The good news is that while the error caused a brief period of chaos on the South Coast with Canberrans struggling to get home before midnight on Sunday, nobody has fallen ill or died as a result.

What happened over the weekend is, however, a reminder of the generally solid job the ACT government has done in responding to the pandemic. Medical facilities have been expanded, social distancing regulations policed in a sensible manner, and the virus kept at bay.

It was certainly no worse than the communications breakdown in South Australia that led to air passengers landing in Adelaide being told they would either have to fly back to Sydney or go into 14-days quarantine despite having beaten the deadline.

The South Australian authorities, like their ACT counterparts, have since apologised to all concerned and, on this occasion, those apologies should be accepted on the proviso assurances are given such mistakes won't be repeated.

That said, errors by governments are so serious right now because nothing is more important in a crisis than public confidence in those in charge. In the last year Australians have responded well to remarkable directions because most people believe our leaders know what they are doing.

Unfortunately, as many governments have learnt the hard way, the quickest way to destroy that trust is to stuff things up. Gladys Berejiklian's government, for example, had to work hard to woo back public confidence after the Ruby Princess debacle which was caused by mistakes and misunderstandings that were identified at the inevitable inquiry.

South of the border the government of Dan Andrews has a much harder row to hoe. If the Coate Inquiry is to be believed the real issue runs much deeper than a bad call by a known individual or individuals that cascaded into a national tragedy. Jennifer Coate's findings, if taken at face value, reveal a complete failure of governance with demonstrably inept politicians and public servants caught well outside of their depth by the spiralling pandemic and not knowing what to do or how to do it.

As John Howard recently said of Donald Trump; when people are in danger they expect their leaders to protect them. That didn't happen on Spring Street. All Australians, not just Victorians, are entitled to be disappointed and angry. More than 800 people died, thousands more got very sick and hundreds of thousands more lost their jobs because of the failings of individuals being paid to protect the public.

What is even more alarming is that there are now suggestions the inquiry may have fallen foul of a deliberate cover-up with the former Victorian police commissioner Graham Ashton saying: "Disappointingly that person responsible for the decision [to employ security guards at quarantine hotels] seems determined to remain anonymous".

That should be read in conjunction with the former health minister Jenny Mikakos's Monday tweet that: "Victorians deserve to know the truth about an event that has so profoundly impacted them. They do not need another masterclass in political deflection from the premier".

Tim Smith, the Liberal member for Kew, has been leading the charge for a Royal Commission into what really happened on March 27. After Monday his case just got a lot stronger.