Brand damage forces hotels to quit quarantine duty
Top hotels are concerned about their reputations and are withdrawing from the hotel quarantine program, with at least a dozen hotels such as Sydney’s Hilton and InterContinental hotels, and Melbourne’s Marriott, already pulling out.
Accommodation Association chief Dean Long is appalled that Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews, as well as others, has named specific clusters after the hotels the clusters have generated from.
“There is a huge reputational risk, as we’ve seen by the reporting by Victoria naming and shaming hotels,” Long told The Australian Financial Review.
“The government approach of naming the cluster after a hotel is disrespectful. It’s disrespectful to the brand.”
Long said hotel quarantine isn’t going anywhere in the foreseeable future.
Melbourne’s current five-day lockdown was triggered by a returning traveller who used a nebuliser while quarantining at the airport Holiday Inn. It is believed this led to 17 cases linking to this cluster. Transmission has also come out of the Park Royal and Grand Hyatt hotels in Melbourne. While in Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth, lockdowns were triggered by staff such as security guards catching the virus from guests.
“There have been outbreaks but it hasn’t been the hotels’ fault,” Long said.
He also stated that hotel quarantine has not been the economic bonanza for hotels as some may have thought.
Most of the fees – about $3000 for an individual for a two week quarantine – go to the state governments, not the hotel.
“Hotel quarantine has been a financial assistance to some but it’s not a licence to print money,” he said.
Tourism and Transport Forum chief Margy Osmond said it was an issue that clusters were being named after hotels, stating that travellers were now asking whether a hotel was used for quarantine purposes.
“Governments at all levels will need to understand they will have to make a significant contribution to the brand rehabilitation of these hotels,” Ms Osmond said.
Some infectious disease experts have said that due to poor ventilation, many hotels were not suitable for quarantining and have suggested that purpose-built facilities in regional areas would be a safer option.
The federal government is now considering a proposal to do just that.
Prominent Toowoomba family the Wagners has offered to build a camp near Toowoomba airport and trucking magnate Lindsay Fox has backed a regional hub in Avalon in Victoria to house returning travellers.
However, Prime Minister Scott Morrison continues to insist hotel quarantine will continue to accommodate the bulk of thousands of returning Australians.
Irit Jackson, 16th February 2021
