We’ll conclude our Australian rolling coverage of Covid-19 developments here. Thank you for your company and correspondence, commendations and criticisms, all of it a welcome and vital part of our community’s discussion.
Tonight in Australia:
More than 6,753 cases have been recorded, with fewer than 1,100 still active.
South Australia has gone more than a week without any new infections. The ACT has zero active cases.
The death toll is 92: NSW, 42; Victoria, 18; Tasmania, 13; WA, 8; Queensland, 4; SA, 4; ACT, 3.
The latest death was that of an 86-year-old Tasmanian woman, thought to be linked to the Ruby Princess outbreak
Twenty-one of the deaths were passengers on the Ruby Princess cruise ship, four were on the Artania in WA and 12 were residents at the Newmarch House aged care home in Sydney.
More than 566,000 tests have been conducted across the country.
More than 3 million people have registered with the federal government’s tracking app CovidSafe since Sunday.
On restrictions, closures and suppression measures:
National cabinet wants to see 20 or fewer cases a week before Australia further eases restrictions.
Australia’s borders won’t reopen for at least three months, the federal government says.
Prime minister Scott Morrison has indicated a mid-May national cabinet meeting will assess lifting some social and economic restrictions.
Initial jobkeeper payments – part of a $130bn package – will be received by employers soon.
Australian manufacturers will get $48.3m in federal government funding to help modernise their operations and create 2,600 new jobs.
In NSW from Friday, households will be allowed two adult visitors, and their children, under an initial easing of self-isolation measures. Most beaches are open for exercise, swimming and surfing only.
In WA, up to 10 people are able to gather for non-contact recreational activities and outdoor personal training, while open homes and display villages will also be permitted.
In Queensland, some stay-at-home restrictions will be eased this weekend, allowing people to travel 50km from their residence to visit parks, have picnics and jet ski. Shopping for non-essential items will also be permitted.
Victoria has no plans to lift restrictions until May 11 at the earliest.
South Australians with coronavirus isolating at home will receive daily support from two new dedicated teams of GPs and nurses via telephone.
NSW students will attend school one day a week starting from May 11. Queensland will on May 15 review keeping children at home. No change has been flagged in Victoria. Western Australia hopes all students will return to classes by May 11 while 63% of students have gone back in SA.
Still open: supermarkets, pharmacies, banks, public transport, some schools, hairdressers, petrol stations, postal and freight services, bottle shops, newsagents, retail shops. Restaurants restricted to takeaway/delivery in most states.
In other developments:
A report into the northwest Tasmania coronavirus outbreak says the most likely cause was the Ruby Princess cruise ship.
Victoria has recorded a new cluster of Covid-19 cases at a nursing home.
One million Australians are expected to apply for unemployment benefits due to job-losses stemming from the disease.
A flight from India will bring more than 100 Australians back to WA on Friday.
The Guardian’s international liveblog continues here:
States, community organisations, and faith groups come to the rescue of those in Australia excluded from federal government Covid-19 assistance: international students, working holiday makers, asylum seekers and refugees.
The best bit about this story is that Victoria's deputy chief health officer studied at James Cook University. The rest of it... I just can't believe what we choose to get worked up about, these of all days. https://t.co/ZUq7KKAbfF
A police officer and her partner have been charged with breaching the regional coronavirus travel restrictions in Western Australia.
The pair are alleged to have driven across district lines from the Wheatbelt to the Perth/Peel region on 9 April and again on 15 April, without a lawful exemption.
Under the Prohibition on Regional Travel directions, you can only travel between regions for work or education, for care or compassionate reasons, to carry freight, or because you have another reasonable excuse.
“It is alleged, on both occasions the man driving the vehicle was advised by police he was not an exempted traveller and was given a direction to turn around,” a spokeswoman from WA Police said.
“It is further alleged the man failed to comply with this direction and immediately continued beyond the police checkpoint.”
The 24-year-old man was charged with two counts of failing to comply with a direction and will face court later this month. The police officer, who was off duty, was also charged.
Police said the officer, a 29-year-old Swan View woman, is currently serving in the WA police force but would not be investigated by internal affairs because she had already resigned.
Her resignation was “unrelated to this matter”, police said.
More on the worsening row between Beijing and Canberra.
Trent Zimmerman, Liberal MP for North Sydney, has left the diplomatic niceties at the door, calling the comments of China’s ambassador to Australia, Cheng Jingye, “downright despicable and menacing”.
