NZ Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern says New Zealand’s Cabinet has agreed in principle to establish a trans-Tasman bubble with Australia early next year.

It would be conditional on case levels staying low and pending approval by the Federal Government.

On the weekend, New Zealand and the Cook Islands announced a similar travel bubble, letting people travel between the two countries without quarantine.

New Zealand’s decision to allow a travel bubble with Australia follows Queensland’s decision last week to open its border to the country.

All other states had already opened to New Zealand travellers, although Western Australia requires 14 days’ quarantine on arrival.

Since October, New Zealanders have been able to travel to Australia without going into quarantine in certain states, but not the other way around.

In a press conference on Monday, Ms Ardern said New Zealand had to make sure there were contingencies in place in case there was an outbreak in Australia.

“And it’s not a hypothetical. There have been several,” she said.

“We would need to make arrangements to have potentially thousands of New Zealanders brought back to New Zealand in numbers that we wouldn’t be able to facilitate, necessarily, managed isolation.”

More to come.

Source: news.google.com