Richard and Matthew provide an update on the Brisbane lockdown, the rollout of the COVID vaccine in Australia, the travel bubble between Australia and New Zealand, the end of JobKeeper and what’s happening with BROWNS.

Transcript

– Welcome to BROWNS TV.

– Hey, I’m Matthew White.

– And I’m Richard Brown.

– This is episode two.

– Why did I look at you when I introduced my name?

– Because you wish you were me. So… Episode two, today, we guys, gonna give an update about what’s happening with the COVID vaccine rollout, some interesting news and the happening federally as well. But let’s talk, firstly, about the Brisbane lockdown is finally over.

– Yes.

– So Brisbane went into a snap three-day lockdown. There was some community transmitted COVID in the capital of Queensland. However, The Queensland Government got on things pretty quickly. They tracked and traced all cases including one interesting one in the Gold Coast.

– Yes, it’s those tradespeople that you gotta watch out for. Especially when they’ve got evening work in the entertainment industry.

– If you don’t know what we’re talking about, google it.

– It’s a very funny story.

– There are some restrictions still in place such as pubs and clubs. You are not allowed to dance at the moment. That’s fine because we can’t dance anyway.

– I can’t?

– No, you can’t. So, vaccine rollout Richard, where are we up to?

– We are behind schedule.

– Yeah, fair bit.

– A lot.

– The target was to have 4 million vaccination jabs by the end of March and we have a little bit under a million. So we’ve got about 3 million vaccination jabs of catch-up and that all needs to be done within the next three and a half weeks to achieve the 4 million target, by the end of April. The government has made a commitment to ensuring that we do achieve this target by increasing the number of vaccination centers. I think many, including people from government, are confident that this can be achieved, but it needs a little bit more urgency. So hopefully this will help out the situation immensely.

– Yeah, but they’re still committed to the 30th of October deadline to have everyone vaccinated which is quite important, ’cause obviously that would help international travel to Australia. But speaking of international travel…

– Really good news announced today. New Zealand opening up to Australia both ways that there will be quarantine-free travel between the two countries.

– Yeah, absolutely amazing news. So we can now travel to our cousins across the ditch to go see New Zealand and New Zealand to Australia. And possibly maybe we can teach our New Zealand neighbors how to speak Australian English properly.

– And they can teach us how to play rugby.

– We need it. So on other news, as you may know, JobKeeper, this is an Australian wage subsidy during COVID to help some businesses out, is now officially over. This will no doubt impact our sector. Richard, I’m getting a lot of questions from our agents and partners about what’s happening with BROWNS. So I’m just gonna ask you upfront. Do I have a job next week?

– Yes Mr. White, you do have a job next week. I think it’s quite timely because there has been some fantastic support of our industry like many other industries until the end of March. But unfortunately the government has not continued any industries specific support particularly for education like they have for the aviation industry. So I think a lot of questions are being raised about international education. And in terms of what’s been done to ensure that providers can trade through this period. I think it’s now coming down to the provider. So it’s about what we are going to do with our partners to look at opportunities whether it be consolidation of footprints, whether it be working with different partners to look at how you can get more operational efficiencies. I think it’s just the time where we have to recalibrate our organizations to look at how we can be leaner and how we can endure this pandemic because you know, it is lasting longer than expected. It is the one year anniversary last month. So I think BROWNS’s always looked at different ways and creative ways of how we can work through challenges over the last 18 years. And it’s something that we’re very proud of, how we rise up and overcome these challenges as a team but also with your support as our very close partners. So I just wanna thank you so much for everything you’ve done to stay committed, to stay loyal to BROWNS during this difficult period. And we’re thinking of you and your families all the way through it. And we look forward to seeing borders reopening. Realistically, I don’t see students coming back into the country until next year.

– Yeah. So probably 2022 is our guesstimate at this moment. Of course there’s no official government announcement yet. You should always follow government advice for that information. However, we have a lot of applications still for this year. We might suggest, probably deferring those till 2022. So just please keep an eye on applications that you may have sent. However, we will, of course work with our partners for the best interests of everyone as well. So more importantly, I still have a job.

– Yes, you do.

– Yeah.

– And on that note, thank you very much for listening. It’s great to be [communicating] with you and we miss you immensely and love you.

– Bye for now.

– Bye, love you too.