Latest / 360 with Katie Woolf / The Week That Was (13 August 2021)

Transcript

The Week That Was (13 August 2021) · 360 with Katie Woolf

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Speaker 1: The top ends tied times in an outboard marine is
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Speaker 1: dain time of Quintrex bar crushes, Stabby Craft, Premium alloy
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Speaker 1: boats and world leading Yamaha outboards. Today we are expecting
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Speaker 1: a high tide of seven point one meters at nine
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Speaker 1: to ten today in Darwin. Right now it's on twenty
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Speaker 1: five degrees, twenty five in the rural area and twenty
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Speaker 1: four degrees in Catherine. And it is time for the
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Speaker 1: week that was proudly brought to you by the Silver
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Speaker 1: Hebron Lawyers, your local lawyers and also broadcasting on eighth
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Speaker 1: in Alice Springs and in the studio with us this morning.
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Speaker 1: We've got the opposition leader, Leofanocchiaro.
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Speaker 2: Good morning, Good morning everyone. Happy Friday, Yeah.
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Speaker 3: Happy Friday.
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Speaker 4: We've got Sky News Northern Territory Bureau Chiefs a week.
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Speaker 2: Call you, Matt coming out, call me excellent.
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Speaker 4: I'm.
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Speaker 5: I wouldn't know.
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Speaker 1: We've got Robin Lamley, the Independent Member for Aarra Loo
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Speaker 1: and goodboding Robert.
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Speaker 6: Thanks Katie, good to be here.
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Speaker 1: And we've got Natasha Files, the Minister for Health and
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Speaker 1: Leader of Government Business.
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Speaker 4: Good morning morning, Robin and I are sharing a microphends
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Speaker 4: if I go quiet.
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Speaker 3: It's because Robin was cuddling up to each other.
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Speaker 4: World today, well, I do not necessarily used today as respectful.
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Speaker 1: Well, look, we might actually start with Parliament and we
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Speaker 1: would have to say that the Northern Territory Parliament descended
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Speaker 1: and descended, I should say, into a bit of a
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Speaker 1: farce earlier in the week, I think with the Speaker
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Speaker 1: struggling to control proceedings during question time. We know that
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Speaker 1: the opposition tempted to censure the government over the twelve
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Speaker 1: million dollar doll and Turf Club grandstand. But well, discussion
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Speaker 1: really descended into a bit of a cage match.
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Speaker 3: Leah.
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Speaker 1: You and you were angered by the fact that Michael
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Speaker 1: Gonna refuse to answer questions about that twelve million dollar grant.
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Speaker 1: You said that really, you know, he wasn't answering any
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Speaker 1: of the questions that you wanted answered. I know then
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Speaker 1: that the government was going you about the fires a
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Speaker 1: vaccine and saying that you think it should be sent
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Speaker 1: to Sydney rather than staying here.
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Speaker 3: In the territory.
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Speaker 1: Now, I think it's safe to say that we're pretty
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Speaker 1: use to you two having a bit of arji bargie
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Speaker 1: in the studio.
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Speaker 3: There's no doubt about that. But it was pretty crappy.
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Speaker 1: Behavior, you know, in terms of the number of times,
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Speaker 1: like no one seemed to be able to get a
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Speaker 1: question out or an answer out without someone saying standing order,
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Speaker 1: whatever it is, Fizy or whatever it is. Leah and
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Speaker 1: I thought, how are you actually meant to discuss anything
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Speaker 1: that Territorians actually care about?
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Speaker 2: Well, it's impossible when you operate in a dictatorship. And
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Speaker 2: that's exactly what we saw this week in parliament. You know,
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Speaker 2: the truth hurts, The truth hurts, and that's what we saw.
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Speaker 2: They didn't want to hear it. We always interrupted twenty
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Speaker 2: times in one speech. In question time, it was just
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Speaker 2: interjection after interjection. We could barely get a question out.
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Speaker 2: And of course, so so Tuesday Wednesday turf club questions,
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Speaker 2: plenty questions there for the government to answer around giving
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Speaker 2: away twelve million dollars. Absolutely just talked around the question,
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Speaker 2: never got to the meat of it. We tried to
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Speaker 2: center the government into a debate on Tuesday. They just
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Speaker 2: gagged us and shut it down. We tried to debate
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Speaker 2: it in our own parliamentary time. So the opposition and
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Speaker 2: Independence get their own little piece of time. That's not
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Speaker 2: government's time. They shut us down in our own time,
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Speaker 2: which is extraordinary and I think unprecedented. And so yeah,
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Speaker 2: we did see really bad behavior to gag debate and
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Speaker 2: only talk about what the government wants to talk about
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Speaker 2: because they don't want to talk about giving away thirty
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Speaker 2: five million cold yellow at the hospital.
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Speaker 1: I mean, they were quick to say that you stormed
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Speaker 1: out of parliament.
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Speaker 2: Later, Yeah, that's right, which is wrong, which is absolutely wrong.
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Speaker 2: And actually Natasha knows she's not even allowed to say that,
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Speaker 2: and she got pulled up by the speaker. So, as
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Speaker 2: I've said before, towards the end of question, it was
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Speaker 2: like ten five minutes to go, which is very normal.
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Speaker 2: I went over to my whip, who's the person who
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Speaker 2: know you did it? Yes? I did, I absolutely did,
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Speaker 2: and everyone saw it. There's all witnesses there. I said
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Speaker 2: to Josh, have you got this because we had like
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Speaker 2: three questions to go, and I walked out. You Natasha
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Speaker 2: then were hysterical screaming at me across the chamber. I
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Speaker 2: was standing at the door. I literally had the door open.
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Speaker 2: I jeered back at you and proceeded through the door.
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Speaker 2: So that's what really happened. Government and trying to deflect
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Speaker 2: and do anything they can to make this about me
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Speaker 2: and not about them.
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Speaker 4: My side of the story is here we go.
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Speaker 1: Well, please don't call me mum, but yeah, look, I
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Speaker 1: think the really interesting thing that I found throughout question
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Speaker 1: time is whenever the Opposition did actually ask a question
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Speaker 1: about the twelve million dollar Grantstone grant is that there
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Speaker 1: was very clearly pre prepared responses from the government that
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Speaker 1: were either read out or were one sentence answers. Now
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Speaker 1: to me, I know that this can be sort of
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Speaker 1: you know, you can sort of look at this however
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Speaker 1: however you like, but Jerry Wood pointed it out I
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Speaker 1: think very well to me earlier in the week when
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Speaker 1: he said a good government actually uses a center motion
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Speaker 1: to be able to explain their side of why they've
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Speaker 1: made a decision, or to be able to turn it
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Speaker 1: around so that people can actually understand why they've made
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Speaker 1: a decision. Now, the fact that that was actually shut down,
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Speaker 1: to me, sort of sees more about that decision and
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Speaker 1: that the government's incredibly worried about what they do or
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Speaker 1: do not say inside of Parliament without question. I mean,
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Speaker 1: I don't know, like I don't know what you think, Matt,
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Speaker 1: I know you've been covering politics for a long time.