For context, the rest of Zimmerman’s comments on the issue were more conciliatory, but it’s a long way back from despicable and menacing.
The comments Zimmerman was referencing, were suggestions by Cheng of a potential Chinese consumer boycott of Australia over Canberra’s pushing for an international, independent investigation into the origins of Covid-19.
Cheng told the AFR:
The Chinese public is frustrated, dismayed and disappointed with what Australia is doing now.
I think in the long term ... if the mood is going from bad to worse, people would think ‘Why should we go to such a country that is not so friendly to China?’ The tourists may have second thoughts.
It is up to the people to decide. Maybe the ordinary people will say ‘Why should we drink Australian wine? Eat Australian beef?’.
Here’s Zimmerman at greater length:
The calls for the inquiry are perfectly reasonable. To be honest, I’ve been very disappointed in the response that we’ve had, particularly from the Chinese embassy in Australia. I thought the ambassador’s comments were downright despicable and menacing.
We should have a relationship with China which allows us to raise these issues, and recognising China will always be an important partner for us. It’s the world’s second largest economy, the largest consumer market in their own region. No one is talking about shutting the doors to China.
We want to maintain the person-to-person relationship that we have with China. The relationship needs to be mature enough to be able to raise these issues – occasionally critically and occasionally expressing our differences without affecting the fundamentals of that relationship.
The current dispute is, ostensibly, over Australia leading global calls for an independent, international investigation into the origins of the Covid-19 pandemic, the first-known cases of which emerged in Wuhan, in China’s central Hubei province.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison and foreign minister Marise Payne publicly launched the push last week, amid accusations globally that China initially covered up the seriousness of the virus, costing the world lost precious weeks to prepare and respond.
Morrison has also raised the issue with US president Donald Trump, France’s Emmanuel Macron, and German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
Australia’s proposal has been met with furious ripostes from Beijing, mainly through the embassy in Canberra and the pages of the Global Times.
The backdrop to this particular dispute is a number of long-running issues between Beijing and Canberra, most notably Australia’s decision to exclude Huawei from Australia’s 5G network, China’s continued detention of Australian pro-democracy writer Yang Hengjun, and the overarching issue of Chinese influence in the Australian polity and economy.
This is remarkable. From my colleague Jillian Ambrose in London.
Renewable electricity will be the only source resilient to the biggest global energy shock in 70 years triggered by the coronavirus pandemic, according to the world’s energy watchdog.
The International Energy Agency said the outbreak of Covid-19 would wipe out demand for fossil fuels by prompting a collapse in energy demand seven times greater than the slump caused by the global financial crisis.
The Human Rights Law Centre has called on the federal government to permanently raise social security payments, after it confirmed in the Covid-19 senate inquiry today that the $550 per fortnight coronavirus supplement won’t continue past 24 September.
HRLC’s associate legal director, Adrianne Walters, said it would be cruel for the government to step backwards after effectively doubling the payments for six months.
Walters said:
A good government would ensure that every person has the means to buy nourishing food, keep warm on a cold night, sleep in a safe place and pay for school books and excursions for their kids. This means the Federal Government permanently raising social security payments for all and ending demoralising systems of compliance and penalties.
In response to the COVID-19 crisis, the Government increased Jobseeker and other payments, recognising the unacceptability of a system that forces people to choose between eating and paying rent. A decent standard of living and compassion are values that must be reinserted into our social security system.
On that note, I’ll hand you over to my colleague Ben Doherty.
An FYI for our readers in WA’s great southern region:
Please be advised that the Mount Barker hospital can no longer do Covid-19 testing. If you think you may have symptoms, please attend Albany Hospital. Please respect our frontline medical staff and follow their directions without abuse.
The three new cases among residents at Newmarch House come after the NSW chief health officer, Kerry Chant, said on Wednesday that two additional staff members tested positive to Covid-19.
One of the staff members had been actively working at the home during the lockdown.
Three more residents test positive at Newmarch House
Three more residents of Newmarch House aged care home in Western Sydney have tested positive to coronavirus, Anglicare Sydney says. It brings the number of residents to have tested positive to the infection to at least 37, with 22 staff members also testing positive.
As of yesterday, 12 residents who tested positive have died.
In a statement, Anglicare Sydney says:
The reasons for this are still being investigated and we are working closely with NSW Public Health Unit and an Infectious Diseases Specialist.
Anglicare Sydney would like to thank the Commonwealth and NSW Government for the additional support they are providing at Newmarch House.
