The head of Australia's Tourism Industry Council says he's confident a bubble arrangement with New Zealand can be worked out, but admits "perhaps we were a bit ahead of ourselves".
Quarantine-free travel from New Zealand to Australia is currently on hold after three community Covid-19 cases were identified in New Zealand this week, and travellers from Australia coming to New Zealand have, as yet, not been allowed to enter without undergoing managed isolation.
Australia is New Zealand's largest source of tourism, and New Zealand is Australia's second-largest, behind China.
The Australian government yesterday extended their pause on quarantine-free arrivals from New Zealand for three more days due to the current testing and investigation going on around the Pullman Hotel cases.
Speaking to Breakfast from Melbourne this morning, Australian Tourism Industry Council chief executive Simon Westaway said the two countries have tried to get a reciprocal bubble working, but it's never quite lined up.
"It's a win-win - but timing's critical," Westaway said.
"I just feel as though we've probably just got to sit down as governments, as an industry collectively and work out how we're going to make this work over the coming weeks, so we can get somewhere towards the middle of this year, because that now seems to be the sort of timing we have to work towards.
"It's a bit frustrating, and maybe we got a little bit ahead of ourselves on both sides of the ditch mid last year - the virus just continues on."
Westaway said the bubble arrangement remains a very worthwhile thing to pursue.
"Australia and New Zealand are so well placed - you've got that beautiful three hour and a bit travel between west coast Australia and New Zealand and I just think we've got to work at it a bit harder.
"It's not that we as a country don't want this to work, in fact we've in fact in essence allowed that to occur for the last three months."
He said the bubble needs to be reciprocal for it to be commercially viable for the flights to start up again.
"We can't have 14 days quarantine at both ends if we want a legitimate bubble - it won't work - it's about seamless travel, but it's got to be safe travel."
About two million Australians visited in New Zealand in 2019 before the pandemic began, Westaway said, with many of them choosing to visit places like Queenstown.
Meanwhile, the loss of the Chinese tourism market in Australia is leaving an economic hole to the tune of $12.4 billion per year.
"We're definitely missing the income, there's no question about that," Westaway said.
"Increasingly, most Australians don't want to go inter-state at the moment - it's a real trying situation if you get there and then have to self-quarantine - we're seeing domestic air travel down by 80 per cent, even this far in."
Westaway said he can't see a situation where a reciprocal travel bubble is arranged between New Zealand and Australia sooner than a few months from now.
"That said, we can get through these patches and hotspots."
SHARE ME