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Speaker 7: Make one good point you make, and I think it
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Speaker 7: goes to Jerry Wood's point as well, and this goes
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Speaker 7: through this whole process. If they made the decision to
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Speaker 7: give the twelve million dollars to the turf Club, well
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Speaker 7: then yes they should own it and they should explain
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Speaker 7: why they did it. Now there might be perfectly good
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Speaker 7: reasons that they can put forward as to why they
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Speaker 7: did it. Remember when this controversy first blew up, and
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Speaker 7: you know, they were proud of that decision and they
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Speaker 7: called the cop Jo jobs noobs for criticizing it. So
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Speaker 7: you know what happened to that approach, because that's what
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Speaker 7: I remember from twenty nineteen and twenty twenty. So if
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Speaker 7: that's what they believe, then why didn't they use that
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Speaker 7: opportunity to go there and say it again. We believe
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Speaker 7: that twelve million dollars was a good project because it
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Speaker 7: was going to create jobs during the construction of that project,
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Speaker 7: and it was going to bring tourists to the Northern Territory. Instead,
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Speaker 7: following this Ichack report, they've dropped the whole thing like
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Speaker 7: a hot scone and they're trying to sort of, you know,
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Speaker 7: point fingers everywhere else but at themselves. And I think
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Speaker 7: the handling of it from the word go was off
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Speaker 7: the mark. The way that they came out and said,
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Speaker 7: well that the board's got to resign, and if they
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Speaker 7: don't resign and we're going to change legislation to have
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Speaker 7: them sacked, well that's going to end in a mess too,
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Speaker 7: because I don't think that the people that they want to.
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Speaker 5: Get off the board are all going to get off
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Speaker 5: the board. And then where are we going to be at.
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Speaker 7: We're going to have a situation where the government's going
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Speaker 7: to be forced to change legislation that's going to affect
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Speaker 7: every club in the Northern Territory.
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Speaker 4: So in terms of the center, the leader of the
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Speaker 4: opposition completely failed to deliver it. She attempted a number
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Speaker 4: of times where yesterdays saw her successfully.
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Speaker 2: That is an actual lie. That is an actual lie.
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Speaker 2: And what why I read my censure? We sent and
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Speaker 2: new and then the speaker said do you accept the censure?
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Speaker 4: And then you said no, you it took you about
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Speaker 4: seven attempts because you interrupted me that many times.
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Speaker 2: I had fifteen secure and lie except here and lie that's.
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Speaker 3: Ridiculous, and explain it.
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Speaker 2: You said no. If I hadn't have delivered it, you
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Speaker 2: wouldn't have been able to say no.
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Speaker 1: So I did my bit, you did your The fact
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Speaker 1: of the matter is, like you just said, match, I
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Speaker 1: don't think people are too concerned about, you know, about
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Speaker 1: the goings on inside Parliament House. But what they are
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Speaker 1: concerned about is that then those questions weren't actually answered
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Speaker 1: now and I think that that is the big thing here.
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Speaker 1: It's quite foolish of the government to think that everyday
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Speaker 1: territorians don't actually want to know some of the answers
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Speaker 1: to this, and there there are there are still a
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Speaker 1: lot of gray areas here. You know, there's questions that
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Speaker 1: we've put to the Chief Minister that then when we've
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Speaker 1: you know, specifically about who'd taken that post obviously into
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Speaker 1: cabinet where he had said I take responsibility for it,
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Speaker 1: but didn't actually say that it was him, and then
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Speaker 1: FALSI we know that both you and Diva Laula confirmed
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Speaker 1: that it was him. You know, there was gray areas there.
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Speaker 1: So then when you start to scratch around and you
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Speaker 1: can see that there's gray areas even on who took
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Speaker 1: it into cabinet. You go, well, hang on a second,
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Speaker 1: what other gray areas are they here that you know
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Speaker 1: that you need some clarification on. But again I will
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Speaker 1: say that if it is a good decision that's been made,
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Speaker 1: then you shouldn't be worried about getting scrutinized inside of Parliament.
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Speaker 2: And every government is responsible accountable to the parliament. In
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Speaker 2: our Westminster system, every government goes to Parliament to be responsible.
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Speaker 2: And we've only got thirty days a year and they're
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Speaker 2: shutting us down in those precious thirty days.
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Speaker 6: What happened in Parliament during the week really was quite appalling,
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Speaker 6: and the only people that were impressed by it were
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Speaker 6: the government. They do have the power, we know that,
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Speaker 6: and they shut us down pretty much at every turn. Look,
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Speaker 6: I think you've got to put this into perspective. People
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Speaker 6: like me travel vast distances, take a lot of time
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Speaker 6: to get here. It cost tax pays a lot of
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Speaker 6: money to run Parliament to make it happen for the
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Speaker 6: people of the Northern Territory, and for us to be
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Speaker 6: shut down at every turn to talk about things that
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Speaker 6: matter to our constituents is ethically and morally wrong. Now,
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Speaker 6: the government will always have the final say, and I'm
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Speaker 6: not going to lose any sleep over this. It is
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Speaker 6: what it is. It is wrong, but people like Natasha
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Speaker 6: make that decision every day in Parliament, every minute of
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Speaker 6: every day in parliament, and it's just wrong. But I
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Speaker 6: need to move on, like I'm not going to spend
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Speaker 6: a lot of time worrying about this when my town
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Speaker 6: has got all sorts of troubles around crime, around the
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Speaker 6: fact that the tourism industry is collapsing. This sort of
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Speaker 6: staff is semantics, it's bs and people know that what
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Speaker 6: Matt said is absolutely true.
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Speaker 2: But Robin also, you know what it does is it's
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Speaker 2: not the government shutting me down or you down, or
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Speaker 2: keys you down, or one of my team down or
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Speaker 2: y near down. It's shutting our community down. We're all
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Speaker 2: there as equals. We come ready and loaded, representing five
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Speaker 2: thousand people each. That's what we all represent. And so
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Speaker 2: when we come to Parliament, when we come to Parliament,
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Speaker 2: we have to go in with those people in mind.
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Speaker 2: That's what we're there for. So when governments stop us
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Speaker 2: from being able to have a say, it's.
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Speaker 4: Actually it's actually hours and hours of parliament in questions
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Speaker 4: who we represented Parliament.
