❓ Dr. Honey questions the Premier about clarifying compensation arrangements for small businesses impacted by COVID-19 shutdowns. The Premier responds that the government is actively working on multiple aspects of the pandemic response, including compensatory measures, and will have more to say shortly.
AnsweredQoN 5Legislative Assembly
QuestionView source ↗
CORONAVIRUS — SMALL
BUSINESS COMPENSATION
5. Dr D.J. HONEY to the Premier:
I have a supplementary question.
Given that we are being told that shutdowns are likely to be the response in
the future, is there any reason that the Premier cannot clarify compensation
arrangements so that businesses can have clarity on the financial impact of
COVID-19 closures?
BUSINESS COMPENSATION
5. Dr D.J. HONEY to the Premier:
I have a supplementary question.
Given that we are being told that shutdowns are likely to be the response in
the future, is there any reason that the Premier cannot clarify compensation
arrangements so that businesses can have clarity on the financial impact of
COVID-19 closures?
AnswerView source ↗
I said that we will have more to
say about that very shortly; I am not sure whether the member listened to the
answer. Obviously we are dealing with multiple things at once. One is to ensure
that our testing regime goes up significantly, and over the course of the last
week or so we have carried out about 50 000 tests, as I understand it. The
second is to come out of lockdown as quickly and safely as we can, and
hopefully I will have more to say about that today. The third is to take
measures to do our best to prevent it occurring again, and the fourth is to
work out what sort of compensatory measures we can put in place. We are doing
all those things at once. There are no easy solutions here. Most governments
have taken a lot longer to do these things than Western Australia has done. We
are the first state in Australia to come out with a recovery plan; I am pretty
sure some states still have not come out with a recovery plan.
We will work through these issues.
The good thing is that because of our management of COVID and our finances, Western
Australia has better financial capacity than other states across Australia. We
will work out what measures we can put in place, bearing in mind that I realise
that whatever we do, the opposition will be critical, but it will be properly
thought through before we do it.
say about that very shortly; I am not sure whether the member listened to the
answer. Obviously we are dealing with multiple things at once. One is to ensure
that our testing regime goes up significantly, and over the course of the last
week or so we have carried out about 50 000 tests, as I understand it. The
second is to come out of lockdown as quickly and safely as we can, and
hopefully I will have more to say about that today. The third is to take
measures to do our best to prevent it occurring again, and the fourth is to
work out what sort of compensatory measures we can put in place. We are doing
all those things at once. There are no easy solutions here. Most governments
have taken a lot longer to do these things than Western Australia has done. We
are the first state in Australia to come out with a recovery plan; I am pretty
sure some states still have not come out with a recovery plan.
We will work through these issues.
The good thing is that because of our management of COVID and our finances, Western
Australia has better financial capacity than other states across Australia. We
will work out what measures we can put in place, bearing in mind that I realise
that whatever we do, the opposition will be critical, but it will be properly
thought through before we do it.
Explore WA Government Data
Search the full archive in the free dashboard, or query programmatically via API.
Explore more
Government Gazette
Appointments, regulatory notices, planning changes.
Hansard
Debates, questions, speeches and sentiment.
Tabled Papers
Reports and documents tabled in Parliament.
Committees
Committee profiles and recent reports.
Regulations
Subsidiary legislation with filters and summaries.
Bills
Proposed laws and parliamentary progress.
Acts
Current WA legislation and summaries.
Explanatory Memoranda
Bills with EMs (text/PDF) available.
Members
MP profiles, party breakdown and rankings.
Pollie Rankings
Data-driven rankings across 19 categories.
Amendment Chains
Track how schemes and regulations evolve over time.