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Katie Woolf spoke with Chief Minister Michael Gunner · 360 with Katie Woolf

0:00
Speaker 1: You are listening to Mix one oh four point nine's
0:02
Speaker 1: three sixty and well we may as well get straight
0:04
Speaker 1: into it because the Chief Minister has arrived in the studio.
0:08
Speaker 2: Good morning to you. Chief.
0:09
Speaker 3: Good hey Kattie.
0:10
Speaker 2: Now did you feel the earth move yesterday?
0:12
Speaker 1: I did?
0:12
Speaker 3: I did you? Just a slight rocking of the house.
0:16
Speaker 3: I was a bit like, what's going on? There's my house? Yeah,
0:19
Speaker 3: house movie, It's just just and after notice.
0:22
Speaker 1: Well I didn't notice that. I don't know what I
0:24
Speaker 1: was doing, but I didn't notice it. Now let's get
0:27
Speaker 1: into it because we know there's so much making headlines
0:29
Speaker 1: today and so much happening around the place. And from
0:32
Speaker 1: today regional Victorians will be able to enter the Northern Territory.
0:36
Speaker 2: Are you expecting an influx.
0:38
Speaker 3: Well, based off previous decisions, yes, so at noon today
0:43
Speaker 3: they're allowed in that where that quarantine mi ndstandings. Lots
0:46
Speaker 3: of Victorians that want to get out that they have
0:49
Speaker 3: been locked down for a long time. They want they
0:51
Speaker 3: want to they want to explore them. There's never been
0:53
Speaker 3: a better ad to come to the territory them right
0:54
Speaker 3: now with the safest we're the best. There's a good
0:57
Speaker 3: feeling around town. So they're safe as us now, so
1:00
Speaker 3: they're welcome here now.
1:02
Speaker 1: Melbourne, of course, has had vast improvements in the number
1:06
Speaker 1: of COVID cases each day. When do you anticipate that
1:09
Speaker 1: the Northern territory might open to Melbourne.
1:11
Speaker 3: Well, yesterday was donut day for the country, so for
1:14
Speaker 3: the first time basically no new cases across the country
1:18
Speaker 3: yesterday locally acquired, which was amazing. The Ring of Steel
1:22
Speaker 3: decision for Premier Andrews is November eight. From memory, I
1:25
Speaker 3: never nine November eight. We will probably pay a close
1:28
Speaker 3: attention to that. We're obviously not going to get ahead
1:29
Speaker 3: of Victoria and what they say about Melbourne and mitchell Shire.
1:33
Speaker 3: So that's the ring of steel that day it comes
1:35
Speaker 3: down that they'll allow free movement within Victoria, we'll pay
1:39
Speaker 3: close attention to that and witnesses paid. We have to
1:41
Speaker 3: make a decision around then, either around giving two replication
1:46
Speaker 3: cycles notice for opening or not. But we'd actually have
1:50
Speaker 3: to make an active decision about around that Ring of
1:52
Speaker 3: Steel time, because that's when we'll know how how Victorious
1:55
Speaker 3: tracking so doing a great job, but at least you
1:57
Speaker 3: know what ten days before we'd make a decision on
1:59
Speaker 3: Melbourn in.
2:00
Speaker 2: Itself, so probably before Christmas.
2:02
Speaker 3: I think we are on track and this is this
2:04
Speaker 3: is obviously the national goal was to be on track
2:07
Speaker 3: by for free movement through the country by Christmas. We
2:10
Speaker 3: saw Western Australia make make its decision the other day
2:14
Speaker 3: about US and a few other of those state jurisdictions,
2:17
Speaker 3: so really it's all now all you know, in different ways,
2:21
Speaker 3: every every jurisdiction seems to be making their way slowly
2:24
Speaker 3: towards Christmas, which is I think a positive sign for
2:27
Speaker 3: the country and really Australians as a whole need to
2:30
Speaker 3: celebrate that. If you look overseas US, UK, France, Germany, etc.
2:35
Speaker 2: Like you know basically every other country UK back into lockdown.