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Speaker 2: It's not ourselves we represent, but.
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Speaker 3: We certainly the questions.
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Speaker 4: We had hours of debate and you failed. There was
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Speaker 4: a motion that was presented. You got up on the
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Speaker 4: cheeresday and you said I'm going to change that motion
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Speaker 4: and we went no worries, and then you were so
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Speaker 4: disorganized you got up an hour before you're meant to
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Speaker 4: read the motion.
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Speaker 2: By I'm sorry, can I can I from the wrong
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Speaker 2: that just happened there? I followed exactly parliamentary procedure, which
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Speaker 2: is at two o'clock give notice. I'm sorry, that's not true.
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Speaker 4: That is absolutely here and so we will be discussing
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Speaker 4: the issues that every day people care about. So we're
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Speaker 4: going to take a very short break and we're going
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Speaker 4: to be speaking about what is top of mind I
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Speaker 4: think for a lot of people at the moment, and
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Speaker 4: that is you th running a.
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Speaker 1: Mark around our CBD. I know that a few of
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Speaker 1: us pulled up even before we got to work this
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Speaker 1: morning on this. So if you are keen to send
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Speaker 1: us a message, zero four three nine two three eight
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Speaker 1: eight one eight is the number.
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Speaker 3: Love to hear from you today.
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Speaker 1: Also broadcasting on eighth in Alice Springs, it is just
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Speaker 1: on nineteen minutes after nine o'clock. And if you've just
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Speaker 1: joined us, it is the week that was leofanocuiio Matt Cunningham,
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Speaker 1: Robin Lamley and Natasha Files in the studio with us
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Speaker 1: now topic which is well and truly become back on
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Speaker 1: the agenda, and I don't know if it ever really
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Speaker 1: fell off the agenda, to be honest, is the issue
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Speaker 1: that we've seen around the territory, not just here in
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Speaker 1: the top end, but certainly in Alice Springs and everywhere
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Speaker 1: when it comes to youth crime. Now, Earlier in the week,
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Speaker 1: we actually took a phone call from well known businessman
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Speaker 1: Jason Hannah, who'd been in contact with us about some
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Speaker 1: of the issues that he is seeing around the city.
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Speaker 1: If you miss that, take a listen to just part
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Speaker 1: of what Jason told us.
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Speaker 8: Mate. Look, something something is amissed, something's not right. You know,
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Speaker 8: there's there's definitely an increase in these juveniles that are
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Speaker 8: in the city late at night in large groups young
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Speaker 8: you know, like eight, twelve, fourteen years old. You know,
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Speaker 8: they're they're literally terrorizing you know, the tourists. There's you know,
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Speaker 8: they're they're harassing people for their scooters.
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Speaker 4: You know, there's there's.
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Speaker 8: Assault that's happening. You know, there's a lot of loud
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Speaker 8: sort of verbalizing threats. It's gotten worse now.
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Speaker 1: Like I said, I'm not foolish enough to think that
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Speaker 1: this is only happening in one location, Robin, I know
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Speaker 1: that this is something that's been high on the agenda
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Speaker 1: for you when you talk about Central Australia for an
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Speaker 1: awful long time. How are things going at the moment
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Speaker 1: in Alice Springs.
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Speaker 6: Look pretty much the same, Katie. What's interesting for me
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Speaker 6: is watching and listening to what's happening in Darwin, because
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Speaker 6: it's almost like it's happening to you guys now to
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Speaker 6: the same level that we've been experiencing for a long time.
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Speaker 5: To start paying attention, well exactly.
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Speaker 2: When things happened when the government mats. Some of us
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Speaker 2: have been paying attention for a long time. Of course,
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Speaker 2: people in Alice Springs have been suffering terribly, but people
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Speaker 2: right around the territory are And you know, now we've
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Speaker 2: got young people who think they're untouchable, they're completely above
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Speaker 2: the law because the Gunner government won't do anything about it.
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Speaker 2: They've weakened bail, they've weakened all the rules around youth justice,
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Speaker 2: and as a result, there's this group of us just
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Speaker 2: Jason's right, they're terrorizing people in the CBD. I mean,
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Speaker 2: I think even this morning I heard that there was
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Speaker 2: a large group of kids going around broke into a
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Speaker 2: massage place, you know, other destruction. I know, Matte, you've
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Speaker 2: got a recent example from last night. It's it's just
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Speaker 2: ab horrent. And in the meantime, people are being bashed,
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Speaker 2: they're being robbed, they're being killed, and the Gunner government
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Speaker 2: just continue to, I don't know, bury their hand in
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Speaker 2: the sand like this isn't happening. On top of that,
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Speaker 2: they've given away thirty five million dollars to youth detainees,
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Speaker 2: which hit victims so hard. I mean, how more offender
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Speaker 2: focus can this government get? We're just seeing new loads
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Speaker 2: all round.
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Speaker 1: Look, I think it's hard at the moment for me
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Speaker 1: to go into a business without somebody telling me some
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Speaker 1: of the concerns that they've got at the moment, particularly
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Speaker 1: in the CBD, around you know, not necessarily youth breaking
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Speaker 1: the law or you know, like doing really bad stuff,
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Speaker 1: but still stuff that is you know, I think it
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Speaker 1: is still like it's intimidating, it's threatening.
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Speaker 3: But then we saw Gary Obsta.
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Speaker 5: That's more serious.
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Speaker 7: But I think it's also you know, businesses are doing
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Speaker 7: it pretty tough at the moment. We're in the middle
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Speaker 7: of you know, COVID that is lasting a lot longer
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Speaker 7: than people thought it would.
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Speaker 5: You know, owning a small business is really hard work.
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Speaker 4: Now.
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Speaker 7: On the way in here this morning, I was just
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Speaker 7: walking in from the car park and I was stopped
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Speaker 7: by Jenny from Cafe twenty one. Now, they had had kids,
14:54
Speaker 7: presumably set fire to all of their plastic crates that
14:57
Speaker 7: hold their bread out the back of their business. Right now,
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Speaker 7: you might say, well, that's a minor thing, but it's not.
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Speaker 7: It's a massive thing for them. I mean, their morning
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Speaker 7: now is spent cleaning up the mess. They're trying to
15:07
Speaker 7: get all of this sorted out. They need to contact
15:10
Speaker 7: the bakery and they need to do all this stuff.
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Speaker 7: They've been in contact already with Paul Kirby's office, who
15:14
Speaker 7: say they're going down there to see them. But you know,
15:17
Speaker 7: it is that inconvenience, and I think that's where that
15:20
Speaker 7: frustration comes from from those business owners who are just
15:23
Speaker 7: trying to get on with business and I mean, the.
