Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

in New South Wales or elsewhere in this suppression phase, bringing forward the doses, hundreds of thousands, whether they be in New South Wales, Queensland or Victoria. Moderna has now, of course, had TGA approval, and that was announced by the health minister and Professor Skerritt, and those first doses will come in September. There are the mental health supports that we are providing not just in New South Wales but also in Victoria—over $17 million of urgent mental health support in New South Wales, done with the New South Wales government, with over $12½ million directly from the federal government, similar to what we did in Victoria during their long lockdown last year. COVID-19 Assist has 581 ADF deployed in New South Wales right now. The economic supports continue to flow through the COVID disaster assistance payment, and I commend those at Services Australia and also those working in Service NSW who are delivering the business payments which we are sharing the cost of.

So, for those who are affected by those lockdowns, particularly in New South Wales, the challenge is to stay at home and to get vaccinated—234,899 doses yesterday; 1.36 million doses in seven days. That is the mark of a program that has been turned around, the mark of a program that has had its challenges for all the reasons we have gone into but that the government has addressed and has turned around and is ensuring that those dosage rates are hitting the levels that are necessary to get this job done. That's 14 million doses we are now closing in on this week. Forty-five per cent of the population had their first dose.

We need to enter phase B strong and we need to not squander the great gains that have been made by Australians as we go into phase B. We must not give up in the fight against delta. This government will never do that. And we will continue to support Australians as we take them through and out of this crisis.

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