The council continues to receive desperate calls from local businesses hit hard by Victoria’s restrictions, and called for support for NSW border businesses.
As of Thursday, June 10, Melburnians were still unable to travel to regional Victoria, and Victorian border region residents who wished to travel into NSW were permitted to travel into the NSW border bubble zone only.
Mayor Chris Bilkey said these restrictions wiped out key business for the NSW operators in towns like Moama and Barham.
“All decisions surrounding these outbreaks seem to disregard that border NSW and its nearby towns are greatly affected every time there is an outbreak in Victoria,” he said.
“Our NSW border region services a Victorian market, and has done for a long time, so it baffles belief that our region is just lumped in with the rest of NSW in the government’s approach to each new health alert.
“We hear about the unenviable situation the Victorian businesses have been plunged into, but who is considering the enormous impact these restrictions have on the businesses just north of the border?
“Federally, JobKeeper kept local businesses afloat, but now they are sinking.”
Despite an easing of restrictions for metropolitan Melbourne overnight, a 25 km travel limit has been imposed to restrict travel into regional Victoria, delivering a crushing blow to the Echuca-Moama tourism industry ahead of the Queen’s Birthday long weekend.
“We are heading into what was a fully-booked long weekend for local tourism operators to now have a wave of cancellations,” Cr Bilkey said.
“We are calling on the NSW Government to invest in targeted relief to help ease the pressures and costs of keeping border businesses open while these restrictions are in place.”
Member for Murray Helen Dalton wrote to both Prime Minister Scott Morrison and federal treasurer Josh Frydenberg on Wednesday requesting urgent financial support for those impacted by the NSW-Victoria travel restrictions.
“Melbourne businesses are receiving financial support from the Federal Government; however, communities in regional Victoria and NSW that rely on trade from Melbourne have lost just as much income,” she said.
She also contacted NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian requesting assurance that the border would not be closed if there were no COVID-19 cases identified in the border region.
“Communities like Echuca-Moama live as one, and the effective imposition of a closed border (through the combination of Victorian stay-at-home restrictions and NSW health guidelines) has ground everyday life to a halt on both sides,” she said.
“While the border bubble offers some relief, it does not take into account that for many NSW border businesses, their chief source of trade comes from deeper in Victoria.
“Some accommodation providers have been brought almost to a standstill.”
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