Australia news live update: diplomat says Omicron travel ban ‘discrimination’; Birmingham supports Berejiklian candidacy; NSW transport strike

Victoria’s daily case numbers are once again above 1,000, with 1,073 new infections recorded in the last reporting period.

Sadly, six people infected with the virus have died.

The NSW numbers are out and the state has recorded 208 new Covid-19 cases but no deaths.

I mentioned before that environment minister Sussan Ley has also thrown her support behind the former NSW premier Gladys Berejiklian’s potential candidacy for the federal seat of Warringah; despite the ongoing Icac investigations.

Here she is on ABC a short time ago:

That process will take its course and I don’t want to comment on that process, but what I will say is that just from the people that I represent, they were horrified that this sort of public shaming seemed to be happening on their television screens everyday. So a lot of people reached out to me directly to actually say, “Why is this happening to our premier who’s done so much for us? We’re really quite angry on her behalf.” So I think the feeling is with her, I think she’ll be an outstanding representative and, you know, there’ll be some steps for her to take and processes to go through. But, of course, we’d love to see her in federal parliament.

Host Michael Rowland:

Some people will see that as public shaming, others will see the presentation of cold-hard evidence. We heard the phone taps where she fixed hospital funding for her then boyfriend Daryl Maguire in his seat where she learned about clearly dodgy behaviour but didn’t alert the corruption commission. Do you think it really was just public shaming?

Ley:

What I trust is the voters’ reaction. I was quite surprised with the number of people who came to me and said they really didn’t like this and that’s how they described the process. And, you know, it was pretty awful and it didn’t need to play out in such a way on our TV screens. I don’t think so. But more importantly, I will let that process take its course. I am simply – look, I know Gladys, she’s been an outstanding woman in public life. She has devoted so much of her life to public service, and people understand that and they appreciate that. And they know that she has a contribution to make.

Australia’s travel ban to several southern African countries due to the outbreak of the Omicron variant has been labelled as discriminatory by a senior diplomat, reports Andrew Brown from AAP.

South Africa’s high commissioner to Australia Marthinus van Schalkwyk said the ban needed to be overturned, due to large numbers of Omicron cases being detected in other continents, and not just in parts of Africa.

He told ABC Radio this morning:

We believe it is discrimination, because the only difference is these countries (on the travel ban list) are on the African continent …

The ban is unfair, there is no evidence the ban works, the World Health Organization confirms that.

The travel ban to nine southern African nations was instituted in the wake of the Omicron variant being detected.

The detection of Omicron also led to a two-week delay to the return of visa holders without the need for a medical exemption, which is now set to take place from December 15.

Despite the pause on international arrivals, 250 fully vaccinated students will arrive on Monday in Sydney as part of a NSW government pilot program.

The arrivals will still need to isolate in student accommodation for three days.

There have been 15 cases of Omicron detected in NSW, while two have been identified in the ACT and one in the NT.