Highlights
- Prof Dan Murphy says he thinks the borders and mandatory hotel quarantine would remain for some time yet.
- Australia's tourism industry calls for COVID-19 support
- Opening of interstate borders will boost domestic tourism market
Australians are being warned that international travel is unlikely to resume until next year, even as coronavirus vaccines are rolled out.
Australia's Chief Medical Officer, Prof Brendan Murphy says he thinks there will be border restrictions for most of 2021.
"I think that we'll go most of this year with still substantial border restrictions, even if we have a lot of the population vaccinated.
"We don't know whether that will prevent transmission of the virus."
Speaking to the ABC, Tourism and Transport Forum chief executive Margy Osmond says tourism operators need more federal government support because of international border restrictions.
Ms Osmond says the average Chinese visitor to Australia spends an estimated $8500 while in Australia while the everyday Australian on a domestic holiday is probably spending about $1500.
She the sector cannot survive on domestic travel alone, particularly if the state borders keep closing.
"We are going to need additional government support. There's no getting away from that. And I can't say more clearly we can't recover without international borders being open. And we can't survive unless the state border issue is resolved."
"We understand the health priority has to be number one for every government, that's a given. But it also means that if we're going to have a tourism industry in 18 months' time, we are going to have to look at additional government support at both state and federal level."
Prime Minister Scott Morrison says while the percentage varies by region, the domestic tourism industry accounts for about 70 to 80 per cent of the overall tourism industry in Australia.
He believes that as state borders open up so to will the domestic tourism market
