Victoria Police Deputy Commissioner Neil Paterson says the head stomp in an arrest on Sunday was an « inappropriate use of force by a police member ».
South Australia will relax its border restrictions with the ACT from midnight tonight — but restrictions on people from New South Wales will remain in place indefinitely.
The Police Commissioner said that from midnight people travelling from the ACT will not have to undertake a 14-day quarantine period when they arrive in SA.
They will also be required to complete an online pre-approval and must declare they have not been to one of the restricted states — NSW and Victoria — in the 14 days before they arrive.
Commissioner Grant Stevens said that for the « foreseeable future », people travelling from New South Wales will still be required to serve the 14-day quarantine period.
He said that there would ideally need to be no community transmission in NSW for at least 14 days for SA to relax border restrictions with that state.
SA Premier Steven Marshall had hinted yesterday that a decision on both ACT and NSW borders was imminent.
« My advice from Health is that [NSW authorities] are doing an exceptional job with contact tracing and they are confident that the situation will improve there to the point that we can lift that 14-day quarantine, » Commissioner Stevens said.
« [However] it is an open-ended time-frame because New South Wales is continuing to identify isolated cases of community transmission.
« We want to see a better situation in terms of community transmission before we relax the restrictions on New South Wales. »
Commissioner Stevens said he remained « optimistic » about New South Wales’ prospects of eliminating community transmission « sooner than later ».
A case of community transmission is where authorities are unable to identify how someone has become infected.
Under the new rules, travellers from the ACT will not be allowed to drive through NSW but will have to fly direct to SA.
« It’s simply not possible for us to be confident that a person driving between ACT and South Australia has not had contact with members of the New South Wales community, » Commissioner Stevens said.
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AEST = Australian Eastern Standard Time which is 10 hours ahead of GMT (Greenwich Mean Time)
