Australia's decision to close its borders to its own citizens was arbitrary and made the country less free than the Eastern Bloc, "where citizens could at least return home", a constitutional law expert says.
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Senior law lecturer at Albury-Wodonga's Charles Sturt University Bede Harris said the inadequacy of state governments' hotel quarantine measures and the Commonwealth's failure to take charge "became a justification for the denial of rights to citizens".
Dr Harris said throughout COVID, Australians have found themselves "at the whim of state and Commonwealth ministers exercising broad powers conferred on them by legislation".
The advocate for constitutional reform said Australia's ban on citizens entering or leaving the country showed why a Bills of Rights is needed.
"There was no public health justification for barring people (including even dual citizens wanting to return) from leaving the country," he said.
"In countries with a Bill of Rights, the courts can intervene to invalidate legislation or the exercise of ministerial discretion under legislation, which cause restrictions of liberties to an extent that is disproportionate to the interests that the infringements serve.
"Such a remedy also removes from governments excuses such as the unavailability of quarantine facilities. The courts could mandate a time frame within which the quarantine system would have to be remedied."
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Dr Harris maintains the closure of state borders was unnecessary, and COVID-control should have been handled at a Commonwealth level, rather than leaving it to states.
"Since there was no correlation between areas in which the virus was spreading and state borders, it followed that the closing of state borders, with all the economic dislocation, waste of resources and cost to human relationships that they caused, was not justified," he said.
"There should instead have been a finely-tuned quarantine system run by the Commonwealth and applied to specific areas identified as having infections above a certain level, often referred to as the 'hot spot' approach."
Dr Harris said quarantine was one of the legislative powers conferred on the federal parliament.
"But the Commonwealth chose not to do that, leaving it to the states to make decisions on border closures based on political rather than epidemiological considerations," he said.
In his book, Constitutional Reform as a Remedy for Political Disenchantment in Australia, Dr Harris argues for constitutional reform and a bill of rights.