Latest / 360 with Katie Woolf / Katie Woolf spoke with Former Territory Attorney General Daryl Manzie on the call for an ICAC overhaul.

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Katie Woolf spoke with Former Territory Attorney General Daryl Manzie on the call for an ICAC overhaul. · 360 with Katie Woolf

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  Speaker 1: Mix one O four point nine dot com DOTU for
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  Speaker 1: all the latest news and information Now three sixty with
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  Speaker 1: Katie Wolf. Everyone is listening Mix one oh four point
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  Speaker 1: nine one and we are.
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  Speaker 2: Coming to you live this morning from the Darwin Waterfront
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  Speaker 2: for one of the very popular driver signing sessions with
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  Speaker 2: both the supercars drivers and the Australian superbikes riders involved
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  Speaker 2: in well several activities in the lead up.
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  Speaker 3: To the Merlin Darwin Triple Crown.
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  Speaker 2: And from one o'clock today they will all be down
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  Speaker 2: here and you'll be able to get your merch signed.
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  Speaker 2: But plenty happening down here before then. Now in the
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  Speaker 2: Northern Territory News today it is being reported that three
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  Speaker 2: former Attorney generals have called for an overhaul of the
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  Speaker 2: Territori's anti corruption watchdog. And joining me on the line
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  Speaker 2: right now is one of those former Attorney generals and
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  Speaker 2: very well known voice around the Northern Territory, Darryl Mansey.
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  Speaker 4: Good morning, good morning. How are you the sports thing?
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  Speaker 2: Very well, Daryl, Great to have you on the show now.
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  Speaker 2: I know I am reading in the paper today that
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  Speaker 2: three of our former Attorney generals yourself included, calling for
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  Speaker 2: an overhaul of the IKAK, Daryl, why do you think
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  Speaker 2: that this is necessary?
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  Speaker 4: Oh jeez, there's a feeling of this, Katie, And I mean,
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  Speaker 4: I'll just run through a few of them. Obviously, the
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  Speaker 4: fact that the way the ICACH is structured at the moment,
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  Speaker 4: there appears to be a minister for the IKAK and
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  Speaker 4: all reports go through that minister before they go to
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  Speaker 4: the parliament. Now, the ICAC should never ever be connected
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  Speaker 4: to government in any way because one of its tasks
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  Speaker 4: will be obviously investigated government at certain times, compared to
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  Speaker 4: a constation of the complaints. Now, that's the first thing
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  Speaker 4: that needs to be independent and seemed to be independent
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  Speaker 4: at the moment. It appears to a lot of people
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  Speaker 4: or as an arm of government, and the way the
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  Speaker 4: legislative structs it, it is an arm of government. So
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  Speaker 4: that's the first instance the total independence and the perception
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  Speaker 4: of independence has to be there. Secondly, the ICAK is
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  Speaker 4: I guess, has powers that are greater than anything that
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  Speaker 4: any government organization has. It's almost equal to the Grand
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  Speaker 4: Tomino Bay Cuba CIA operation in terms of their powers
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  Speaker 4: to question people, to detain people. There beyond anything that
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  Speaker 4: the police or Supreme Court judges have in the operation
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  Speaker 4: of their duty. I mean a detective who's investigating rapes
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  Speaker 4: or murders, pedophilia, you know, any of these things, they
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  Speaker 4: don't have the powers of the IKAQ. So those powers
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  Speaker 4: are very very strong and they need to be handled
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  Speaker 4: absolutely without any sort of suspicions of bias or anything
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  Speaker 4: at all. Now we've seen I guess we've seen recently
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  Speaker 4: just yesterday or the day before the Yesterdays committee, we
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  Speaker 4: saw we saw the ICAC commissioner actually threatening a alleged whistleblower.
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  Speaker 4: I mean, they haven't even detailed yet the finalization of
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  Speaker 4: an investigation into that by the Independent Assessor of icacos
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  Speaker 4: a senior Sydney senior counsel. But the ICAC Commissioner really
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  Speaker 4: gave her a terrible saw him a terrible serve and
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  Speaker 4: mad all sorts of comments about them and their role
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  Speaker 4: and why they were aren't reliable, all sorts of things. Now,
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  Speaker 4: that's something that shows immediately not only a bias, but
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  Speaker 4: it was a bullying, threatening type of comments that were
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  Speaker 4: made by him. Now that's just not on. And the
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  Speaker 4: other thing is that he made effect to a journalist
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  Speaker 4: and he told the journalist I've got more powers than
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  Speaker 4: a judge, and you have no protection against me, and
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  Speaker 4: I'm feeling I may actually I could question you behind
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  Speaker 4: closed doors and deal with you. Now, that's not the
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  Speaker 4: sort of behavior of expect from someone who shows no
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  Speaker 4: bias is independent. That is threatening behavior and using and
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  Speaker 4: abusing or threatening to abuse the powers that he has. Now,
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  Speaker 4: I think all that's tied together with legislation, So the
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  Speaker 4: legislation needs dealing with to set up what should be
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  Speaker 4: a totally independent operation. Now, the second thing that I
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  Speaker 4: think we need to be aware of this man actually
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  Speaker 4: makes some very unfortunate comments after a recent to a
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  Speaker 4: death during the apprehension of a person in Yuan Debout,
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  Speaker 4: and they were public and he refused to recognize that
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  Speaker 4: there was a bias being shown by him towards the situation,
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  Speaker 4: and he had to be forced to stand down from
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  Speaker 4: that by the independent assess of the guy from Sydney
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  Speaker 4: the Senior Council. Now, yeah, he should he should have
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  Speaker 4: understood that straight off. And in fact, at the time
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  Speaker 4: I said he had not only to step down there,
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  Speaker 4: he needed to step down and retire because he's lost
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  Speaker 4: the confidence of territorians that, in a nutshell are the
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  Speaker 4: reasons that.
