Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

On several occasions we have worked together with the states and territories to combat COVID-19, and on each occasion we have put forward plans in good faith and sought, together, to achieve those plans. Now, that is the right thing to do. And, as we struggled against that COVID-19 pandemic, we set out a program of restrictions that could be eased in different phases as we struggled against the then known variants of the COVID-19 pandemic. But, as we know, as the pandemic has progressed, new and different variants have emerged. These are things that neither I nor the premiers, the chief ministers—indeed, in the great wisdom of the Leader of the Opposition—would have been able to have the foresight to know which turns the pandemic might take.

There is no country in the world today that has been able to predict every movement in this pandemic, but it is the responsibility of governments to respond to the circumstances that we face and to seek to provide a path out. Now, on occasion, the pandemic, the virus, gets the better of those plans. But we will continue to make them and we'll continue to move towards them and implement them and we will encourage Australians to engage with us in that so we can indeed chart our path out. And it may well be the case that further strains of this pandemic may impose further blows. But, I tell you what, Australians will respond. They won't hope for the worst like the Labor Party in this pandemic. They won't seek to take political opportunity of the pandemic.

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