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Speaker 2: Whole building could have burnt down, you know. I mean,
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Speaker 2: imagine that Jenny Rock's up to work this morning and
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Speaker 2: the cafe's gone, and that's the reality of it.
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Speaker 3: I'll take you.
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Speaker 1: Through just some of the stuff that I've been told
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Speaker 1: about over the last couple of weeks. So obviously we
15:38
Speaker 1: spoke to Jason Hannah and he raised those concerns. I
15:41
Speaker 1: also caught up with Carol, who obviously owns the art
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Speaker 1: gallery across the road near Cafe twenty one, and spoke
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Speaker 1: to other listeners on the show a little bit earlier
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Speaker 1: in the week. Now, obviously there are concerns around dudes
15:54
Speaker 1: who are doing the wrong thing. So our general manager
15:57
Speaker 1: here at the radio station are gone to get some
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Speaker 1: breakfast about seven thirty in the morning last week. There
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Speaker 1: was he reckons two kids that looked about thirteen, one
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Speaker 1: that maybe looked sixteen, that also went into to where
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Speaker 1: he'd gone and Uncle Sam's to get something to eat.
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Speaker 1: They then started abusing staff and started abusing people inside.
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Speaker 1: He said he looked down, he did not want to engage,
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Speaker 1: and then they started yelling out to him. You know,
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Speaker 1: he tried to ignore them again. They came over started
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Speaker 1: yelling out at him again when he stood up there,
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Speaker 1: then around him with one of them threatening to stab him.
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Speaker 4: You know.
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Speaker 3: So, I think we've reached a point where.
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Speaker 4: It's very easy for us to sort of go okay,
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Speaker 4: you know, well, nobody got stabbed, nobody got punched, so
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Speaker 4: you can say that there's no criminal behavior that has occurred.
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Speaker 1: But when we have reached a point in the territory
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Speaker 1: where that kind of behavior is just sort of you know,
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Speaker 1: like we've just kind of gone, oh, all right, well,
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Speaker 1: stuff like that happens, it's.
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Speaker 3: Actually not good enough.
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Speaker 1: And if that happens to a tourist, if it happens
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Speaker 1: to a local, no matter who it happens to, it's
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Speaker 1: actually not okay. Now, add to that, we saw the
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Speaker 1: vision that's been on Channel nine News of what's been
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Speaker 1: happening at some of our petrol stations. I know there's
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Speaker 1: an article in the paper today about this as well. Now,
17:11
Speaker 1: Friday night last week, and I said this. On a yesterday,
17:14
Speaker 1: my husband and I were with the kids, went to
17:16
Speaker 1: a service station in parap to get some chocolate after soccer,
17:19
Speaker 1: as you do. There was a man who had gone
17:22
Speaker 1: in who was clearly very intoxicated he was older, he
17:26
Speaker 1: wasn't a youth, and he attempted to steal aerosol cans
17:30
Speaker 1: of both insects spray and also deodorant. My husband stopped
17:34
Speaker 1: him when he tried to well, when he stopped him,
17:36
Speaker 1: he started shaping up and wanting to fight him, all
17:38
Speaker 1: the while with our eight year old son there next
17:40
Speaker 1: to him. He then walked outside started kicking the bins
17:42
Speaker 1: over through a big steel bin lid at Patrick, at
17:46
Speaker 1: my husband. You know, Pat's brought him up, mate, stopped,
17:49
Speaker 1: de escalated the situation.
17:50
Speaker 3: I'm in the car trying to call the police.
17:52
Speaker 1: He's taken him away obviously, then brought him something to eat,
17:55
Speaker 1: de escalated the situation. This is while my Asian ten
17:59
Speaker 1: year old kids are watching. You know, then having the
18:03
Speaker 1: discussion with your kids after that that you know that
18:06
Speaker 1: that person's intoxicated, that behavior is not okay, But trying
18:09
Speaker 1: to explain that, Robin, as you pointed out, you know,
18:12
Speaker 1: this is the type of thing that you've been grappling
18:13
Speaker 1: with in Alice Springs. I totally understand that this is
18:17
Speaker 1: a really complex issue, whether you're talking about you know,
18:21
Speaker 1: the behavior of youths, or whether you're talking about the
18:25
Speaker 1: you know the use of substance and the impact that
18:28
Speaker 1: that is having on people. But I just don't think
18:31
Speaker 1: that we can sort of, you know, just kind of
18:34
Speaker 1: turn a bit of a blind eye and go, oh,
18:35
Speaker 1: what's happening. You know, we've got these long term changes
18:38
Speaker 1: to try and fix it. I don't know what we
18:41
Speaker 1: do to an like, to fix the problem. I really
18:43
Speaker 1: don't know what we do, Katie. We keep trying. In
18:47
Speaker 1: Parliament this week we heard about all the different initiatives
18:52
Speaker 1: of the government, how much they're putting into this. But
18:55
Speaker 1: look at what's happened over the last five years. We've
18:58
Speaker 1: seen a deterioration in Lauren. We've seen crime go through
19:02
Speaker 1: the roof, and meanwhile the government keeps throwing money at
19:06
Speaker 1: things that aren't working. We didn't hear anything in parliament
19:10
Speaker 1: this week about what they're going to do differently. We
19:13
Speaker 1: have normalized this behavior. You're absolutely right, Katie. The bar
19:17
Speaker 1: has been set so incredibly low, and we all are
19:21
Speaker 1: starting to accept that this is the normal state of
19:25
Speaker 1: business in the Northern Territory.
19:26
Speaker 6: It's not. We cannot ever accept it, and we have
19:29
Speaker 6: to keep trying different things, whatever they are.
19:32
Speaker 2: It's not normal it's disgusting, it's terrible, it's not okay.
19:37
Speaker 2: We can't stand by this. I mean, Natasha, you're the
19:40
Speaker 2: Tourism minister. How can you stand by and see this
19:44
Speaker 2: happening to our towns and our communities across the territory.
19:47
Speaker 4: So we don't stand by. We've invested across a range
19:50
Speaker 4: of areas. We've invested in police, We've invested in resources
19:54
Speaker 4: to support them. CCTV, there is Katie Strikeforce, Trident are
19:58
Speaker 4: doing in conjunction with the low police divisions, particularly focused
20:01
Speaker 4: on the CBD. At the moment, they do acknowledge that
20:04
Speaker 4: there has been.
20:05
Speaker 3: We could call the police commander yesterday, yeah, and.
20:07
Speaker 4: So they're doing a body of identified work there to
20:11
Speaker 4: you know, make sure that this is certainly being dealt with.
20:13
Speaker 4: And so we don't accept this as normal behavior. We
20:16
Speaker 4: have it as unacceptable. There's not a silver bullet, there's
20:19
Speaker 4: not a silver solution.
