"Our crisis council of Cabinet funded and endorsed a program. The program is then delivered at a local level by a big team, a team that was able to I think provide support and quarantine for in excess of 20,000 people," Mr Andrews said.
"The exact nature of security arrangements, their adequacy or otherwise, that is appropriately a matter for the judge to look at.
"I don't believe ADF support was on offer. It's been provided in limited circumstances in New South Wales, not to provide security as such but to provide transportation from the airport to hotels. I think it is fundamentally incorrect to assert that there was hundreds of ADF staff on offer and somehow someone said no. That's not, in my judgement, accurate.
"There was a proposal drawn up. [Using private security guards] was essentially already operating, at some significant scale, but would need it go to another level. It was running quarantine and support services for a range of different people, whether it be health workers, vulnerable Victorians, women and children fleeing family violence. The best answer I can give you is that this hotel quarantine model … had worked well in those cohorts. It was simply limited to include the return travellers and it was stood up within the time frame.
"It was essentially an extension of a program that we had already stood up. Nothing more, nothing less."