2:39
Speaker 3: It's just extraordinary where we are and have done an
2:44
Speaker 3: incredible job as a country. Good early decisions, boy, they
2:46
Speaker 3: said bat Victoria the other day. Premier Andrews can make decisions,
2:50
Speaker 3: but you're talking about millions of people, millions of people.
2:53
Speaker 3: It only works if victorians buy in and do it.
2:56
Speaker 3: You can't enforce that kind of level of compliance like
2:58
Speaker 3: you haven't got enough police have to have ordinary victorians
3:01
Speaker 3: say yes, we're going to do this. And so victorians did.
3:05
Speaker 1: It well let's last week we actually, I guess as
3:09
Speaker 1: those borders open and we see that movement. Last week
3:12
Speaker 1: we did speak to doctor Robert Parker, the head of
3:14
Speaker 1: the AMA. He said that the AMA and am SAD
3:17
Speaker 1: are in lockstep with concerns about Victorians heading into the
3:21
Speaker 1: northern territory and do think that additional measures could be
3:24
Speaker 1: implemented to keep territorians safe.
3:26
Speaker 2: If you miss that interview, take a listen.
3:29
Speaker 4: I mean the issue is if it does kick Darling
3:30
Speaker 4: and I've been to a restaurant, I want to know,
3:33
Speaker 4: you know, you know, potentially if I've become into contact
3:36
Speaker 4: with it. Whenever I go to the cinema now, which
3:38
Speaker 4: is not on the occasion, they take my phone number,
3:40
Speaker 4: which is you know exactly what should happen, and they
3:42
Speaker 4: should have those scanning things so you can just scan
3:44
Speaker 4: your phone and they got They've got it. I mean,
3:47
Speaker 4: it makes sense again and again from overseas, we're in
3:49
Speaker 4: minded of how dangerous as virus is in the countries
3:52
Speaker 4: that have been reasonably say that breaks out again and
3:54
Speaker 4: kills people, and I just think the government needs to
3:57
Speaker 4: have a greater degree of surveillance to protect the health
3:59
Speaker 4: of territory.
4:00
Speaker 1: Now you have obviously been out this morning announcing this
4:03
Speaker 1: is now going to happen.
4:05
Speaker 2: Why did you decide that this needs to happen?
4:07
Speaker 3: So we wanted to add to our contact tracing tools,
4:10
Speaker 3: I think just for public confidence out there. We have
4:13
Speaker 3: an excellent contact tracing system. We just not had to
4:15
Speaker 3: use it or really have had to use it, and
4:18
Speaker 3: we certainly haven't had to do any industrial scale contact
4:20
Speaker 3: tracing like jurisdictions down south, and our ability to trace
4:25
Speaker 3: quickly starts from our borders and so it puts us
4:27
Speaker 3: ahead of places like News Have Wales. We've got exceptional
4:30
Speaker 3: collection of data on our borders of who's coming into
4:33
Speaker 3: the normal territory. We also have a number of number
4:37
Speaker 3: of businesses and number premises are collecting data already, either
4:39
Speaker 3: as part of the already existing business model or as
4:42
Speaker 3: part of their COVID nineteen safe plan. So it's about
4:45
Speaker 3: plugging some gap. So we want to do this and
4:47
Speaker 3: do it right. But for me, it's an additional tool.
4:50
Speaker 3: It cannot be seen as a substitution for contact tracing.
4:53
Speaker 3: It does not preclude, as we've seen in this Have Wales,
4:56
Speaker 3: if there is contact tracing going on, they're still do
4:59
Speaker 3: a call out saying if you've been to F forty
5:01
Speaker 3: five reporting and as you will know, if forty five
5:03
Speaker 3: has an existing pretty good tap in or whatever the
5:06
Speaker 3: system is there, they know who's going to F forty five,
5:09
Speaker 3: but they still will put a call out saying if
5:11
Speaker 3: you've been in. So it's not a it's not a substitute,
5:13
Speaker 3: it's an additional tool. And so we've been looking at
5:16
Speaker 3: it for a little while now about adding it to
5:17
Speaker 3: our arsenal. For me, it's not about Victoria. It's about territory.
