Australia news live: New Zealand travel bubble opens; national cabinet meets over Covid vaccine

It looks like the NSW premier, Gladys Berejiklian, has stepped up to speak now and has some Hollywood related news.

And yes, that is Chris Hemsworth standing behind her in this photo. It looks like he will be starring. (Which is a fundamentally boring leading man choice, but hey that’s a discussion for a different time).

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If you are an avid blog follower you would know that I am often assisted in running the live blog by my small kitten Astro.

But today I’m trying from the office rather than home and he hasn’t taken the rejection well.

(In actuality he just really doesn’t appreciate my grandma’s tiny Papillion coming into his home. Very offended.)

(Also I’m aware of how daggy this joke is, but I refuse to stop making it.)

Uber Eats reported 74 serious incidents – including three deaths – involving its delivery riders in NSW last year, according to the state’s workplace safety regulator, the AAP reports.

The SafeWork NSW information was tabled in state parliament ahead of the resumption of a committee inquiry into the gig economy.

Uber Eats general manager Matthew Denman and Uber’s head of driver operations Amanda Gilmore will appear at the hearing on Monday.

The inquiry will also hear from Woolworths and the NSW Farmers Association.

According to SafeWork NSW, three Uber Eats riders died on Sydney’s roads last year.

The deaths include a rider who was wearing an unapproved helmet and another who was killed while using an e-bike unapproved for use on NSW roads.

Labor’s spokesman for the gig economy, Daniel Mookhey, said the NSW government had yet to introduce legally enforceable minimum safety standards.

The government is letting platforms like Uber Eats write their own rules even though their safety record is ghastly.

Just when we think we have Covid-19 under control, it looks like good old fashioned gastro is making a come back.

The Victorian health department says there have been 389 gastroenteritis outbreaks in childcare so far this year, 140 more incidents than the yearly average for April.

As a result, Victoria’s executive director for communicable disease, Dr Bruce Bolam, has put out a series of warnings, urging people to keep their children home from kinda or childcare for at least 48 hours after the child recovers.

Gastroenteritis can spread quickly through settings such as early childhood education and care services, where children play and interact closely with each other and can readily spread their bugs.

It is important that early childhood services have good hygiene practices in place and to respond quickly with thorough cleaning if any children become ill.

Since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, alcohol-based hand sanitiser has become significantly more prevalent and is often the go-to if someone is worried they may have touched infected surfaces, but Bolam warned it is much less effective against bugs such as norovirus than soap and water.

Handwashing with soap and water is still the best personal hygiene method to minimize the chance of spreading the virus.

A good old-fashioned scrub with soap and warm water is the best way to remove the gastro virus from our hands and prevent passing it on to infect others.

The numbers we are really hanging out for today are NSW’s.

Over the weekend it was confirmed three family members diagnosed with Covid-19 in hotel quarantine picked up the virus from fellow returned travellers.

Health detectives believe the three cases picked up the virus from a family of four who stayed in the adjoining room of the Adina Apartment Hotel at Sydney’s Town Hall.

All guests on the 12th floor of the hotel, where the families stayed, have been retested and returned negative results. Staff who worked on the floor are self-isolating and being tested.

All seven people have been transferred to special health accommodation, where they will stay until they’re no longer infectious.

The big question now is if this virus spread any further and if staff members may have been infected, potentially bringing the virus out into the community.

We usually hear from NSW Health around 11am.

Some lovely photos from AAP’s Mick Tsikas coming out of Sydney Airport this morning as families from Australia and New Zealand reunite.

Here are a few of my favourites:

In case you missed it yesterday Victorian premier Daniel Andrews has delayed his return to work until June, confirming his fractured spine will force him to miss next month’s state budget.

Andrews broke several ribs and fractured his T7 vertebra after slipping on wet stairs at a holiday home on the Mornington Peninsula in early March.

At the time he said he would require at least six weeks off to recover, which suggested a return late in April, but in social media posts on Sunday, the premier said his return date was now expected for early June.

I’m making slow and steady progress …

A couple of weeks ago when I started daily walks, I could only manage about 15 minutes. Now I’m out for almost an hour.

The premier, who has maintained considerable support despite the state’s deadly second wave of Covid-19, said that while it was frustrating to remain out of work, he had no choice.

You only get one chance to properly recover from serious injuries.

We just have to wait until the ribs and spinal fracture have properly healed.