Residents of Sydney’s Northern Beaches local government area should be aware that a special Public Health (COVID-19 Northern Beaches) Order 2020 was published late today, commencing at 5:02 pm on Saturday 19 December. The effect of the order (made due to increased cases of COVID-19 in that area of Sydney) is that there is a “lockdown” in force for all residents, and except for a limited number of specific purposes no-one is to leave their homes. Nor is anyone from outside the area to travel into it. Most will be aware of this already, but this will means that no-one can leave home to attend their usual church service on Sunday Dec 20 if they live in the area, or their church is located in the area.

Schedule 1 cl 2 allows leaving home for “work”, which as previously discussed on this blog would seem to allow even a volunteer who was serving as an essential part of a church team to visit the church premises for the purposes of “live streaming”. Schedule 1 cl 14 allows for “a person who is a priest, minister of religion or member of a religious order—[to go] to the person’s place of worship or providing pastoral care to another person”. But other than these limited exemptions, and some specific provisions relating to weddings and funerals, church services cannot be held in person.

This Order expires at midnight on Dec 23. Hopefully it may not be required after that point if the current spread is contained.

The NSW Government has now released the text of the new more generous gathering rules which will apply from Monday 7 December, in the Public Health (COVID-19 Restrictions on Gathering and Movement) Order (No 7) 2020 (“PHO7”). The new rules are much more generous in allowing churches to gather- in short, most indoor church meetings will only be subject to a new “one person per 2 square metres” rule, rather than a hard numerical cap. Restrictions as to outdoor gatherings have also been eased.

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