Victorian health minister Jenny Mikakos has responded to calls from the state opposition that the deputy chief health officer, Dr Annaliese van Diemen, resign over a tweet.
The Deputy Chief Health Officer is doing an outstanding job protecting Victorians from this deadly pandemic. Criticism from angry MPs is irrelevant to the fight against this virus. #springst
— Jenny Mikakos MP #StayHomeSaveLives (@JennyMikakos) April 30, 2020
This is the tweet:
Sudden arrival of an invader from another land, decimating populations, creating terror. Forces the population to make enormous sacrifices & completely change how they live in order to survive. COVID19 or Cook 1770?
Opposition leader Michael O’Brien said the tweet was a sign that “in Daniel Andrews’ Victoria, left wing views are the main qualification for public office”. We’ll just state, for the record, that van Diemen’s public health qualifications and experience are sound.
The opposition has been calling for the Andrews government to lift restrictions for some time. Victoria and Tasmania are the only states not to announce a loosening of restrictions. The current public health orders in Victoria are due to expire on 11 May.
Labor senator for the ACT Katy Gallagher was asked on the ABC for her reaction to the jurisdiction reporting no new active cases of Covid-19. She says it’s a “fantastic result” but cautioned against calls to lift restrictions and return to in-person schooling.
We are an island in the sea of New South Wales. We can’t close borders in that sense. So there’s still risks that are presented for us as a small jurisdiction.
I know that the current chief minister will be weighing up a whole range of information and advice that’s coming to him. But I think, and in time I would hope to see, some lifting of restrictions and a pathway to go back to as more normal way of living, and certainly as a mum with two kids at home at the moment, that’s getting kids back to school as soon as it’s safe to do so.
Bishop says she has also been surprised at a press conference by the presence of a senior diplomat, as Greg Hunt was yesterday when Andrew Forrest invited the Victorian Chinese consul general to the press conference without the health minister’s knowledge.
Bishop:
It would not be acceptable diplomatic practice to give the government hosting the press conference no notice or little notice of the attendance of a diplomat that hadn’t been invited by the government. So that would not be usual diplomatic practice.
Although I have experienced similar behaviour in the past, and so it’s not unprecedented, it seems to be an unfortunate situation that occurred.
Forrest and other billionaires, notably Kerry Stokes, have told the government to ease to pressure on China. Bishop said she is not privy to government briefings but imagined Scott Morrison was driven by public health concerns.
Meanwhile, former foreign minister Julie Bishop is on the ABC talking about the government’s call for an independent investigation into the origin of the coronavirus, which has upset Beijing.
Bishop says it would be “preferable of course had China led a credible investigation into the origins of coronavirus”.
But clearly China doesn’t want to cooperate with an independent international investigation, and that does make it challenging, not only for Australia, but for other countries that have been affected by coronavirus.
And I think we should scale down the rhetoric, more calm and quiet diplomacy, so that we can understand more about this virus, how it got into human populations and whether decisions could have been taken that would have prevented its spread. So I think that China has a responsibility to support an investigation, if indeed it won’t carry out a credible investigation for the rest of the world itself.
Police in New South Wales have fined five women for allegedly breaching social distancing laws, after a video emerged of the women dancing on TikTok alongside NRL player Nathan Cleary.
But Cleary himself has not been fined.
This statement has been issued by police:
Police have issued PINs to five women after photos and videos were shared on social media allegedly showing a group not complying with social distancing earlier this week.
Officers from Nepean Police Area Command initiated an investigation after photos and videos were shared on social media concerning an incident at a home in Penrith on Saturday 25 April 2020.
Following further inquiries, police this afternoon , issued PINs to five women – aged in their late teens to early 20s – for failing to comply with a Ministerial Direction.
A 22-year-old man, who was filmed in the videos, was spoken to by police. No offence relating to him has been detected; however, he was issued a warning regarding social distancing.
If you haven’t been following this story, firstly, congratulations, and secondly, allow me to fill you in. Cleary is in trouble with the NRL, who fined him $4,000 after learning of the incident. Police said they didn’t fine him because he hadn’t left his house — the women came to him. It was, Cleary said, an impromptu 10-minute stop-off on their way home. But the emergence of the TikTok has cast doubt on that story, because TikTok challenges can take longer than 10 minutes to film.
The Daily Telegraph doorstopped Cleary about it on Wednesday. Literally: their report said he spoke to them “through the crack of his front door”.
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