5:22
Speaker 3: How is it going to be police though, so I'll
5:24
Speaker 3: get onto that. So territories are about to start traveling
5:28
Speaker 3: a lot, I think over Christmas because they're missing their families,
5:31
Speaker 3: and so for me, it's about putting some systems in
5:33
Speaker 3: place for when territorianess start doing that and coming home,
5:36
Speaker 3: and about adding to it. We will be enforced, or
5:39
Speaker 3: so I should say, it will be like our previous
5:41
Speaker 3: measures we're done where police and environmental health officers be
5:43
Speaker 3: about early more on an education basis than a compliance basis.
5:47
Speaker 3: We suspect a lot of businesses will be trying to
5:49
Speaker 3: do the right thing, but on necessary nailing on the head,
5:51
Speaker 3: so that the first step will be to say, oh,
5:53
Speaker 3: if you tweak this or do it this way will
5:54
Speaker 3: be better, so go that. Obviously, if you fail the
5:56
Speaker 3: attitude test and you're clearly you know, not complet lying,
6:00
Speaker 3: fines and that exists, so five thousand for an interviewal
6:03
Speaker 3: twenty five thousand for it for a business, just as
6:05
Speaker 3: any other direct breach of the Choe direction, So it
6:07
Speaker 3: would be that's probably a good thing, be officially a
6:10
Speaker 3: direction of the Chief Health officer or all the penalties
6:13
Speaker 3: that apply for breaching a direction of the Chief Health officer.
6:16
Speaker 3: So that's how we will all allow that lay it out.
6:18
Speaker 3: We're also asking every premise to update their COVID nineteen
6:22
Speaker 3: safe plan every six months, so you've got to keep
6:24
Speaker 3: looking at and updating it. We're also asking everyone to
6:27
Speaker 3: essentially nominate one of their staff to be a COVID
6:29
Speaker 3: nineteen supervisory, which would be a common practice anyway for
6:33
Speaker 3: oh ands type issue, someone on staff who's training those things,
6:37
Speaker 3: just to make sure that people are aware of the
6:39
Speaker 3: safety plan, enforcing the safety plan, or doing the safety plan.
6:42
Speaker 3: So there would be an expectation internally that you'll do
6:45
Speaker 3: this too. I also think customers will vote with their feet.
6:47
Speaker 3: If we're doing some of these things and you go
6:49
Speaker 3: into a premise and you're thinking, ah, I just don't
6:50
Speaker 3: think this place is up to scratch, You'll vote with
6:52
Speaker 3: your feet.
6:53
Speaker 2: I reckon, Yeah, I agree with you.
6:55
Speaker 1: And we caught up with Alex Bruce from Hospitality last week.
6:58
Speaker 1: They're more than happy with this measure being implemented. In fact,
7:00
Speaker 1: they're incredibly cooperative in this space because they.
7:02
Speaker 2: Don't want to go through another lockdown.
7:05
Speaker 1: And a lot of these a lot of these different
7:07
Speaker 1: measures to me are quite common sense. But what about
7:10
Speaker 1: places like shopping centers and even your largest supermarkets. We're
7:14
Speaker 1: quite often you are there for longer than fifteen minutes.
7:17
Speaker 3: So the basic list we've chosen from is those businesses
7:21
Speaker 3: that were closed during COVID. That seems like a sensible
7:24
Speaker 3: place to start. We've added a couple in light headdresses.
7:27
Speaker 3: There are places of mass movement where we think that
7:30
Speaker 3: that kind of registration will be difficult, and considering we're
7:33
Speaker 3: we're not substituting out the need to say, if you've
7:36
Speaker 3: been to Woolies between these times, check in, so there
7:40
Speaker 3: is still that foursome contact tracing system. This is just
7:42
Speaker 3: an additional tool you go make sure it works if
7:46
Speaker 3: you put it into a spot like that that's very burdensome.
7:48
Speaker 3: You Magic casual and shop is where like thousands of
7:50
Speaker 3: people go through there in a day, or bus depots,
7:53
Speaker 3: So these are decisions made at the lockdown stage, right, Yeah,
7:56
Speaker 3: how do you shut down some of these things? So
7:58
Speaker 3: for us, it's about doing it in enough spots to
8:01
Speaker 3: plug the gaps to make sure it works, and then
8:03
Speaker 3: there'll be some general content tracing you've always got to
8:06
Speaker 3: do in terms of just putting out the alert saying
8:08
Speaker 3: if you've been to place X.