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  Speaker 3: Well, and Daryld there is a lot to unpack from that.
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  Speaker 2: I know that yesterday, you know, i'd felt very surprised
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  Speaker 2: when I saw this, you know, when i'd seen it
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  Speaker 2: also when i'd spoken to Matt Cunningham about that situation
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  Speaker 2: where you know, where the ik Commissioner had said that
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  Speaker 2: he could be forced to reveal the I mean that
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  Speaker 2: goes against everything that obviously we're trained as journalists to
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  Speaker 2: do when it goes against our code of ethics. But
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  Speaker 2: just to sort of, you know, just to I guess,
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  Speaker 2: get to the bottom of this. Do you think, I mean,
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  Speaker 2: is it necessary as the new KAC commissioner comes in
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  Speaker 2: that that a review is undertaken, or do you think
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  Speaker 2: that this needs to happen sooner rather than later. We
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  Speaker 2: do know that there is going to be a changing
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  Speaker 2: of the hands in the next couple of weeks.
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  Speaker 4: Anyway, well, I think really we need to be the
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  Speaker 4: government of the day should be stepping back and not
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  Speaker 4: worrying about any knowledge or relationships, step back and say
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  Speaker 4: what do we have the IKAC for. What's it for.
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  Speaker 4: It's supposed to be reading out corruption at the highest level.
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  Speaker 4: Now to date, we haven't seen that we've seen some
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  Speaker 4: minor little things, and even those of haven't proceeded with
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  Speaker 4: any further than comments by the Yekak officer claiming corruption, etc.
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  Speaker 4: But no prosecutions have been launched. Now, we had a
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  Speaker 4: very capable process in place which looked at all this
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  Speaker 4: sort of thing over well. Ever since the territory has
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  Speaker 4: been self governing, and we've seen police commissioners prosecuted and jailed.
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  Speaker 4: We've seen senior police officers, we've seen public servants all
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  Speaker 4: eventually ended up in court. Now there's been before that
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  Speaker 4: this meant that the system was working. There was a
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  Speaker 4: lot of claims, of course, that were unsubstantiated about our
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  Speaker 4: corruption and this, that and the other, but none of
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  Speaker 4: that has come to fruition. Now we're spending many millions
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  Speaker 4: of dollars in running a situation here an office to investigate,
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  Speaker 4: when I think a very very high level police unit
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  Speaker 4: has the same capacity, probably a greater investigative capacity than
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  Speaker 4: the EYEKAC would have because these people are trained in it.
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  Speaker 4: And we saw the National Crime Authority formed which did
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  Speaker 4: an extremely good job in the days of looking into
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  Speaker 4: all these things. So I think we'd be better off
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  Speaker 4: looking at that to get the result we want rather
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  Speaker 4: than copying what happens in the state. And it's not working.
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  Speaker 4: And I guess look, we just saw that that example
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  Speaker 4: of an employee of IKAK, a senior employee employee his
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  Speaker 4: own reality. Now that just that doesn't matter what the
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  Speaker 4: rules say. And mister Fleming's been very clear he says
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  Speaker 4: we don't have to comply with Northern Territory procurement rules
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  Speaker 4: and processes, including employments now responsibly. Instead he's endorsed that
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  Speaker 4: employment which wouldn't pass the pub test anywhere. And that's
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  Speaker 4: is one of the problems. We've got a man with
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  Speaker 4: massive powers who thinks he can just ride along and
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  Speaker 4: use all that power to ensure that he's got smooth sailing.
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  Speaker 4: It's just it's pretty bad when you step back and
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  Speaker 4: look at it.
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  Speaker 2: Well, Daryl Mansey, I'll tell you what plenty for us
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  Speaker 2: to think about this morning.
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  Speaker 3: We are going to have to leave it there. We've
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  Speaker 3: got a lot lined up for this morning.
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  Speaker 2: I really appreciate your time and really appreciate your perspective.
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  Speaker 2: Code that's Daryl Mansey there, of course, well, former broadcaster
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  Speaker 2: but also former Attorney General for the Northern Territory and
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  Speaker 2: he along with two other Attorney general's former Attorney Generals
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  Speaker 2: i should say in the Northern Territory Chris Burns and
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  Speaker 2: also John L. Frank So from both sides of the fence,
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  Speaker 2: both Labor and the COLP, saying that they do think
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  Speaker 2: that there needs to be an overhaul of the Eyekack,
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  Speaker 2: you know, fairly strong words that you'd have to say
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  Speaker 2: from Daryl as well, really pointing out that it wouldn't
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  Speaker 2: just be about an overhaul, he's actually wondering whether we
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  Speaker 2: need to go back, whether we should be abolishing and
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  Speaker 2: going back to it a totally different, totally different authority
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  Speaker 2: through the Northern Territory Police in order to deal with
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  Speaker 2: these types of investigations.
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  Speaker 3: Keen to hear your thoughts this morning.
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  Speaker 2: You can send us a text message if you'd like to,
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  Speaker 2: and that text lineer we'll just read it out to
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  Speaker 2: it is zero four one eight nine five seven three
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  Speaker 2: six ' nine