20:20
Speaker 3: And I think stop.
20:21
Speaker 1: Trying, Like I'm at the point where I just think
20:23
Speaker 1: the government needs to stop making us like, stop gas
20:26
Speaker 1: lighting us, stop making the territorians feel as though.
20:29
Speaker 4: We were not about to point to some of the
20:31
Speaker 4: actual things that we're doing.
20:32
Speaker 1: But you're making people feel like we are seeing things
20:36
Speaker 1: differently or like, you know, like we live in a
20:39
Speaker 1: different place.
20:39
Speaker 4: That's not so we've grown youth justice, so we have
20:42
Speaker 4: to acknowledge we have adult corrections. We launched the Aboriginal
20:45
Speaker 4: Justice Agreement earlier this week, and it would be great
20:48
Speaker 4: to hear from Lea whether she supports that and whether
20:50
Speaker 4: she will sign that.
20:50
Speaker 2: Very happy to talk about the Aboriginal Justice Agreement that
20:53
Speaker 2: our forty eight actions has one that even mentions victims, so.
20:57
Speaker 4: You won't be supporting it.
20:58
Speaker 1: So like, while we're discussing this now, I've just been
21:00
Speaker 1: sent through photos of what looked like honestly eight year
21:03
Speaker 1: old kids walking around the city last night the CB
21:07
Speaker 1: last night, to the.
21:07
Speaker 7: Point that the thing that I think, and I've said
21:10
Speaker 7: this before when I went down to Alice Springs earlier
21:12
Speaker 7: this year, that that was the thing that blew my mind.
21:14
Speaker 7: It was eight year old kitchen around the streets exactly,
21:16
Speaker 7: you know. And I absolutely can understand Robin's frustration and
21:20
Speaker 7: the people of our springs.
21:21
Speaker 5: So you must be listening.
21:22
Speaker 7: And when they're listening to us later today in Alice Springs,
21:25
Speaker 7: they'll be thinking, what are these people banging on again?
21:29
Speaker 2: Constantly, except when the Chief Minister is in town.
21:32
Speaker 5: But it is.
21:33
Speaker 7: But it's also like it it's not something I wouldn't
21:36
Speaker 7: have a clue how to fix it. This is something
21:38
Speaker 7: that's the point by decades of bad policy basically, and
21:43
Speaker 7: that's the position we're in now.
21:44
Speaker 2: But a lot of these kids are in the care
21:46
Speaker 2: of the territory, right, so the territory is in effect
21:49
Speaker 2: the parent of a lot of these young people, and
21:52
Speaker 2: yet they're allowed to be out on the streets in
21:54
Speaker 2: the middle of the night causing destruction.
21:56
Speaker 3: Just point out.
21:57
Speaker 4: So we've grown the investment in youth justice from around
21:59
Speaker 4: two million to over sixty million. We have to the
22:02
Speaker 4: point that I was getting at, you have to you
22:04
Speaker 4: have adult corrections, you have youth justice, and you have
22:07
Speaker 4: to But the strong correlation between child protection and youth justice,
22:10
Speaker 4: we know that in the territory. We also know that
22:12
Speaker 4: it's child neglect. And so in terms of this work,
22:16
Speaker 4: there is a lot of hard grinding work. You don't
22:17
Speaker 4: see the results quickly, but we are starting to see
22:21
Speaker 4: some of those statistics turn. But Katie I took offense
22:24
Speaker 4: that we're sort of gas lighting and we don't.
22:26
Speaker 3: Care, because we do genuinely can that.
22:28
Speaker 1: And it feels for people because every time they talk
22:31
Speaker 1: about it, like every time they ring in or every
22:33
Speaker 1: time they talk about it, then when they're you know,
22:35
Speaker 1: then when you know, when they try to have their
22:38
Speaker 1: concerns heard, or when you've got a business who's grappling
22:41
Speaker 1: with some of this behavior, or when you've got somebody
22:43
Speaker 1: who's had you know, youth saying that they're going to
22:46
Speaker 1: stab them.
22:47
Speaker 3: You know, with respect.
22:49
Speaker 1: Talking about what you're going to do over a ten
22:51
Speaker 1: year period isn't going to help them right now.
22:54
Speaker 3: What we're doing for them.
22:55
Speaker 1: More police ruses reason even when you've got you know,
22:58
Speaker 1: like we had the police on yesterday and the police
23:00
Speaker 1: commander said, you know, they're in a situation where they
23:03
Speaker 1: can't arrest somebody who's behaving badly around the CBD or
23:07
Speaker 1: who's out on the streets.
23:08
Speaker 3: And that's where you go, well, where is territory families.
23:11
Speaker 4: They're side by side with the ureos. But this and
23:14
Speaker 4: that's that investment from twenty million to over six company
23:16
Speaker 4: on the street. It's a really difficult issue and we
23:20
Speaker 4: are putting resources in right now upfront, and we're also
23:23
Speaker 4: making sure that there is long term work, but it's
23:26
Speaker 4: an incredibly difficult issue. No government has the silver bullet.
23:30
Speaker 4: Were certainly to have the silver but we haven't seen
23:34
Speaker 4: territory families or you know whoever walking around the street
23:37
Speaker 4: at night trying to round these kids up. So, Katie,
23:40
Speaker 4: we're certainly putting in place a number of measures to
23:43
Speaker 4: address these issues and to make sure that we do
23:46
Speaker 4: see that change. And of course, and any incident is
23:49
Speaker 4: unacceptable and it angers us and the response. You know,
23:52
Speaker 4: we do care when it happens in our communities. We
23:56
Speaker 4: feel for people significantly. But what I'm saying is that
23:59
Speaker 4: we have to have long term investment and we can't
24:01
Speaker 4: have the chopping and changing.
24:03
Speaker 2: You seeds have got worse.
24:05
Speaker 6: Why do you think crime has deteriorated under your watch
24:08
Speaker 6: over the last five years.
24:09
Speaker 4: We know that there's a number of factors that lead
24:11
Speaker 4: to crime, Robin, we need. We saw significant work done,
24:15
Speaker 4: Jody and Carney and Melandery McCarthy did a significant body
24:18
Speaker 4: of work. We saw that work pulled away, we saw
24:21
Speaker 4: a decline to police resources. Then we've come back and
24:24
Speaker 4: put that investment in place, but it takes time to
24:26
Speaker 4: see that results. But we certainly any incident of crime
24:29
Speaker 4: is dealt with and it should be dealt with appropriately.
24:32
Speaker 2: I think it's because you came in and watered down
24:35
Speaker 2: bower laws and watered down the powers. You took use
24:38
Speaker 2: justice out of corrections and put it in territory families.
