Comedian Nikki Osborne is relocating her family to Queensland due to ongoing COVID-19 restrictions in Melbourne

Five days after being granted a border pass, actor and comedian Nikki Osborne will uproot and relocate her family to Brisbane, saying she is fed up with the “depressing” life in Melbourne The Queensland-raised actor and comedian, who has lived in Victoria for the past 15 years, will arrive in Brisbane with her husband Jeremy Starr and their two children on Monday, just five days after being granted a border pass. Having homeschooled her children, one of whom has autism, since March, when her national comedy tour was cancelled due to COVID-19 restrictions, Osborne said “there’s no quality of life” in Melbourne, which has been under stage four restrictions for more than a month. VICTORIA’S HORROR VIRUS DEATH TOLL GROWS “It’s really depressing down here. All our friends’ businesses are going bust and all my industry mates can’t work … it’s depressing watching your kids staring at a screen or a wall,” she said. “We have police patrolling our street every night.” “The fact we are leaving the state and we can’t even say goodbye to our friends and the kids won’t see their friends again, it feels like we are escaping a war torn country.” In order to apply for the border pass, Osborne, who has rented out her Mornington Peninsula home, had to have leased a home in Brisbane she was unable to inspect, enrol her children in school, have a letter of employment and have organised freight for her belongings. QLD PREMIER ‘WILL NOT BE INTIMIDATED’ BY BORDER CRITICISM The I’m A Celebrity … Get Me Out Of Here! star, who will spend two weeks in hotel quarantine, said living in Queensland would also allow her to gain work on productions around the country, which weren’t employing Victorians because of the restrictions. “There is no hope of being able to open a show in Victoria in the foreseeable future, whereas if we go to Brisbane everything opens up,” she said. “Melbourne has always been the comedy hub. But that’s all turned on its head. Now it’s actually been wonderful for me because I can justify living in Queensland and that be good for employment.” It comes amid a continued exodus from Victoria, with the AFL and Melbourne Storm among organisations that have moved north. Last week millionaire construction magnate Mark Simonds fled Melbourne for the Gold Coast with his family and friends on a luxury yacht and was subsequently ordered into quarantine, while earlier this week former Mongols bikie Shane Bowden was caught in a Queensland border breach after entering from Victoria.