13/01/2022
We encourage any small business and people affected by these restrictions to contact their local member of parliament. We arnt asking for much just equal rights to trade and move forward.
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Dear Ms Palaszczuk,
It’s January 14, 2022 and I didn’t want to have to write you another letter, but here we are. I have been quietly writing letters to my local member for Nicklin on the Sunshine Coast since mid December but I’ve had zero response to date.
Yesterday you released your 90% plan for Queensland; the one that small business in particular hospitality venues and creatives have been clinging to hope, waiting for you to release, waiting for you to have a plan.
You fell short of delivering any plan, all you have done is announce your taking down your border walls, but what is your plan and roadmap to recovery for small business to trade?
Without rehashing a letter I sent in August, the last 2 years venues and creatives have been hit hard by every lockdown and restrictions brought in.
From December 18, if a couple chooses to have 1 unvaccinated person at their wedding their guest list drops to 20 guests. Yet 50 unvaccinated people can go to a gym, their local shopping mall and gather in a park or private residence.
Not releasing a plan for us is pushing clients to alternate loopholes of hiring airbnb properties which really are unregulated and there is no accountability should someone host an event there or in their own backyard. Yet businesses like mine are expected to be Covid-19 compliant (which costs a lot of time and money) and we still have been stripped of our rights to trade fairly.
I'm currently losing thousands of dollars a day of turnover for every day that goes by with no plan released.
Right now I should be enjoying my summer holidays with my family in NSW and come back confidently knowing I worked really hard to a sell out my 2022 events calendar, but instead I’ve been sitting here calming down distressed clients, asking them to wait for a plan that today didn't come. And if I can't convince them to wait, I'm forced to refund their event which is looking like another 12 weeks of lost turnover all because there is no fair and reasonable plan for us to trade.
NSW and VIC released a clear plan ahead of time, how long is the Queensland Government going to punish small businesses - in particular creative businesses for a small percentage of the population that isn't vaccinated.
Surely you can expand on the 90% plan and at least come back with reasonable conditions, such as mask wearing, 4sqm rule, temperature checking and rapid antigen testing?
I have sat tight and followed the rules, kept my child at home because I’m “non-essential”. And kept my business viable for almost 2 years.
Not only am I now faced with no direction for 2022, did you know childcare centres are now warning families that if you can work from home, your child doesn’t really need to be in childcare and you need to justify your hours worked to send them when the peak hits?
This is just another example of how the rules are going to affect small business owners and impact their children's right to education, because daycare centres can’t get enough staff. So non-essential small business owners are expected to now carry the burden of another problem your government has created.
At this point we need a plan to work with, we need to know what's coming for our industry that's deemed non-essential, we need to know that as business owners we are going to be treated as equally as a school teacher, nurse, builder & electrician. Because for the past 22 months we have not been treated equally in our ability to trade.
Regards,
Sara Morley
L&L co. Events
📸 Candi Photography