24:41
Speaker 2: You depowered youth justice officers. All of these things are
24:45
Speaker 2: now coming home to roosts and it is at catastrophic levels.
24:49
Speaker 2: You've taken powers away from our police, our youth justice
24:52
Speaker 2: offices being abused and insulted every.
24:55
Speaker 4: Day like adults, and so saying usment but just to
25:00
Speaker 4: adult corrections and commission.
25:02
Speaker 2: That makes you You're making it sound like I'm saying,
25:04
Speaker 2: put use in an adult prison.
25:06
Speaker 3: We will put it.
25:07
Speaker 5: I'm not going to get to your level that youth
25:10
Speaker 5: still are in an.
25:11
Speaker 2: Adult They are in an adult prison, that is prison.
25:14
Speaker 7: Four years after the government promise to build a new
25:17
Speaker 7: facility for them.
25:18
Speaker 5: I don't know whether was so even being turned out
25:20
Speaker 5: there exactly.
25:22
Speaker 2: And they're building a new seventy million dollar facivities facility
25:25
Speaker 2: with thirty beds. You know, this is this is chronic
25:28
Speaker 2: policy failure. The bail reform is not working, you know.
25:31
Speaker 2: Alderman Gary Haslett was brutalized by the alleged defender was
25:36
Speaker 2: thirteen years old and on bail at the time. Now
25:39
Speaker 2: you can't tell you know, you guys wanted to spreak
25:41
Speaker 2: the toughest ever crime laws. You wanted to say you're
25:44
Speaker 2: making you know, bail. You know if you've breached your bail,
25:46
Speaker 2: you won't get bail again. Well, that's clearly garbage because
25:49
Speaker 2: people are still being victimized by young people who are
25:53
Speaker 2: out on bao, so that system is fundamentally broken.
25:56
Speaker 6: You know, there are people in Alice Springs, Aboriginal people
26:01
Speaker 6: that want to help. They want to be a part
26:03
Speaker 6: of the solution. They're sitting listening to you now. They
26:07
Speaker 6: are waiting to be called upon to help this situation
26:11
Speaker 6: with kids, sensible people with really common sense solutions. They
26:16
Speaker 6: haven't been engaged at all. There's a reluctance of government
26:20
Speaker 6: to go beyond the bureaucracy the government itself. There are
26:25
Speaker 6: solutions in Alice Springs that could be tapped into very easily,
26:29
Speaker 6: and I really ask the government to start looking at it.
26:32
Speaker 5: I think that's a really good point.
26:33
Speaker 7: Just quickly, and from my most recent visit to Alice Springs,
26:36
Speaker 7: I spend a bit of time with Michael Little down
26:38
Speaker 7: there and he spoke more sense in half an hour
26:42
Speaker 7: than I've heard a politician speaking five or six years.
26:44
Speaker 6: And a cheap, common sense solution.
26:46
Speaker 7: I think that I think Rom's got a really good point.
26:48
Speaker 7: They're the people who really need to be engaged.
26:50
Speaker 2: And Tenant Creek is the same. Tennant Creek is absolutely
26:53
Speaker 2: the same. I think when you boil it all down,
26:55
Speaker 2: we've got a government that's happy to talk about spending
26:57
Speaker 2: lots of money on offenders and just completely has walked
27:00
Speaker 2: away from victims and there's a massive disconnect there. You
27:02
Speaker 2: are entirely offender focus and you have left territorians behind.
27:07
Speaker 3: Well, look we're going to take a very short break.
27:09
Speaker 1: You are listening to Mix one oh four point nine's
27:12
Speaker 1: three sixty. It is twenty five minutes away from ten o'clock,
27:15
Speaker 1: still plenty to discuss. It is twenty minutes away from
27:19
Speaker 1: ten o'clock and you are in the oh listening to
27:22
Speaker 1: the week that was in the studio with the s
27:23
Speaker 1: Robin Lamley, Natasha Files, Matt Cunningham and Leo Finocchio. Now
27:28
Speaker 1: Territory Day and the fact that it's being well celebrated
27:33
Speaker 1: on August twenty nine, has got a lot of people
27:36
Speaker 1: very concerned around the fireworks. We honestly we have been
27:41
Speaker 1: inundated with phone calls, with messages. We put a post
27:44
Speaker 1: up on the socials earlier in the week and a
27:46
Speaker 1: lot of people living out in the rural area are
27:48
Speaker 1: incredibly worried about the date. And the reason for that
27:52
Speaker 1: is the fact that usually we see in late August
27:55
Speaker 1: the threat of a fireban and the threat.
27:57
Speaker 3: Of fires is quite high.
28:00
Speaker 1: We know that if a fireban is declared, hopefully we'd
28:03
Speaker 1: know a couple of days or a few days leading
28:05
Speaker 1: into the twenty ninth of August. But what it would
28:07
Speaker 1: mean then is that nobody would actually be allowed to
28:10
Speaker 1: let those fireworks off. So throughout the week we spoke
28:13
Speaker 1: to a number of different people who raise their concerns
28:15
Speaker 1: about firecrackers being able to be let off. On the
28:18
Speaker 1: twenty ninth, we also though caught up with Luke, the
28:21
Speaker 1: owner of Fusion Fireworks, who had said to us that
28:24
Speaker 1: realistically they just need to know either way, if there
28:27
Speaker 1: needs to be specific areas where the fireworks are allowed
28:30
Speaker 1: to be let off, well tell the retailers nice and early,
28:33
Speaker 1: but that he had not been consulted with you know
28:35
Speaker 1: before that date was decided, and that's what we're kind
28:39
Speaker 1: of hearing quite loudly and clearly. I think at this
28:42
Speaker 1: point is that nobody, by the sounds of it, had
28:45
Speaker 1: been consulted with I'm assuming that the Chief Minister had
28:47
Speaker 1: obviously consulted with someone filesy, had he consulted with his
28:51
Speaker 1: cabinet about that date extensively.
28:54
Speaker 4: So Katie, obviously territory Day, I can't remember that, whether
28:59
Speaker 4: we're in lockdown.
29:00
Speaker 3: In lockdown, I.
29:01
Speaker 5: Can't remember the line.
29:04
Speaker 2: Not ou Natasha. She always remembers the lines get a
29:08
Speaker 2: bit offended along the way, but she remembers that you
29:11
Speaker 2: heard it.
29:11
Speaker 9: Firstly, she remembers you found respect his files how to
29:16
Speaker 9: chat in the break and I'm going to not be
29:18
Speaker 9: offended by Leah, but she's going to be nice to me.
29:21
Speaker 9: But I at that what I was trying to the
29:23
Speaker 9: COVID days certainly ag quickly.
