CORONAVIRUS —
INTERSTATE AND INTERNATIONAL BORDER RESTRICTIONS —APPLICATIONS
892. Hon COLIN TINCKNELL to the minister representing the
Minister for Police:
(1) How many
applications has the government received from people seeking to enter WA on
compassionate grounds since the hard border closure was implemented?
(2) How many of these applications
received approval to enter WA?
(3) Is the
government aware of how many people have entered WA without making a formal
application?
Hon
STEPHEN DAWSON replied:
I thank the honourable member for
some notice of this question. The following answer has been provided to me by
the Minister for Police. The Western Australia Police Force advises the following.
(1)–(2) As
part of its response to protecting the community from COVID-19, the Western Australia
Police Force gave priority to developing processes that allowed the timely
processing of applications for entry. The first five months of managing entry
to the state were based on ensuring the systems and processes were in place to
assist the Western Australian community. The G2G PASS has been critical to this
process and placed Western Australia ahead of other states. The priority was to
keep the community safe and support the State Emergency Coordinator and the
police to manage the borders rather than to collect data. Now the state has
systems, processes and procedures in place, the WA Police Force is looking at
data collection options that do not require daily manual counting.
(3) Travellers
are encouraged to apply prior to entry into Western Australia on G2G PASS or
the ''WA Entry'' application. Applications are regularly made and
assessed upon presentations at border arrival points—airports, ports and
road borders. Statistics are not recorded on the number of persons presenting
before making an application.