Australia will within weeks allow residents of New Zealand to enter the country without having to quarantine, Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack has said.
In March, Australia closed its borders to all non-citizens and non-permanent residents to slow the spread of Covid-19. Mr McCormack said New Zealand citizens and residents will be allowed to travel to Australia's most populous state New South Wales and its remote Northern Territory from 16 October.
They will not have to undergo a two-week mandatory quarantine, which is required of all Australians returning from other countries. "This is the first stage in what we hope to see as a trans-Tasman bubble between the two countries," Mr McCormack told reporters in the capital Canberra.