Thousands of Victorians were unjustly and inhumanely denied a COVID-19 border exemption to return home to farewell dying loved ones, attend medical appointments, care for sick family members or start jobs.

That is the finding of an investigation by the Victorian ombudsman into the Department of Health’s NSW border exemption scheme.

Ombudsman Deborah Glass said the decision to shut the border to COVID-stricken Sydney and others parts of NSW in July left thousands stranded and unable to get an exemption.

Of 33,252 applications from July 9 to September 14, when the probe was launched, only eight per cent were granted.

In all, the watchdog received 315 complaints including from stranded souls paying double rent with no job, internet-less caravanning pensioners who were asked for documents they did not have, and a farmer afraid of having to destroy her animals when she could not get home.

One family said they were treated “inhumanly” as they awaited an exemption to be with their dying daughter in Pakenham, while another person missed the death of their father after having their application denied.

“I will never see him again now due to these Vic health workers being completely supercilious and condescending with my applications,” they wrote.

When Fiona needed to travel to Victoria from Canberra to care for her 49-year-old intellectually disabled sister with terminal cancer, she was asked to provide a statutory declaration from her 86-year-old mother to explain why she could not.

“(It was) beyond unreasonable and is very intrusive and unkind, it’s inhuman actually,” Fiona told the ombudsman.

Ms Glass did not criticise the border closure call, finding it was lawful and needed to protect people in the face of a public health emergency. 

But she hit out at the narrow use of discretion, lack of reasons for refusals and delegation of decision-making.

“The overwhelming majority of applications did not get to a decision-maker at all, and the guidance did not change even as case numbers in Victoria grew and the risks evolved,” Ms Glass wrote in the report released on Tuesday.

“The consequences of that were vast, and unfair, for many thousands of people stuck across the border.”

It led to some of the “most questionable decisions” she has seen during her seven years in the job.

Despite scaling up its exemption team from 20 staff in July to 285 by early September, those responsible for categorising and prioritising applications were expected to complete 50 per hour or one every 30 seconds.

Ms Glass said people felt caught up in a “bureaucratic nightmare”.

“The effect of a complex and constrained bureaucracy meant some outcomes were downright unjust, even inhumane,” she wrote.

“It appeared to us that the department put significant resources into keeping people out rather than helping them find safe ways to get home.”

The ombudsman has recommended the state government acknowledge the distress the system caused, improve policy and guidance for such schemes and consider redress payments to help those denied exemptions to cover financial costs.

The Victorian government refused to apologise last year after Ms Glass found it breached human rights by suddenly locking down 3000 Melbourne public housing tower residents without warning in July 2020.

The latest report comes as Victoria recorded 1185 new COVID-19 infections and another seven deaths in its latest reporting period, taking its toll from the pandemic to 1385.

The health department confirmed on Tuesday the state is managing 13,050 active cases, dropping from 16,503 on Monday.

By Callum Godde in Melbourne

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