TAKING HEROIC DOSES OF WHATEVER’S GOING SINCE 1986 The Byron Shire Echo • Volume 36 #11 • August 25, 2021 • www.echo.net.au
Local biz call for more assistance
Food available for the needy
Aslan Shand Getting basic food and supplies onto local tables is the key driver for the reopening of the Mulllumbimby Community Food Box this Thursday, August 26 from 9.30 till 11.30am at the Uniting Church, 32 Dalley Street. The Food Box supplies a mixture of cheap and free wholesome food, including bread, fruit and vegies.
Paul Bibby Byron’s coastal tourism operators have been forced to ask Council for significant rent reductions and licence extensions owing to a dramatic, COVID-related downturn in business. Six businesses, including three surf schools, a kayak tour operator, a horse riding tour operator and a surf shop have all written to Council asking for help to keep their operations afloat. Councillors will vote on these requests when the matter comes before this week’s full Council meeting. The staff report contained within the meeting agenda reveals that a combination of international border closures and the reluctance of domestic visitors to pay for coastal tourism activities has resulted in ‘the quietest winter trade in 14 years’. In a letter supporting the kayak operator’s application, Destination North Coast also said that many businesses appeared to have received little if any benefit from State Government’s Dine and Discover voucher program. ‘Anecdotal feedback indicates that many of the targeted businesses are not benefitting as intended,’ the organisation’s General Manager, Michael Thurston, said. ‘As a result, it remains a big challenge for products such as these to attract and convert sales from the domestic market. ‘Ensuring that they remain viable throughout this period until international tourists return is vital for the rebuilding process.’ ▶ Continued on page 3
Bruns biz kicks off support initiatives ▶ p7
Masks required Food Box co-ordinator Gill Lomath has asked anyone coming to the Food Box to follow COVID-19 safety protocols of mask wearing and social distancing to ensure everyone’s safety. ‘This is quite a risk for us, as we have a reduced number of volunteers. Not all our folk are yet fully vaccinated and most are elderly’, Gill told The Echo. ‘But we feel we should try to help those who are finding it difficult to put food on the table, especially those with children. We know our service is really important, especially right now’.
Gill and Barry Lomath with Edie Trotter. Photo Jeff ‘Foodie Since 1086 Oops 1986’ Dawson
Nats rejects Labor’s call for border checkpoint With Sydney COVID-19 cases increasing, and the Sydney lockdown extending until the end of September, local Labor MP, Justine Elliot, called on fellow Liberal and Nationals State MPs to support a border checkpoint ‘to keep our community safe and to protect local jobs and businesses’. Ms Elliot says 17,000 locals have signed the petition to enact the checkpoint. Yet bipartisan support appears unlikely, ‘owing to a range of legal and regulatory issues’, according to Nationals MLC Ben Franklin, who backed his leader, John Barilaro, on the issue. Mr Barilaro said, in a COVID-19 briefing last week, that ‘moving the border
Nyck Jeanes stood down as BayFM President ▶ p9
becomes another cliff edge for another community’. This is despite Labor claiming the Qld Government ‘offered this proposal to NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian, who, to date, has unfortunately refused it’. Mrs Elliot added, ‘The Qld Premier has said she’s written to the NSW Premier offering to start negotiations about the issue, and the NSW Premier wrote back, refusing to take up the offer’. ‘The fact is that governments can do anything if they have the will to do it’. Mr Franklin told The Echo, ‘It is also not feasible to relocate the Queensland Government’s
biosecurity checkpoints from the NSW/ Queensland border to the southern region of the Tweed Shire Local Government Area (LGA), which is a distance of approximately 50km’. ‘Such an action would also prevent many North Coast residents, particularly from smaller localities who rely on services from bigger areas, from accessing these important services north of the checkpoints, such as hospitals, emergency services, health care and education’. Tweed MP Geoff Provest (Nationals) and Lennox Head-based Liberal MLC, Catherine Cusack, were asked for comment but there was no reply by deadline.
Indigenous perspective on the govt COVID-19 failures ▶ p10
m u i Prem Lifestyle Agents
Ballina petrol station a venue of concern Health authorities say a confirmed case of COVID-19 visited the BP Travel Centre at West Ballina on August 20 between 8am and 8.30am. Those at the centre in that timeframe is considered a ‘casual contact and must immediately get tested and isolate until a negative result is received’. To find your nearest testing clinic, visit www.nsw.gov.au/covid-19/howto-protect- yourself-and-others/ clinics.
Treat your dad this Fathers Day: Sunday Sept 5 ▶ p17–19
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