Anthony Albanese breaks election promise to hold a Royal Commission into Australia’s Covid response and announces a weaker ‘inquiry’ without sweeping powers

Anthony Albanese is set to announce his Government will hold an inquiry into the Covid pandemic but not a royal commission which the Prime Minster once promised.

The government’s watered down commission of inquiry will lack the powers of a Royal Commission to compel witnesses to appear and testify truthfully.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese vowed to hold a royal commission during last year’s successful election campaign from opposition that saw him oust Scott Morrison. 

Nationals Senator Bridget McKenzie has already accused the Albanese government of going back on its word.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is being accused of breaking an election promise to hold a royal commission into Covid

‘It’s another broken promise by Anthony Albanese,’ Senator Mckenzie told Sharri Markson on Sky News on Tuesday.

‘He went to the election promising a royal commission. 

‘They ran a select committee in the Senate throughout Covid hearing from experts for over a year they heard from experts from right across the country and out of that inquiry they decided they would have a royal commission. 

‘They are not delivering a royal commission.’

She accused Mr Albanese of trying to shield Labor premiers still in power from that period, such as Victoria’s Dan Andrews and Queensland’s Annastacia Palaszczuk from full scrutiny of their actions during the pandemic.

‘There are some things we led the world in, and some where politics got in the way,’ Senator McKenzie said. 

While Mr Albanese said he was committed to hold a Covid inquiry in August of last year he has not mentioned it since. 

Under Victorian Premier Dan Andrews Victoria experienced one of the world’s longest lockdowns

The commission of inquiry will likely be conducted by an economist, an epidemiologist, and a public administration expert. 

Mr Morrison, who led Australia through the majority of pandemic which the World Health Organisation declared over in May, has stated he will only cooperate with a Covid inquiry that examines the record of both the states and  Commonwealth. 

‘Any serious retrospective inquiry that seeks to go back over this ground would be obsolete if it did not require equal attention and involvement of all state and territory governments who shared in Australia’s response to this one-in-a-100-year event,’ he said.  

After the virus hit Australia in early 2020 lockdowns and shutting the national and interstate borders kept the continent largely Covid-free compared to other countries.

However, the draconian measures used to control outbreaks, including one of the world’s longest lockdowns in Victoria at 262 days and Western Australia effectively sealing itself off from the world for almost two years, attracted backlash. 

While Australia’s low rate of Covid mortality contrasted with much higher tolls elsewhere this has not been the case since the Omnicron strain defied all attempts at containment in early 2023.

Australia’s infection rates and deaths have quickly caught up quickly and even surpassed other countries with the nation having the third worst statistics for those measures per capita in the world by mid-2022, according to the Burnet Institute.