29:26
Speaker 2: But we couldn't have.
29:27
Speaker 4: Territory down on the first of July because we're even
29:29
Speaker 4: lockdown or it was near lockdown. I can't remember in lockdown,
29:32
Speaker 4: So August twenty and obviously territory Day, first of July
29:34
Speaker 4: is the dry season, so there is fire risk then,
29:36
Speaker 4: so August twenty nine is a special day, Territory Day
29:39
Speaker 4: and Freedom Day, and certainly hoping that the weather is good.
29:42
Speaker 4: But if there is a total fire band in certain areas,
29:46
Speaker 4: then that does include crackers.
29:48
Speaker 2: So didn't answer made the decision that this was it?
29:50
Speaker 2: Old Chief out on his own, or you guys are
29:52
Speaker 2: back to your mamma high five pats on the back, go.
29:54
Speaker 9: On, Mickey, Well yah, you're only Oh no, I can't
29:57
Speaker 9: say that because that would be mean and I'm trying
29:59
Speaker 9: to be nice.
30:02
Speaker 3: You're on you don't know how, I don't know. Well,
30:11
Speaker 3: we're here on mixed one O four nine.
30:13
Speaker 4: We're not offended by much, so feel free to tell
30:15
Speaker 4: us you know, will please with me?
30:17
Speaker 3: Think I'm certainly not offended by much. I don't think
30:19
Speaker 3: you are, are you mat cunning home?
30:21
Speaker 6: I'd like to say, we have a perennial dry season
30:24
Speaker 6: in Central Australia, So you you mop up here. You
30:26
Speaker 6: need to get over yourselves.
30:28
Speaker 1: Not you.
30:32
Speaker 3: Deeply apologizing. I'm like, how was the decision made, Natasha?
30:36
Speaker 3: Was it?
30:37
Speaker 1: Did the whole cabinet actually make this decision? Because I
30:40
Speaker 1: will say that our bushfires MT and our rural firefighters
30:44
Speaker 1: and people that live rural they genuinely are concerned about
30:48
Speaker 1: the gamber grass and the threat of bad fires on
30:53
Speaker 1: on the day that has been chosen on August twenty nine.
30:56
Speaker 4: So Katie as I was just saying in a long
30:58
Speaker 4: winded way, we missed out on Territory Day. It's been
31:00
Speaker 4: rescheduled to August twenty nine. The same rules apply for
31:02
Speaker 4: the first of July. There's firebands then people won't be
31:05
Speaker 4: able to have crackers in those areas. The professional fireworks
31:08
Speaker 4: they'll be right across the territory. Anti major events are
31:11
Speaker 4: organizing that. So you know, we celebrate Territory Day in
31:14
Speaker 4: the dry season on July first. We know that August
31:17
Speaker 4: twenty nine people have those concerns. I think today's there's
31:20
Speaker 4: a fire already h and there's advice going out, so
31:23
Speaker 4: you know it's no different. People have to listen to
31:25
Speaker 4: the advice to pick up on Robin's point in Central Australia.
31:28
Speaker 4: They have to listen to the advice in their local area.
31:30
Speaker 2: But why didn't government just make it the next week?
31:33
Speaker 2: You know, like everyone had the wholesalers had the fireworks,
31:36
Speaker 2: people were ready, the advertising was out, the sheds had
31:38
Speaker 2: been hired people at least premises all of those things.
31:42
Speaker 2: Why didn't government just move it one week later? It'd
31:44
Speaker 2: be done in Dustin and we wouldn't be having this conversation.
31:46
Speaker 7: Risk had been called un territory and could we have
31:49
Speaker 7: survived for a year without it?
31:51
Speaker 5: I mean, I know we didn't have last year.
31:53
Speaker 6: I totally I've got a conflict of interest. My family
31:56
Speaker 6: been selling fireworks in the territory for twenty years.
31:59
Speaker 3: We stood to there's a.
32:00
Speaker 6: Lot of money, but I feel the same as Mad
32:03
Speaker 6: why not just grap it for a year?
32:04
Speaker 1: But this is the thing as well, Robin, and this
32:06
Speaker 1: is the discussion that we'd had with Fusion earlier in
32:08
Speaker 1: the week. You know they've now been renting space for
32:11
Speaker 1: seven weeks, obviously waiting on from that initial date, and
32:14
Speaker 1: then they've got I think one hundred and fifty torn
32:16
Speaker 1: a firework he set in storage. So if you know,
32:19
Speaker 1: obviously firework retailers make as you've seen, it's certainly a
32:23
Speaker 1: lucrative day. It's a great day for people if you
32:26
Speaker 1: are selling those fireworks. But then if we get to
32:28
Speaker 1: four days out and there is a fireban going to
32:30
Speaker 1: be in place, or it's a few days out and
32:32
Speaker 1: there's going to be a fireban in place. For those retailers,
32:35
Speaker 1: you would have to say it to be quite devastating
32:36
Speaker 1: for them if they've been rented place.
32:38
Speaker 6: You only pay for what you sell as a retailer,
32:41
Speaker 6: so it's the supplies that lose out and they do
32:44
Speaker 6: most of the advertising.
32:45
Speaker 4: Term.
32:46
Speaker 7: I think to talk about the fireman is one thing,
32:48
Speaker 7: but whether there's a fireban or not, I mean, the
32:51
Speaker 7: government might be hoping there's a fireban because whether if
32:54
Speaker 7: there's no fireman. There's still a big difference between July
32:57
Speaker 7: one and August twenty nine, and might be there might
32:59
Speaker 7: be a fire man because it's windy or whatever, or
33:01
Speaker 7: it's a bit hotter. But it's the problem with August
33:04
Speaker 7: twenty nine is it's a hell of a lot drier
33:07
Speaker 7: than it is on Yeah, July one.
33:09
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely absolutely, it's a mess. And of course, you
33:12
Speaker 2: know we've already had some really horrific fires out in
33:14
Speaker 2: the rural area. There was that one in Humpty Doo
33:16
Speaker 2: the other day. We all saw the photos of that.
33:19
Speaker 2: It's just it's really genuinely scary stuff. And I know,
33:23
Speaker 2: I don't know if it's Luke, but I've certainly heard
33:25
Speaker 2: that the people selling the fireworks were wanting to engage
33:29
Speaker 2: with government and be consulted about maybe the government could
33:32
Speaker 2: develop zones. For example, urban areas can be green zones
33:35
Speaker 2: because there's less risk because there's less obviously bush land,
33:38
Speaker 2: and then other areas can be staged. So you know,
33:41
Speaker 2: the fact that you're hearing from Luke that there's been
33:43
Speaker 2: no consultation just shows the government really doesn't have a
33:46
Speaker 2: commitment to this issue. And I wouldn't be surprised if
33:49
Speaker 2: there is a fireban on that day and the government goes, oh, well,
33:51
Speaker 2: we've always said you know that, we've always said that.
