Rent, wages on national cabinet agenda

NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian warned on Thursday morning that the state may need to enforce more strict lockdown measures if the measures already taken don't show an impact in the number of cases.

"I'm saying to the community that if we're not convinced we've had a sufficient amount of success, NSW will have to take further action and that's a position I've been clear on from day one," Ms Berejiklian said.

"If there's a significant shift ... you know you need to take further action."

Measures taken by NSW are likely to affect the ACT, with Chief Minister Andrew Barr previously saying the territory would seek to align itself with the surrounding state wherever possible on the shutdown of non-essential services.

The border between NSW and the ACT will not be closed, Health Minister Rachel Stephen-Smith said on Thursday, but residents were advised against travelling between the two regions if they didn't need to.

"There are simply too many people who live in Queanbeyan and work in essential services in the ACT and vice versa," she said.

"If you don't need to travel within the region, and certainly if you don't need to travel within regions, you should not need to be doing so."

Labor and the Greens have been pushing for tenants to be protected from evictions during the economic crisis caused by the public health emergency, a move which has already been mooted in Tasmania, where legislation has been introduced to the upper house.

The matter has already been considered but hasn't been finalised by the national cabinet, with considerations for different systems in different states and the need to involve banks and creditors.

"The states, working together with the Treasurer, have done some excellent work today and there's more work to be done on that," Prime Minister Scott Morrison said on Tuesday.

Labor said banks and landlords also need to be supported in order to protect tenants from evictions.

"It's understandable that landlords rely upon some income coming in from the investments that they have made. It's also the case that we need to have more payment flexibility in place," Labor leader Anthony Albanese said on Thursday.

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The government is distancing itself from calls for Australia to introduce wage subsidies similar to those already introduced in the United Kingdom, with Finance Minister Mathias Cormann saying it wasn't the best way in the Australian context.

"Doing it the way that we have through the existing jobseeker payment framework was the fastest way to provide the necessary support to those Australians who through no fault of their own are losing their job because of the economic impact of the coronavirus," Senator Cormann said.

While not ruling out further action, the Finance Minister wouldn't give details of what was being considered.

"We have always said that our approach to this will be scalable. We will continue to assess what is an evolving situation still," he said.

"We will continue to make judgements on how the support packages that are already out there can be further improved. Of course we will continue to make judgements."

The national cabinet will meet again on Friday morning.

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