Residents of NSW's Western Division have had double cause for celebration this week with many receiving their highest rainfall in years and the state government relaxing border restrictions.
From midnight tonight (Wednesday) those entering SA from NSW will no longer be required to quarantine for 14 days, a requirement which has been in place since July.
SA Premier Steven Marshall said it would be a "massive, massive relief to people who had been isolated from friends, from family, from business opportunities".
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Matt Jackson from Tirlta Station, which is 110 kilometres north-east of Broken Hill in NSW, was on a high after receiving 40 millimetres of rain at the weekend, but says the easing of the border is also great news.
"There will be so many relieved people able to go about their business now and access essential services," he said.
The Pastoralists' Association of West Darling president said families with children at boarding school had missed out on many events and people had delayed elective surgery with the self-isolation period not a viable option for most.
Early in the week, Mr Jackson's sons, who are in year 11 and year 12 at boarding school in Adelaide, received exemptions from SA Health to come home for school holidays, which start tomorrow (Friday). He is relieved they will not need to have COVID-19 tests on day 1 and day 12, which had been conditions of the exemption.
There will be so many relieved people able to go about their business now and access essential services.
- Matt Jackson
While Mr Jackson understands the SA government's motivation to protect the health of its residents, he hopes they rethink any future COVID-19 restrictions.
"They should be revisiting what worked and what didn't," he said.
"Excluding Broken Hill was something that definitely didn't work, being a city so close to the SA border, they need to be more accommodating.
"If they can plan to exclude us based on a line on the map, they can come up with a plan for the line on a map to include us.
"There has been no community transmission within the Far West local health district this whole time."
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