommodation for about 6000 in reasonably remote locations. At least two of them have even been used as detention centres in the past and they have the runways to take international flights.

The State premiers have actually been pushing HARD for this solution

the Federal government has been saying no

because the Federal government would have to pay for it

[as opposed to the moment, when the states are paying almost the entire cost of quarantine accommodation; security guards; medical staff; PPE; medical supplies, apart from the $3000 Australian the returned travellers are paying]

I think we'd be much, MUCH better off using a dedicated quarantine facility/facilities

than an adhoc solution of commercial hotels WHICH STILL HAVE NON QUARANTINE HOTEL GUESTS STAYING IN THEM ON OTHER FLOORS OF THE HOTEL

For starters, there have been multiple incidents where people snuck out of quarantine

- one guy propped open a fire exit door with a brick and left quarantine on 6 separate days, and caught trains, buses and taxis

- another guy climbed out of the hotel balcony using a ladder someone else brought him

We actually have a facility, Rottnest - an island about 23 kilometres off the coast of Perth with lots of holiday cottages - which we used for quarantining families with young kids and other people under 50 early on [no one over 50 or with preexisting medical conditions], but then there were concerns about the response time for possible medical emergencies since the nearest hospital is a boat ride + an ambulance ride once you get to shore.

One of the problems is many of the state premiers are ALP [our centre-sort-of-leftish party], but our Prime Minister is currently LNP [equivalent to Tory/Republican]. So the Prime Minister wants premiers to look bad because he thinks it will help him get re-elected - especially since he fucked up the bushfires so badly that his only hope is to try to convince people he's done better handling COVID than the premiers have.

[davidgillon]

he fucked up the bushfires so badly that his only hope is to try to convince people he's done better handling COVID than the premiers have.

Sounds familiar. Don't think he's getting any votes from the people stuck overseas!

[vass]

as Education Minister he expressed a wish for all schools to be 'better than average'

What's his district, Lake Wobegon?