IS THE AIRPORT’S BUREAUCRAT REQUEST TO LOWER OUR QUARANTINE STANDARDS PART OF THE U.S. - AUSTRALIAN FREE TRADE AGREEMENT?
Australian quarantine regulation for international passengers were a “massive overkill” and arrivals should not have put up with long queues at quarantine checkpoints, says the Sydney Airport Corporation chairman, Max “the axe” Moore Wilton.
He called for the Australian Quarantine and Inspection Service’s stringent target of checking at least 80 per cent of all luggage to be eased. “Very clearly we know that 80 per cent of the passengers are not at risk materials, so they AQIS have a regime which is far in excess of the risk, he said. Max “the axe” Moore Wilton a former chief of the Department of the Prime Minister during John Howard’s tenure, complained that delays caused by excessive screening for exotic pests and diseases were one of the three things he had identified that damage Sydney’s reputations as a welcoming city.
“After you collect your bags sometimes people can be in the queue for 30 or 40 minutes after they might have been on a 20 hour flight from Europe. You don’t face this anywhere else in the world. It makes people very frustrated. There needs to be a quarantine regime but it needs to be far more risk assessed.”
He said only people who declared that they were carrying food products or banned items, or had travelled to areas considered a quarantine risk, should have mandatory baggage checks. For those who said they were not carrying anything risky, there should be only random checks. “Obviously you need to have random checking to make certain people are telling the truth but you don’t treat people (as if they) are in truth lying to you after they say they are bringing in any product,” he said.
A quarantine spokesman Carson Creagh, said the service could not and would not rely simply on declarations. “We are aware of delays and infrastructure problems at Sydney Airport and, while we sympathise with passengers, we make no apology for our role in managing the risk of exotic pests and diseases that could be carried in passengers’ baggage.”
The National’s leader in NSW, Andrew Stoner, said Max Moore Wilton was putting airport profits ahead of bio-security. “I can understand it’s certainly in the interest of Max Moore Wilton and Macquarie Airports to have more people move faster through Sydney International Airport but it’s not in the interests of rural communities to have any increase in the risk of exotic diseases entering Australia,” Mr. Stoner said. “I think a lot of city people don’t understand. We are talking about a $9 billion agriculture sector in NSW alone that is at risk on a daily basis from exotic diseases.”
The quarantine services 80 per cent intervention target was set by the Howard Coalition Government after a foot-and-mouth disease outbreak in Britain in 2001.
One fifth of quarantine breaches were committed by people who had not declared anything and Australian passengers accounted for 20 per cent of all infringements, Mr. Creagh said.
Max Moore-Wilton said that other factors creating negative experience for passengers arriving in Sydney were a lack of taxis during peak hour and an overcrowded and expensive airport rail service. How hypocritical of Max “the axe” Moore-Wilton where his Macquarie Bank owned Sydney Airport charges an arm and a leg for the use of their car park, in fact their charges are the most expensive world-wide.
We could be forgiven for believing that Max Moore-Wilton and the Macquarie Bank are fulfilling the United States - Australia Free Trade Agreement by demanding the lowering of our quarantine standards which was signed off with the Bush Government by the Howard-Vaile Liberal-National Coalition. In fact we believe that our Quarantine Services (AQIS) should upgrade their passenger search to 100 per cent not 80 per cent which Mr. Creagh admits is the present procedure.
We cannot afford the slightest risk to our $9 billion NSW agriculture sector. The Australian Federal Government must not compromise our Quarantine regulations.