Wilson Security accused of Victorian hotel quarantine contract ‘cover up’
Melbourne AU August 18 2020 A security company contracted to provide guards for Melbourne’s COVID-19 quarantine hotels potentially breached its agreement with the Victorian Government, with an email suggesting it failed to inform at least one of its subcontractors of its obligations.
Among those responsibilities were obligations to provide infection-control training and protective equipment.
In an email, Wilson later asked the subcontractor to backdate the agreement to cover this failure.
Wilson Security then attempted to conceal this failing by asking the subcontractor to backdate documents for the Government.
Wilson made the backdating request in an email, provided to 7.30, nine weeks after its subcontractor had hired guards to work in a quarantine hotel.
Victoria’s former chief crown prosecutor, Gavin Silbert, has reviewed the correspondence.
“It was an attempt to cover up, effectively, by Wilson,” he told 7.30.
“Wilson are trying to cover their tracks and to cover themselves from any sort of legal liability and any sort of blame.”
In March three private security companies, MSS, Unified and Wilson Security, were contracted at short notice by the Victorian Government to provide hundreds of guards to work in quarantine hotels.
Subcontracting was allowed under the Government’s agreement with Wilson, obtained by 7.30, but the security company was meant to pass on its obligations of training and infection control to every subcontractor.
“They must agree to the same obligations and that’s got to be consented to prior to the subcontracting,” Mr Silbert said.
“And if Wilson subcontract without the prior approval of the Victorian Government, they’re in breach of the agreement.”
Security guards working in hotel quarantine have been accused of not following infection control protocols and have previously been blamed for Victoria’s second wave of COVID-19, which has seen thousands of new cases and hundreds of people die.