8:09
Speaker 1: Check in now just for the reassurance of Territorians, because
8:12
Speaker 1: I know that some people will be listening right now
8:14
Speaker 1: and thinking to themselves, hang on a second, are my
8:16
Speaker 1: personal information going to be passed on to different businesses
8:20
Speaker 1: for them to then send me marketing collateral and.
8:22
Speaker 2: Be used inappropriately?
8:25
Speaker 1: Is there going to be measures in place to ensure
8:27
Speaker 1: that territorians personal data is kept safe?
8:30
Speaker 3: Yep, So that was obviously dealt with in place to
8:32
Speaker 3: loar News have whales, so absolute assurance on that, and
8:35
Speaker 3: we've also said the businesses, we're not mandating a particular system.
8:38
Speaker 3: So the QR code works well. We probably prefer that
8:41
Speaker 3: because it's just nice and neat. But if you want
8:42
Speaker 3: to do pen and paper and manage that on site
8:46
Speaker 3: in a way that looks after people's privacy, that's okay too.
8:48
Speaker 3: So we can work with you through that. So you've
8:50
Speaker 3: got till now, from now until November thirty to work
8:52
Speaker 3: on how you intend to do it. But we're not
8:54
Speaker 3: going to stop you from doing a pen and paper
8:56
Speaker 3: method if you don't want to do the QR code method.
8:59
Speaker 1: Now I've also there's a question that continues to come
9:02
Speaker 1: through on the tech side about equipment at the hospital,
9:05
Speaker 1: particularly respirators, etc. At the hospital. Do we have all
9:09
Speaker 1: of the equipment that is required if we have an
9:12
Speaker 1: outbreak in the territory.
9:13
Speaker 3: Yes, so we've got a lot of equipment there and
9:16
Speaker 3: we've got the ability to scale up. There will come
9:19
Speaker 3: a point in any of the territory and state jurisdictions
9:23
Speaker 3: where you'd be worried, and that's one reason why we
9:25
Speaker 3: have quarantine and international quarantine is to make sure that
9:28
Speaker 3: people come in in such a rate that we know
9:29
Speaker 3: our public health system can handle it. So Sydney's made
9:32
Speaker 3: that same decision. One reason why they've got cap numbers
9:34
Speaker 3: of international rivals is essentially a formula about their public
9:37
Speaker 3: health system make sure we never run the risk of
9:40
Speaker 3: overwhelming it. So a lot of our decisions that we've
9:42
Speaker 3: made and New Zealand two the fact one reason why
9:44
Speaker 3: New Zealand went harder earlier than Australia was about their
9:47
Speaker 3: public health system to make sure it wasn't ever overwhelmed.
9:49
Speaker 3: So that's the decisions we've made to make sure that
9:51
Speaker 3: we can handle anything that comes into the territory. International
9:54
Speaker 3: is probably the greatest risk as we know, and we've
9:57
Speaker 3: got some you know, general numbers about how many will
10:00
Speaker 3: think on a flight will get COVID and how do
10:02
Speaker 3: you handle that internally within our system. Knowing that there's
10:06
Speaker 3: also been an offer on the table that if necessary,
10:08
Speaker 3: they can be repatriated to the state which they would
10:10
Speaker 3: ordinarily call home as well. We've seen some of that.
10:12
Speaker 3: So for us, we have got all the equipment we need.
10:15
Speaker 3: We are, though, making decisions to make sure we never
10:18
Speaker 3: overwhelmed that equipment.
10:19
Speaker 1: All right, We've got a lot of text messages coming
10:21
Speaker 1: through this morning, and not many of them about COVID,
10:24
Speaker 1: so we might push along and I want to ask you.
10:26
Speaker 1: We know that next week the budget is going to
10:28
Speaker 1: be handed down. We are all anticipating some big numbers
10:31
Speaker 1: when it comes to debt and deficit. One of the
10:33
Speaker 1: commitments which was made by your government was to cap
10:36
Speaker 1: public the public service numbers. As I understand it, there
10:39
Speaker 1: are now twenty eight hundred and thirty six full time
10:42
Speaker 1: equivalent public servants in the territory. We do know that
10:46
Speaker 1: the former Treasurer Nicole Madison announced that number would be
10:49
Speaker 1: capped at twenty one than three hundred and ninety five.
