Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has launched an explosive attack at the state and territory leaders who he saw “undermine” former prime minister Scott Morrison at National Cabinet during the pandemic.
The Australian Greens MPs
The Leader of the Greens, Adam Bandt, says the National Cabinet agenda should include the Greens’ call for investment in publicly-owned domestic mRNA vaccine production.
The Greens have been calling for publicly-owned vaccine manufacturing for almost a year, and since February have been explicitly calling for Australia to be able to produce mRNA vaccines here. Top scientists and immunisation experts have also argued that Australia should have domestic mRNA production.
Current expert advice and international experience suggests that it could take 6 months to construct and commence mRNA production domestically in Australia, which is not only competitive with the Government’s best guess timeline around international vaccine imports, but vastly superior, as it would provide a permanent buffer against unexpected events overseas.