Paul Scarr (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

There is no doubt that Australia is in difficult times at the moment. My heart goes out to the communities in Western Sydney, the broader Sydney community and, indeed, the areas across all of Australia where people are subject to lockdowns. We hope and pray that we emerge from this crisis as quickly as possible, as quickly as we can. I want to make a few points in relation to this debate. The first is: the Prime Minister has been absolutely crystal clear that he takes responsibility. He takes responsibility for the current situation and for the early setbacks. I want to quote the Prime Minister:

… I take responsibility for the early setbacks in our vaccination programme. I also take responsibility for getting them fixed and that we are now matching world’s best rates, with more than 1 million doses …

We're actually doing better than that now. As to the latest figures in terms of vaccination rates—and a lot of this has been contributed to by the GPs, the pharmacists and the clinics in New South Wales, many in those areas which Senator Keneally spoke about—in the last three days, one million doses of the vaccine have been given to Australians. That's an extraordinary figure. That means that more than 85 per cent of our over-70s have received one dose of the vaccine; more than 70 per cent of our over-50s have received one dose; and more than 50 per cent of over-16s have received one dose—extraordinary figures.

There has been an extraordinary acceleration in relation to the number of doses given. If we go back, historically, and have a look at the acceleration, we can see it drawn out in stark relief. One million doses took 45 days; going from 13 to 14 million doses only took six days; going from 14 to 15 million doses took three days; going from 15 to 16 million doses took five days; and going from 16 to 17 took three days. We're essentially providing a million doses every three days, which is an extraordinary effort. I really commend all of the health workers and other health professionals who are engaged in that process, and I congratulate all of those Australians who, with the benefit of their own health advice, have made their own determination to come forward and be vaccinated.

It's not only that. We have a national plan, which has four phases, and it is absolutely vital that we stick to that plan. It's absolutely vital that all of the premiers and all of the state governments stick together on the plan that was agreed at national cabinet—the plan that was informed by the best research available to the government, from the Doherty institute, and by economic modelling from Treasury. We need to stick with the plan. It would be extraordinarily disappointing if the rhetoric in this place generated an atmosphere which led or encouraged people to depart from that plan. I was very concerned about some of the rhetoric coming from those opposite in relation to continually looking at case numbers. As the Prime Minister has said, once we hit that 70 per cent vaccination rate, once we hit that 80 per cent vaccination rate, our focus has to shift to those hospitalisation rates and be not so much on those case numbers.

If you look at Israel, which was out there at the forefront and got its people vaccinated more quickly than any other country on the face of the earth, their current COVID case rate is extremely high. In Israel it's in the thousands every day, notwithstanding the fact that they were out there and got their people vaccinated early. But, as is the case in Israel, so will be the case in Australia. We have to be committed to the national plan that was agreed upon, and that means that, once we hit those 70 per cent and 80 per cent vaccination rates, we have to start opening up. We can't continue indefinitely with these lockdowns. It is just not possible. They are taking a toll on our young people and on older people. A mental health toll is being paid by so many people in our community. Small businesses are seeing their life's work destroyed. In the future, we can't continue with lockdowns that just go on indefinitely. Once we get those 70 per cent and 80 per cent vaccination rates—and we're achieving remarkable outcomes at the moment—we have to start to open up.