10:53
Speaker 1: Why does the public service continue to grow despite that cap.
10:58
Speaker 3: So what we said at the time we announced the
11:00
Speaker 3: original cap was if we have to make decisions as
11:02
Speaker 3: a cabinet, we will about adding to it. And we
11:06
Speaker 3: have made some deliberate decisions around you know, the one
11:08
Speaker 3: hundred staff we took on in the health sector, around
11:10
Speaker 3: the COVID border controls, the additional sixty six police plus
11:14
Speaker 3: adsumental liaismon officers, etc. For the borders. So they're all
11:19
Speaker 3: additional to the cap just for a starter. So we've
11:23
Speaker 3: made the hydraulic Fracturing Implementation Team. So we have made
11:26
Speaker 3: some decisions as a government to add to that cap
11:29
Speaker 3: where they were necessa and the case was made. So
11:33
Speaker 3: it's about managing your numbers. But what we've said is
11:35
Speaker 3: you as a CEO can't just whack on staff. You've
11:38
Speaker 3: got to make sure that you've got a case for it.
11:40
Speaker 2: So are all of the increases COVID related?
11:43
Speaker 3: A lot of them are, but they're all to the
11:44
Speaker 3: front line. That's probably the most important thing that we've
11:47
Speaker 3: made sure they've gone. Give you another example, there's a
11:50
Speaker 3: standing decision that if Health replaces an agency nurse with
11:54
Speaker 3: a full time nurse, they can add to their cap.
11:56
Speaker 3: We want to make sure there's no loopholes so agency
11:58
Speaker 3: nurses don't count on the cap, and so obviously we
12:03
Speaker 3: don't want Health to something go down this path of
12:05
Speaker 3: wacking on a whole lot of agency nurses and getting
12:07
Speaker 3: around the cap. We want them to know that if
12:09
Speaker 3: they substitute an agency nurse for a full time nurse,
12:11
Speaker 3: which is actually a better result for territories and their
12:13
Speaker 3: health needs in my opinion, that they can then add
12:16
Speaker 3: to their cap.
12:16
Speaker 2: So how many public servants do we have right now?
12:19
Speaker 3: So just below twenty two thousand is my read on it.
12:23
Speaker 3: We were actually had achieved a rare thing in the
12:27
Speaker 3: last ten years, and there's never been achieved before where
12:29
Speaker 3: we had the same amount of public servants at the
12:31
Speaker 3: same time last year. We had that just prior to COVID,
12:34
Speaker 3: so we had a brief moment of going the CAP's
12:36
Speaker 3: working and then COVID hit and then there was a
12:38
Speaker 3: significant increase obviously in public servants post COVID hitting.
12:40
Speaker 2: Are you wanting that number to come down slightly?
12:44
Speaker 3: It would really depends on the COVID response. So we're
12:46
Speaker 3: allowed for border controls to being placed between now and
12:49
Speaker 3: the next year, and that's still the plane at the
12:52
Speaker 3: moment right If some of those things were to change,
12:54
Speaker 3: then we might be able to bring it down. If
12:55
Speaker 3: some of those things were to continue on, we might
12:57
Speaker 3: have to maintain and where they are. So it's still
13:00
Speaker 3: got to be informed decision making about is that public
13:03
Speaker 3: servant that we're adding to the cap actually delivering a
13:05
Speaker 3: genuine service for territories and needed and you have to
13:07
Speaker 3: make a case.
13:08
Speaker 2: Now I understand as well.
13:09
Speaker 1: There was part of the wages policy which would have
13:12
Speaker 1: seen a one thousand dollars cap on any pay increases.
13:16
Speaker 1: Has that been implemented and if not, is it going
13:18
Speaker 1: to be implemented as part of the budget.
