COVID-19 has presented an unprecedented situation, with a State of Emergency being declared in Tasmania for the first time.

For the last nine months many people, including police have been required to adapt the way they live and work.

The safety of all Tasmanians remains our priority as we respond to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The role of police in leading hotel quarantine security for people arriving from overseas is in accordance with identified national best practice.

Tasmania Police is managing the security arrangements in order to ensure the highest-possible standards of quarantine compliance that will help protect Tasmanians from the risk of transmission of COVID-19.

While managing hotel quarantine security has an impact on police resources, business as usual will continue.

As always rostering across these functions will take account of rest and welfare.

Currently 24/7 uniform police and members of the Special Operations Group are not being utilised in quarantine hotels in order to retain sufficient resources to respond to day-to-day policing and high risk incidents.

Next week we will see an injection of 32 officers to frontline stations across Tasmania as the next course graduates. This will be one of the largest graduations in a number of years and is a welcome boost for the frontline. As these graduates will be going to 24/7 stations they will not be utilised in quarantine hotels.

Jonathan Higgins

Acting Deputy Commissioner