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New Zealand's ban on quarantine-free travellers from Australia will remain until November at least, with future trans-Tasman travel hinging on vaccination rates.

Deputy Prime Minister Grant Robertson said the increased infectiousness of COVID-19's Delta variant, present in uncontained outbreaks in NSW and Victoria, led to New Zealand's decision for lengthen its travel ban.

"Decisions we make about everything COVID are led by a health response," Mr Robertson said.

"We are pushing out for another eight weeks and will re-assess."

Jacinda Ardern's government halted the trans-Tasman bubble back in July for eight weeks.

Friday's fresh eight-week extension takes the travel pause through to November 19.

Mr Robertson said New Zealand would be "extremely unlikely" to fling open the borders in November, suggesting re-openings would rely on vaccination rates.

"What we want to do is see where we are - both countries and states within Australia ... on vaccination rates in eight weeks time," he said.

"We have a desire to get New Zealanders vaccinated and once we do that, that opens up a series of options.

"The more people we get vaccinated and the quicker we get them vaccinated, the more options open up for us."

The trans-Tasman bubble was first agreed in principle by the Australian and New Zealand governments back in May 2020.

In October, NSW became the first state to allow travellers across the Tasman Sea without quarantining.

New Zealand reciprocated six months later in April, creating the trans-Tasman bubble.

However, operating the bubble proved difficult.

Kiwi health officials paused the travel arrangement several times in response to COVID-19 outbreaks in different parts of Australia.

The bubble was also unpopular in New Zealand.

While scenes of long-awaited family reunions pulled at the heartstrings, most Kiwis feared the bubble would see the return of COVID-19 in the community.

This week, a poll conducted by Labour's pollsters showed 54 per cent of New Zealanders viewed the opening "as the wrong thing to do".

Just 29 per cent of Kiwis - and just 24 per cent of Labour voters - approved of the bubble.

Ironically, the trans-Tasman bubble saw hundreds of thousands of travellers between Australia and New Zealand without spreading coronavirus.

Instead, it was a leak from New Zealand's border regime last month that produced NZ's first major outbreak in a year.

Instead of the return of quarantine-free travel, New Zealand will open up thousands of spaces in its quarantine regime, known as MIQ, for Australian-based Kiwis to come home.

Flag carrier Air New Zealand said on Friday it will operate "a limited number of quarantine flights" across the Tasman for eager travellers.

Those travellers will need to spend two weeks in quarantine, and pay the costs as per each jurisdiction's policy.

"We understand this continues to be a very distressing time for people trying to get home," Air NZ executive Leanne Geraghty said.

"We're committed to doing everything we can to get customers back to where they need to be as safely and quickly as possible."

© AAP 2021

NSW has reported 1284 new locally acquired cases of COVID-19 and 12 deaths as the government unveils a home quarantine pilot plan.

Most of NSW is locked down and police are cracking down on compliance measures as authorities battle to contain the spread of the virulent Delta strain.

This includes the regional council areas of Lismore and Albury, sent back into seven days of lockdown on Thursday evening after uncovering COVID-19 cases.

Of the 12 deaths in the 24 hours to 8pm on Thursday, two people were in their 20s, three people in their 50s, one person in their 60s, two people in their 70s, three people in their 80s and one person in their 90s.

It takes the toll for the current NSW outbreak to 222.

There are 1245 COVID-19 patients in NSW in hospital, with 228 in intensive care units and 112 on ventilators.

With NSW set to hit the 50 per cent double-dose vaccination milestone, Premier Gladys Berejiklian on Friday said NSW would hold a pilot program for seven days of home quarantine for 175 fully vaccinated international arrivals.

This program would be extended at 80 per cent double-dose coverage.

"That's Aussies returning home through Sydney Airport but also our citizens having the opportunity to go overseas when previously they weren't able to," Ms Berejiklian said.

Meanwhile, NSW Labor has called for more freedoms for outdoor exercise and recreation to be restored to western Sydney locals, including additional freedoms for outdoor picnics.

"The chief health officer has repeatedly informed the community that the transmission of the Delta variant is far more prevalent in indoor settings so it makes sense for the government to take a look at this," opposition health spokesman Ryan Park said on Friday.

"It still could remain restricted to double vaccinated households but surely spending a few hours outdoors at this very good time is a small way that families can try and get some enjoyment back."

Deputy Premier John Barilaro on Friday said his government would stick to its "measured approach" for reopening after lockdown.

Meanwhile, a NSW parliamentary inquiry into the state's outbreak will resume on Friday, focusing on issues in western Sydney.

Twelve people have been diagnosed with COVID-19 across three social housing buildings in inner Sydney's Redfern. A mobile vaccination team is visiting each tower building to provide vaccinations.

Elsewhere, a man has been charged with the serious assault of another man at a drive-through COVID-19 testing clinic in Auburn.

The 18-year-old man allegedly pulled the 55-year-old male victim from his car and punched and kneed him before driving away.

He will appear at Burwood Local Court on Friday.

© AAP 2021

A Dutch museum has unveiled a previously unknown work by Vincent van Gogh - a study for one of his best-known drawings, Worn Out - in which an old man sits in a chair with his head in his hands.

Van Gogh "was really interested in the ordinary person, he was also looking to express emotion", Van Gogh Museum director Emilie Gordenker said on Thursday.

"I think we're all coming out of the COVID period feeling like this and the amazing thing is that we can share this with our visitors. We're open, we're delighted to be open."

Discoveries of works by the famously troubled artist, who died in 1890, are extremely rare. The drawing is owned by a private collector and had never been known of or displayed.

The work was done with Van Gogh's favourite drawing tool, a carpenter's pencil, in his distinctive style, on water-marked paper from 1877.

It closely resembles the more famous Old Man drawing, but the perspective is at eye level with the old man, rather than from above.

The work can be dated with unusual precision to the last weeks of November 1882, senior researcher Teio Meenendorp said, because of two letters Van Gogh wrote on November 24 of that year.

It was a period of relative stability for the artist while he was living with a woman in The Hague.

One letter was to his brother Theo, saying he had made two drawings of "an old man with his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands" and he was thinking of making it into a lithograph.

The other letter was to a fellow artist, saying with confidence he planned to make a lithograph of the theme. Van Gogh did make the lithograph, titled At Eternity's Gate, three days later, on November 27, 1882.

The Dutch artist was troubled by mental illness and considered himself a failure. He returned to the theme with an oil painting known as Sorrowing Old Man, based on the lithograph, two months before his own death.

© RAW 2021