13:20
Speaker 3: So that remains our position. The EBA negotiations have actually
13:25
Speaker 3: started yet, so I guess the actual moment for implementation
13:27
Speaker 3: is when the EBAs agreed to and we're off so
13:30
Speaker 3: that but that is basically our wages policy will be
13:32
Speaker 3: formally adopted during the budget process. But we accepted that
13:36
Speaker 3: a couple of years back when lang Land's put it forward.
13:38
Speaker 3: So that is our policy position. But no EBAs come
13:41
Speaker 3: up for negotiations yet.
13:42
Speaker 1: Okay, so it is the policy position, but it hasn't
13:44
Speaker 1: actually been implemented yet.
13:46
Speaker 3: No, So obviously we're still within a current well there's
13:49
Speaker 3: more than one EBA in the public service, but we're
13:50
Speaker 3: within the current award agreement, so that makes sense. We're
13:53
Speaker 3: honoring what we said then, but as they come around
13:55
Speaker 3: to the next lot of negotiations, that will be our position.
13:58
Speaker 1: Okay, So is there going to be some measures in
14:00
Speaker 1: place as part of the budget. Can we expect for
14:02
Speaker 1: next week to try and rain in some of that
14:04
Speaker 1: spending within the public service.
14:05
Speaker 3: So we're still continuing all our budget repair measures. The
14:08
Speaker 3: biggest problem for the next budget we flagged this at
14:10
Speaker 3: the cronavirus fiscal report will be revenue so won't be
14:12
Speaker 3: expensure and every jurisdiction is going through the same thing. Basically,
14:18
Speaker 3: there was there was no money to be made. Businesses
14:20
Speaker 3: weren't turning over cash. Yeah, payroll went back was well,
14:22
Speaker 3: we even gave payroll relief your GST slump. So the
14:25
Speaker 3: biggest impact on the next budget will be hopefully a
14:28
Speaker 3: temporary one as a short lived one as Australia bounces
14:31
Speaker 3: back and essentially it recovers. But there'll be a massive
14:33
Speaker 3: whack to revenue based around you know, it'd be huge.
14:37
Speaker 3: As we flagg during the Crown Vis fiscal report, we're
14:39
Speaker 3: looking at a massive deficit because the revenue got smashed.
14:42
Speaker 1: How bad can we expect the budget to be next week?
14:45
Speaker 1: I mean, I know when we look at it from
14:46
Speaker 1: a federal scale, when the Treasurer of Josh Fridenberg handed
14:50
Speaker 1: his down, you know they were massive numbers.
14:53
Speaker 2: Are we expecting similar.
14:55
Speaker 3: I believe Josh said eye watering. I think you can
14:58
Speaker 3: safely say ours will be eye watering. I mean we've
15:00
Speaker 3: ragged over two billion dollar deficit in the Cravio fiscal report.
15:02
Speaker 3: Like that is you know, and is it more than that?
15:05
Speaker 3: Well that same areas, how do you get more than
15:08
Speaker 3: two bills? Anyway, It will be a massive deficit because
15:11
Speaker 3: we've had a massive whack to revenue and we've also
15:14
Speaker 3: deliberately made decisions as a government to take the hits
15:17
Speaker 3: so businesses didn't. So we've waived payroll and power and
15:21
Speaker 3: a range of things that might still trickle some money in,
15:24
Speaker 3: but we said we rather you keep that money than
15:26
Speaker 3: us take that money off of you at a time
15:27
Speaker 3: when you're doing it really tough and not We obviously
15:30
Speaker 3: also spent money on different stimulus measures to make sure
15:33
Speaker 3: people stayed in jobs. So we're about trying to we're
15:36
Speaker 3: holding the show together right now, yep. And that would
15:39
Speaker 3: be still reflecting the next budget, maybe even the budget after,
15:41
Speaker 3: because there's only a few months between the two budgets.
15:44
Speaker 3: So but we're basically in the exactly the same boats
15:46
Speaker 3: the Australian government right now. Safetisical strategy.
15:48
Speaker 1: Will there be other I mean, camp territories expect any
15:52
Speaker 1: incentives to be made throughout next week's budget. I know
15:55
Speaker 1: that it's not really a good time to be spending,
15:57
Speaker 1: but it is also a time, as we saw through
15:59
Speaker 1: the federal where you do need things to keep going,
16:03
Speaker 1: to keep the territory moving.
