Carlton Supporters Club

Well they said he could come and then locked him in a room for 10hrs.

It now looks like his claim of having an exemption is bogus, there are leaks that claim the reason given is 'natural immunity" to COVID.

So at the moment it looks like Djoker just rolled up and tried to legally bully his way into the country never having had a exemption or visa to travel here without immunisation!

That's not what Craig Tiley said yesterday.

It's too early to say whether you're right or wrong, MBB. We're in the dark. At the very least, the Federal Government should have made its position clear to Djokovic before he jumped on the flight. Scotty from Marketing is acting as if his arrival was unexpected but it wasn't.

This position assumes the question was asked before he left, this seems to contradict reports that the application failed in flight, so it looks like nobody checked before he left.

It may be the media reports of having an exemption were all part of the plan to sway public opinion in an attempt to apply political pressure and get past the local customs and quarantine rules.

We're you asleep yesterday?

Federal health authorities told Tennis Australia boss Craig Tiley on two occasions in writing that people who were not vaccinated and had contracted COVID-19 in the past six months would not be granted quarantine-free travel to Australia.

The emergence of two letters from the Department of Health and Health Minister Greg Hunt in November casts doubt over why tennis star Novak Djokovic was granted an exemption to play in the Australian Open by health panels set up by Tennis Australia and the Victorian government.

According to multiple sources, the world No.1 men’s player applied for an exemption on the basis that he had contracted COVID-19 in the previous six months.

In a letter sent to Mr Tiley on November 18, Department of Health first assistant secretary Lisa Schofield said “people who have previously had COVID-19 and not received a vaccine dose are not considered fully vaccinated”.

Ms Schofield said such people would “not be approved for quarantine-free entry, regardless of whether they have received foreign vaccination exemptions”.

If Novak was a nobody he would be through but because he is high profile vocal antivaxxer they blocked him.
Exemptions are supposed to be for people who want to be vaccinated but can't. We know the Djoker will never get vaxxed so he should have been told he was not welcome from the moment it was mandated for anyone who wants to work in Victoria.

Whatever the case, it’s hard to escape the feeling all of this government blowback was put into play during Djokovic’s flight as politicians quickly realised the Pandora’s box they’d invited in by not flatly rejecting Djokovic’s application the moment it arrived.