a fine-able offense.
if you ever watched Border Security Australia, you will know it deals almost exclusively with people who lie on their declaration forms, especially as it relates to food items they are bringing in, which often could destroy Australia’s agriculture industry.
naughty, naughty. food confiscated, fine of around US$250.
Normally, yes. But it does carry a potential twelve month prison term.
And by the way I do watch Border Security Australia on occasion - mostly while waiting for the news to come on. No idea how widely it’s broadcast, but anybody who has seen it, knows what a joke the claim that’s been repeatedly made on Freerepublic over recent days, that just because somebody was allowed on a flight to Australia, must mean they had a completely valid visa for entry really is.
11 Jan: Spectator Australia: It’s a win for ‘Novax’ and a win for Australia
by Nick Kestelein
The first win shouldn’t be undervalued; it’s one in a series of wins we sorely need as we try to recover a few Western democratic norms in the coming year. What a good start though, to be reassured that our bureaucrats have a duty to provide due process according to written rules, rather than daily diktats, and that they can be held to account.
But the second win we need is a win for good sense, because things have changed in the last two weeks and paradigms need to shift in response...
Though the situation has changed dramatically, public mindsets have not. It’s terrible that so many Australians found themselves on the losing side of Novak’s legal battle. This is not their fault, but the fault of a blissfully under-informed, biased, sensationalist, and frankly dishonest media. At the time I write this, they’re leaning into it; holding onto the fading hope that a minister will overrule and send Novak home. That minister is a moron if he does...
Our media and politicians have been reckless to stoke division. They need to start explaining to the Australian public that an unvaccinated person, at most, poses a threat to themselves – not the people around them. And that if an unvaccinated person is young and very healthy and has already had and recovered from the virus at least twice before – they aren’t presenting any risk...
https://www.spectator.com.au/2022/01/its-a-win-for-novax-and-a-win-for-australia/
12 Jan: Spectator Australia: Game, set and match to Mr Djokovic
by David Long
Djokovic’s appeal win must be very embarrassing for Scott Morrison, who sanctimoniously lectured us in his tough-man voice: ‘Rules are rules, especially when it comes to our borders. No one is above these rules.’ With those few words, Scot Morrison revealed himself to be a gloating bully quite happy to implicitly defend his Border Force employees who, it seems, had broken far more serious rules by not allowing Novak to obtain legal advice.
And it is particularly sad in a country noted for the ‘fair go’ to find hundreds of people who would still deny Djokovic’s win and the benefit of a law that anyone of us in similar circumstances can use...
In answer to Judge Kelly’s question, ‘What more could he have done?’ quite a few people said he should have got vaccinated, which seems to prove that many Australians do not know that ‘exemption’ means ‘excused from being vaccinated’...
None of it should have happened because there were so many opportunities for the federal government and its various agencies to check Mr Djokovic’s documents before he left Serbia or before he boarded the plane. That would have been one way to pre-empt the problem that unvaccinated players from overseas posed.
Unfortunately, it appears that Morrison’s incompetent government had approved a transfer of responsibility for that final decision to Tennis Australia and the Victorian government, which meant that their control of the visa process had already been compromised. Worse still, the Morrison government knew what rules those two bodies were administering and, despite their caveats during the process, had approved them...
There are many reasons why what Australia has done to Novak Djokovic will remain a canker on our national reputation for giving everyone a fair go for a long time. It would be interesting to know if they received instructions from a minister to do what Justice Kelly said they did. If that is the case, that minister should resign...
PS: If reports are correct that the federal government is investigating Novak to see if he travelled in the 14 days subsequent to his infection with a view to cancelling his visa, it will prove that all that I’ve said above about Morrison’s bullying is correct. It will be nothing less than revenge for his having won the appeal and it’s about time that Morrison retired. He was never suited to the top job and this is just another example of the old saying: ‘It’s not only cream that floats to the top.’
https://www.spectator.com.au/2022/01/game-set-and-match-to-mr-djokovic/