On Wednesday, Premier Gladys Berejiklian announced that anyone – including NSW residents – returning from Melbourne to Sydney from Friday, August 7 would be forced into mandatory self-paid hotel quarantine for 14 days. The stint will cost each entrant around $3000 for the duration of the stay.

The new restriction, which came into place at 12.01am this morning, hopes to stem the spread of COVID-19 across the border as the number of infections and deaths continue to rise in Victoria.

“We don’t want to see multiple places where returning travellers are coming,” Ms Berejiklian said.

“And we also feel, given the evolving situation in Victoria has been going on for some weeks, that people do that at their own expense.

“There should be no difference from a NSW citizen coming back from an overseas destination in terms of the cost having to pay versus the cost of returning travellers from Victoria.”

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Ms Berejiklian said any non-border town travellers will only be able to enter the state of NSW via plane into Sydney.

“That would allow us to control the risk assessment process for all returning travellers,” she said.

There are some exemptions for travellers, meaning they will not be forced into self-paid hotel quarantine.

Those who are considered as ‘critical workers’ will be exempt, and that group is deemed by the Government as people who do a job that cannot be performed by a local worker.

It is understood this will be a “very, very small category of workers” according to the NSW chief medical officer Dr Kerry Chant.

On the Services NSW website, the below workers are exempted from the mandatory hotel quarantine rule which is now in place in NSW for returning travellers from Victoria:

• COVID-19 environmental cleaning on a commercial basis that is not available locally

• Commonwealth defence and security services

• Maintenance and repair of critical infrastructure

• Medical, hospital, dental or veterinary care

• Agriculture, construction, energy, mining or manufacturing

• Movement of freight on a commercial basis

• Movement of persons on a commercial basis

The NSW Government will allow Victorian travellers to enter via Sydney Airport on compassionate grounds, where a family member is terminally ill and close to the end of their life, and for those who are caring for a family member “in significant need”.

Weddings and family functions will not be considered, and only funerals that are an immediate family member will be allowed entry.

Critical workers into NSW will not be allowed to visit any location outside their workplace, home or where they will be staying to self-isolate.

Police checks will also be in place to ensure the traveller is abiding by the restrictions.