Remove The Cap (SBS)

THIS ONE IS IN DUTCH – 1000’s of Aussies are stranded overseas. They can’t return home because the AU federal government has placed a cap, or upper limit on the number of citizens and permanent residents that can arrive back in Australia. This is, so they claim, to not overwhelm the COVID19 quarantine facilities (travelers arriving in Australia have to go into quarantine for 14 days). However, the responsibility of making sure this upper limit is actually adhered to is placed largely with the airlines. As you can imagine this leads to utter chaos. Travelers often don’t know until they arrive at the airport whether their flight will indeed take off or if they will get a seat (which is booked and paid for). Since only a few 1000 people can arrive each week, planes fly to Australia mostly empty. The ticket prices are sky-rocketing! If you don’t book business class you basically, or so it seems, don’t stand a chance of getting on a flight. One man (himself a stranded traveler) trying to highlight the problem is Dutch-born, Pieter. He created the web site REMOVETHECAP.COM. Thousands of people registered with his site and dropped a pin on the map to show where they are stranded. Pieter is one of the faces of an Amnesty International campaign that tries to get Aussies back home, and he spoke at a Senate Select Committee hearing via video-link. This interview aired on both SBS and 4EB in Brisbane