Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk says the prime minister and the state opposition are using people's personal tragedies involving border restrictions to subject her to the worst bullying she's seen in her lifetime.
Ms Palaszczuk lashed out at Scott Morrison after Liberal National Party leader Deb Frecklington asked her about the case of Canberra woman Sarah Caisip who tried but failed to enter the state in time to see her dying father.
She's now in quarantine and is set to miss his funeral at 2pm on Thursday in Brisbane after health officials told her she wasn't supposed to even be in Queensland because her right to enter didn't cover her father's death.
Ms Palaszczuk revealed Mr Morrison had called her to speak about the case ahead of the funeral.
"It is absolutely not acceptable for the leader of the opposition to do what she is doing today: a coordinated campaign with the prime minister's office is disgusting and it is demeaning," Ms Palaszczuk told state parliament.
"I would hope that the prime minister would work in a cooperative matter with everyone across this country and this divisiveness, and these fights, and this intimidation, and this bullying is the worst I've ever seen in my lifetime."
Mr Morrison also made a public plea on behalf of the Caisip family on Thursday, saying it wasn't about borders and that Ms Palaszczuk's lack of action over the "heartbreaking case" had forced his hand.
"The only thing that matters today is that Sarah can be with her 11-year-old sister Isabel and her mother Merna while they mourn the passing of their father and husband Bernard at Mount Gravatt today," he told radio 2GB.
"It was Father's Day on the weekend ... In this midst of all this heartache surely just this once this can be done.
Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton also joined demands for the Queensland government to relax its coronavirus measures on Thursday, calling Ms Palaszczuk "pig-headed".
"The premier here in Queensland is just so pig-headed and people are suffering because of it," Mr Dutton told radio 2GB.
Ms Palaszczuk reiterated the state's chief health officer was in charge of assessing medical exemptions to cross the border.
She said the state's hospitals were already treating 1,000 NSW residents a week, but admitted that many people were missing funerals.
"Around the world, we have seen bodies being buried in the pits ... where no families have been able to say goodbye," the premier said.
"This is a world pandemic, this is not the time to carry on like this, this is a time when every single person in this country should be working together and this politics of division is disgusting and disgraceful."
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