16:04
Speaker 3: You'll see us target jobs again. So for my opinions,
16:08
Speaker 3: some of the things I've really got to do for business,
16:10
Speaker 3: especially small business. Small businesses are the ones we most
16:13
Speaker 3: need to look after here. It's how do I increase
16:16
Speaker 3: demand to your business? How do I reduce costs to
16:18
Speaker 3: your business? How do I help you your supply chain?
16:21
Speaker 3: How do I help you with your workers? So we
16:23
Speaker 3: have got this odd position in the territory in the
16:26
Speaker 3: middle of a recession. We've got a heap of job
16:28
Speaker 3: vacancies out there, We've got jobs going. So how do
16:31
Speaker 3: I help you as a small business on your workers front,
16:33
Speaker 3: on your cost front, on your money through the door front,
16:36
Speaker 3: on your supply chains. A bit of an issue that's
16:38
Speaker 3: coming through as well. So we'll be looking at some
16:40
Speaker 3: of those measures that really help businesses and through businesses jobs.
16:44
Speaker 1: Now. Obviously we've spoken about public service numbers. One of
16:47
Speaker 1: the areas where numbers continue to be a bit of
16:50
Speaker 1: a concern though, is the police force. We caught up
16:52
Speaker 1: with the Police Association last week and President Paul McHugh
16:56
Speaker 1: flagged with us that almost ten officers are leaving a month.
17:01
Speaker 2: Are you concerned about these numbers?
17:03
Speaker 3: We never want police to leave. But my understanding, the
17:06
Speaker 3: vice remains are saying from the police commissioner, is that
17:08
Speaker 3: we're recruiting above attrition, and so we've got we've bring
17:12
Speaker 3: more police in than we lose, which has been the
17:15
Speaker 3: case now for four or so years under us. We
17:18
Speaker 3: have a turnover in the territory public service full stop.
17:20
Speaker 3: Unfortunately just Territorians turn over. But my understanding remains that
17:25
Speaker 3: we recruit above attrition.
17:27
Speaker 1: Why do you reckon we're losing police officers? Why do
17:29
Speaker 1: you reckon they are choosing to leave?
17:31
Speaker 3: So I know that, well, there's a general territorians leaving
17:34
Speaker 3: to be a family sort of thing, but I do
17:36
Speaker 3: no specifically to police. At the moment. There's a massive
17:38
Speaker 3: recruitment exercise on for most other states so looking to
17:41
Speaker 3: seriously vols to the size of their police forces. So
17:43
Speaker 3: that's always attractive and so a particular point in time
17:47
Speaker 3: right now where other states are looking to expand as
17:49
Speaker 3: we are, we're putting extra police on too because i've
17:51
Speaker 3: border control. So I think every jurisdiction is going through
17:53
Speaker 3: a similar similar process at the moment. But mind standing is,
17:57
Speaker 3: you know Unfortunately, Territorians sometimes feel the cooler family who
18:01
Speaker 3: live down south and grandparents of kids and stuff like that.
18:03
Speaker 2: Are you worried we will lose more of our police officers?
18:06
Speaker 3: Well, based off historical attrition, we will continue to lose
18:09
Speaker 3: public servants full stomp or as business has the same issue,
18:14
Speaker 3: but we are still recruiting more than we're losing remains.
18:16
Speaker 3: That made my understanding.
18:17
Speaker 1: Now I've just got a couple of messages here from listeners.
18:19
Speaker 1: I'll read one of those out. It says another break
18:21
Speaker 1: in at the Palmerston Oasis shopping center last night. Can
18:24
Speaker 1: you please ask the Chief Minister when is his government
18:26
Speaker 1: going to do something about this?
18:28
Speaker 3: So we obviously just been talking about police. We've got
18:31
Speaker 3: people working at the pointy end about reducing crime. They're
18:34
Speaker 3: doing really excellent work through that property crime space. One
18:37
Speaker 3: crime is a crime too many, don't get me wrong,
18:39
Speaker 3: but we do take it seriously. Please be doing significant
18:42
Speaker 3: work to make sure we try and keep property crime
18:43
Speaker 3: levels low. Unfortunately, we still see crime and we don't
18:48
Speaker 3: want that. And if you do do it, we will
18:51
Speaker 3: catch you. There will be a significant consequence. We make
18:54
Speaker 3: sure there's more choices of consequence. So it's creative and
18:58
Speaker 3: it does more to break the cycle. But we will
19:01
Speaker 3: take this seriously. We all keep doing everything we can
19:04
Speaker 3: to catch the person who does it and do the
19:05
Speaker 3: work to stop it.
