Michaelia Cash (WA, Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Government in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

I thank Senator Hughes for the question. On both the health and economic fronts, Australia has fared far better than most countries when it comes to dealing with COVID-19. What we are now seeing is that it is very pleasing that Australia is again reopening to the world. The incredibly high vaccination rate that we have in Australia has now meant that we can take further steps as a country to safely reopen.

We see, today, South Australia is safely reopening, and certainly the comments that I have had are that it is fantastic to see more and more of the internal borders coming down as states and territories continue to have increased vaccination rates. To all Australians out there who have gone and got themselves vaccinated: we certainly thank you. What we see with the borders coming down and Australia reopening is it's allowing families to reunite. It also has an important economic benefit for businesses, in terms of finding staff and making it easier to do business, as we know, between the states and territories.

The continued safe reopening is important for Australia to continue securing our economic future. Australia's economic recovery, as we know, is gaining pace, with the RBA upgrading its growth forecast for 2022 from 4.25 per cent to 5.50 per cent, and unemployment is set to continually fall to be sustainably with a '4' in front of it. That's why—you've seen the announcement—from 1 December this year we are now welcoming back fully vaccinated eligible visa holders to Australia without them needing to apply for a travel exemption. This means eligible visa holders, including skilled workers, students and humanitarian, temporary, working holiday-makers and provisional family visa holders, will all be able to come to Australia, and that's a good thing. (Time expired)