Sky News Live - Interview with Laura Jayes
Subjects: school closures in NSW, vaccination rollout.
LAURA JAYES:
Well, there are thousands of parents’ home schooling at the moment, and they are hoping for a bit of relief today when we hear from the Premier, Gladys Berejiklian, at 11am as New South Wales goes into a prolonged lockdown. Joining me live now is Alan Tudge. He's the Minister for Education and Youth. Minister Tudge, thanks so much for your time. You are the Federal Minister, the New South Wales Minister obviously makes some decisions around this, but do you have any good news for parents in New South Wales today?
ALAN TUDGE:
I'm not aware of what's going to be announced by the Premier today. I do hope that schools can be opened as quickly as possible, but obviously they’ve got to take into account the risk of COVID running throughout Sydney as well. We are aware there's going to be a lockdown for a further four weeks. I just hope we can get the schools open because if kids not only miss schooling, in many instances, if they're not at school - but it's also so damaging to their mental health as well. We particularly saw that in Victoria where kids lost almost six months of schooling last year and this year from lockdowns - we certainly don't want to see that repeated anywhere else.
LAURA JAYES:
Yeah, Minister, what have we learned from that? And what have we learned how to get around it? If there are outbreaks, is there a way that we can get kids to school regardless?
ALAN TUDGE:
I think we do need to have a proportionate response. And I'm hoping, certainly from the Victorian perspective, that if we ever have to have any further lockdowns in the future that there is a proportionate response in relation to closure of schools; and, only needing to close those schools, for example, where, where the virus is active and being able to keep schools open where it is not. But this Delta variant is different to previous variants, it does seem to have been infecting kids more than the previous variants had. So obviously, the health advisors take that into account when providing their advice to the premiers in making those decisions.
LAURA JAYES:
Would you endorse a plan that saw children go back to school in the Central Coast area? Or the Illawarra? Or the Blue Mountains? Anywhere outside of those five hotspot areas?
ALAN TUDGE:
I just don't want to second guess…what the Premier is going to announce today, and I don't have all the data in front of me either, which they have. I just think we do need to have in mind, in terms of making these decisions, the very significant impacts that school closures can have on students - not only in terms of their learnings, but equally in terms of their mental health. And we certainly saw that in Victoria with those prolonged lockdowns last year and this year.
LAURA JAYES:
Why aren't teachers being vaccinated as a priority?
ALAN TUDGE:
Well many teachers can get vaccinated already. Certainly, if you're above 40, go and get your vaccine, go, and get vaccinated today, and I would encourage everybody to do that. Of course, if you're below 40, teachers are still eligible to go and get vaccinated with the AstraZeneca vaccine and they should speak to their GP about the risks associated with that, and I’d certainly be encouraging them to do that.
LAURA JAYES:
Okay, but you’re not making it any easier. I mean, we saw in New South Wales that frontline workers at supermarkets were going to be prioritised when it comes to the vaccine. Would you like to see a similar kind of approach for teachers? And can't you help with that?
ALAN TUDGE:
Well, at the end of the day, those priorities are determined by the National Cabinet on advice from the Chief Medical Officers. And to date, they haven't prioritised, they haven't changed their priority listings. But I just do emphasise that so much of the teaching workforce can be vaccinated already and that, indeed if you are below 40, you still have that opportunity to go and get vaccinated today with the AstraZeneca, having consulted with your GP to understand those risks.
LAURA JAYES:
Well, okay. Well, hopefully that does happen today. The vaccine rollout, we're told, is ramping up. We're getting 250,000 doses of Pfizer a week in New South Wales. There’s eight million people here. Could be ramped up even further, couldn't it?
ALAN TUDGE:
Well, we’ve been very rapidly ramping up the vaccination rate as you’d know. Today, it’s almost 11.5 million people have been vaccinated at least once, and that’s now increasing by more than a million people per week. The most vulnerable group in the society are the elderly, and amongst the elderly, we’ve got a very high proportion of those above 70 who have been vaccinated now and we’re increasing those rates every single week. So, we’re starting to get into a very good position and certainly by the end of the year we want to be in that great position where everybody’s had that chance to be vaccinated.
LAURA JAYES:
Yeah look we don’t want to go over the history too much and look, I disagree that it is a significant ramp up. But it’s certainly getting better. We see a number of articles from the health industry, we also see some in The Guardian today that really point the finger at the department taking a business as usual approach when it came to vaccine procurement. This is important, isn’t it? We really sat on our hands for too long and that’s why we’re in this situation.
ALAN TUDGE:
Well, I think you said it – we don’t need to go over the past history there. We have got massive doses of Pfizer coming through. We do have a supply of AstraZeneca which is there, already. And those vaccine rates are ramping up very, very rapidly. It was well over a million last week and if we start to track at a million per week, which we have been, very quickly get through the remaining population that wants to get vaccinated. And of course, our message is to everybody, is do go and get vaccinated because that really is going to be the ticket for us to be able to get back to normality.
LAURA JAYES:
Okay. Alright. Well yes, we hope so indeed. Now, a couple of weeks ago, before this outbreak here in New South Wales, the New South Wales Treasurer did put a plan to you to get university overseas students back into New South Wales; what is going on with that plan at the moment? Is it officially on ice?
ALAN TUDGE:
So that plan was a very good one. We’d looked at that closely and that was almost ready to be executed to be honest, Laura. Now, obviously there has been a pause to that, due to the present lockdowns in Sydney. We would still like to get international students back as quickly as possible, but it has to be done in a safe manner. And obviously, given the lockdowns, that has been paused by the New South Wales Government while they’re prioritising other things. We've always had the number one priority being the health and safety of Australians and I think that's quite right. But we do want to see international students back at some stage.
LAURA JAYES:
Yeah, so this is an indefinite pause at this stage? You know, are you looking at it needing to be, you know, a month free of any community transmission before you'd revisit this or what is it?
ALAN TUDGE:
Well, those decisions as to when any pilots might start would be up to the respective state governments in consultation with those universities having been effectively ticked off at the federal level. Now, South Australia, for example, was the first cab off the rank in terms of having a plan developed, a very modest one, and of which we had said that this meets all the criteria which we had set. It is now up to them in terms of the timing of that. Now, they were hoping to do that of course, this year.
Listen, the last few weeks, I think has interrupted many, many plans. And clearly the major focus now is getting back on top of that Delta variant so it can open up the economy. But then, from my perspective, I'd certainly like to see some of those pilots up and running later in the year, if we can.
LAURA JAYES:
Yeah, seems a while away at this point, I've got to say. Alan Tudge, thanks so much. You've been through this in Victoria; now Sydney’s going through it. Thanks so much.
ALAN TUDGE:
Thanks very much, Laura.