19:06
Speaker 1: There's another one here, this time about Karama. It says,
19:08
Speaker 1: can you please ask the Chief Minister what is going
19:10
Speaker 1: to be done about muggings and bashings in Karama. People
19:14
Speaker 1: have had enough and are going to start to take
19:16
Speaker 1: matters into their own hands soon enough.
19:20
Speaker 3: I'll talk of police specifically about Karma. Crime doesn't come
19:22
Speaker 3: up as often as Palmeston, Palmerston or Alice, but like when,
19:27
Speaker 3: but there has raised issues from time and time about
19:29
Speaker 3: the shopping center and people and how they behave through
19:31
Speaker 3: that shopping center. We've talked to the shopping center owner
19:34
Speaker 3: out there, something we do also take seriously. I was
19:37
Speaker 3: speaking to Nai yesterday actually just about how things were
19:40
Speaker 3: going in Krama and what support she needed. And we
19:43
Speaker 3: are arranging, as always police to talk with the shopping
19:46
Speaker 3: center owner. How do we manage that. We've done CCTV
19:48
Speaker 3: things in the past where we put the cameras in
19:50
Speaker 3: the right spots to make sure that we can identify
19:52
Speaker 3: and catch people who are doing the wrong thing. Just
19:55
Speaker 3: on the note about taking things in your own hands.
19:57
Speaker 3: My message the same as what polices is, which is
20:01
Speaker 3: please don't The chance of you're making mistake about who
20:06
Speaker 3: you might choose to do that with is high, and
20:10
Speaker 3: police are highly trained in how to do this. We
20:12
Speaker 3: don't want you getting into trouble yourself. Don't do that,
20:17
Speaker 3: be really careful, don't make sure you don't get hurt either,
20:20
Speaker 3: like the chance of hurting yourself as high too, But
20:22
Speaker 3: please let police do the job called police.
20:24
Speaker 1: Yeah, Chief, I have just received a text message from
20:28
Speaker 1: a police officer and it says I'm a serving member
20:31
Speaker 1: and it is because of a huge lack of support
20:33
Speaker 1: from our management, Our associations gutless and our commissioner is
20:36
Speaker 1: more worried about pursuing members than offenders. I'm more than
20:39
Speaker 1: happy to have a talk to the Chief Minister about it.
20:42
Speaker 1: That's obviously on members leaving. It does sound as though
20:46
Speaker 1: it is something that you know that is a concern
20:49
Speaker 1: within the force.
20:50
Speaker 3: I'm always happy to take advice on what support people
20:53
Speaker 3: might need. Every public serment requires some level of support.
20:58
Speaker 3: As a boss myself, I know I'm aware that my
21:00
Speaker 3: troops might complain about me occasionally, so you do need
21:04
Speaker 3: to take some of that stuff seriously always and provide
21:05
Speaker 3: the ability for people to be able to pass information on.
21:09
Speaker 3: What probably stays me most about that statement is the
21:12
Speaker 3: person feels that it's the Commission, Management and Association, so
21:16
Speaker 3: that you know where do you turn to in that
21:18
Speaker 3: in that sense, so obviously always happy, there's there's a
21:22
Speaker 3: there's a percema process. I've got it, very careful about,
21:24
Speaker 3: but always happy to take advice.
21:25
Speaker 1: Chief Minister Michael Gunner, we better leave it there. Are
21:28
Speaker 1: always good to catch up with you. Thanks so much
21:30
Speaker 1: for your time this morning and extensively talking us through
21:32
Speaker 1: all of those changes and taking those questions from our listeners.
21:35
Speaker 2: Thank you, thank you.
21:36
Speaker 1: You are listening to Mix one O four point nine's
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Speaker 1: three sixty