33:53
Speaker 3: Could be the risk.
33:54
Speaker 2: I mean, it's just you're setting people up for failure
33:56
Speaker 2: and people don't like that. It's disingenuous. People just want
33:59
Speaker 2: certainty around these things, and this decision for twenty nine
34:03
Speaker 2: August has created anything but that.
34:05
Speaker 1: Well, whatever happens, I just really hope that we do
34:07
Speaker 1: not see a situation where there's fires around the place.
34:10
Speaker 1: We know that the you know like that there always
34:12
Speaker 1: is come July first, but I really hope that we
34:15
Speaker 1: don't end up with serious situations out in the rural
34:17
Speaker 1: area with that gamber grass and you know, Robert, I
34:20
Speaker 1: know you said Alice Springs obviously is the desert.
34:22
Speaker 3: It's always dry, it's always pretty dry there.
34:24
Speaker 1: But yeah, with that gamba, there is a real concern
34:27
Speaker 1: for a lot of people that live in the rural area.
34:30
Speaker 1: We might take a very short break. You are listening
34:32
Speaker 1: to Mix one oh four point nine.
34:33
Speaker 3: It is the week that was. You are listening to
34:36
Speaker 3: Mix one oh four point nine. It is the week
34:38
Speaker 3: that was.
34:38
Speaker 1: And Leofanocchiaro, Matt Cunningham, Natasha Files and Robin Lamley all.
34:42
Speaker 3: In the studio with us.
34:43
Speaker 6: Now.
34:44
Speaker 1: I do want to talk about the fact that we
34:46
Speaker 1: know that there's been further changes obviously to hotspots, and
34:50
Speaker 1: well we have seen Canberra obviously going to a lockdown yesterday.
34:53
Speaker 1: I got a couple of listeners in Canberra this morning,
34:56
Speaker 1: Dan Bullshit and Carl listening to us away from from
34:59
Speaker 1: Canberra as I unders done it well known ABC a
35:02
Speaker 1: newsreader and reporter. But look, there's no doubt that these
35:06
Speaker 1: lockdowns have a big impact all around the nation. But
35:10
Speaker 1: whether you're in lockdown or you're not in lockdown, when
35:12
Speaker 1: you talk about tourism in the Northern Territory, it's having
35:15
Speaker 1: a big impact for us. I know that it's something
35:17
Speaker 1: we've spoken to both Tourism Top End and also Tourism
35:20
Speaker 1: Central Australia about Tourism Central Australia. Robert Have you know,
35:25
Speaker 1: had told us at different times that this issue is
35:27
Speaker 1: incredibly worrying for them.
35:30
Speaker 6: Look, the industry is at its knees in certain sections.
35:34
Speaker 6: Some are doing better than others, but I know that
35:37
Speaker 6: there are a number of businesses, tourism businesses in Central
35:40
Speaker 6: Australia that are looking at basically folding up. You can't
35:45
Speaker 6: sustain a business if there's no customers month on endlessly,
35:49
Speaker 6: so that's really sad.
35:51
Speaker 4: So Katie, we're entering one of the most critical times
35:54
Speaker 4: of the pandemic. We've seen the delta variant which is
35:57
Speaker 4: different to no other. It's seeding outside of Sydney and
36:00
Speaker 4: I won't go into that detail because people are well
36:03
Speaker 4: familiar with that. We have to keep it out of
36:04
Speaker 4: the territory. But in terms of tourism operators, absolutely, Tourism,
36:09
Speaker 4: top End, Tourism, Central Australia, Hospitality, they've all done it
36:12
Speaker 4: incredibly tough. We thought this dry season would be the
36:15
Speaker 4: bumper season to help it wouldn't make up for but
36:17
Speaker 4: incredibly focused on what support we can provide them and
36:20
Speaker 4: noting that it's not necessarily we see support come in
36:23
Speaker 4: for areas that are locked down. These are people that
36:26
Speaker 4: are outside the lockdown, but the lockdowns are having just
36:28
Speaker 4: as much of an impact. So if you're in a
36:31
Speaker 4: Sydney and your cafes is shut, the same impact is
36:34
Speaker 4: being felt by tourism operators. So working with the commworths
36:37
Speaker 4: but also looking at what we can do to provide
36:39
Speaker 4: some support. Tourism vouchers help in one space, but we
36:43
Speaker 4: know that they don't go into all the sectors and
36:45
Speaker 4: there's a couple of areas of tourism that are particularly
36:47
Speaker 4: hard hit.
36:48
Speaker 2: It's really heartbreaking, you know, and people were hoping that
36:51
Speaker 2: this dry season. Of course, essentially people have businesses had
36:54
Speaker 2: three wet seasons. What we say up here, you know,
36:56
Speaker 2: it's different in Central Australia you have winters, but people
37:00
Speaker 2: haven't been able to rebound out of this. Of course,
37:03
Speaker 2: the chopping and changing at the moment is just literally
37:05
Speaker 2: a daily, hourly occurrence and so it's really complicated for
37:10
Speaker 2: people running a business. We can't do enough to support
37:13
Speaker 2: them running. That's why it's so important as territorians. You know,
37:16
Speaker 2: if you are thinking about, you know, going away for
37:18
Speaker 2: the weekend or doing something, make sure you're out there
37:21
Speaker 2: spending money in our local businesses and doing something a
37:24
Speaker 2: bit different. You know, we've really got to back each
37:26
Speaker 2: other in at this time.
37:27
Speaker 7: I think just from a national perspective. I mean there's
37:30
Speaker 7: a story on the front page of the Australian Financial
37:32
Speaker 7: Review today that talked about how there's going to be
37:34
Speaker 7: a brew haha in the National cabinet today with the
37:37
Speaker 7: premiers blowing up at a plan by Gladys Breer Jiglian
37:40
Speaker 7: to open up right to open. But the reality is
37:44
Speaker 7: we're going to have to get to a point where
37:46
Speaker 7: even if there are cases we can just have constant
37:49
Speaker 7: border closures and lockdowns. We've got to hit that vaccination rate,
37:52
Speaker 7: whether it's seventy percent or eighty percent, And once we
37:55
Speaker 7: get there, we've got to accept that this is a
37:57
Speaker 7: virus that we're going to have to live with. Remember,
37:59
Speaker 7: at the beginning of the pandemic, the plan was all
38:01
Speaker 7: about suppressing the virus. Then it became politically advantageous for
38:05
Speaker 7: state and territory governments to go We're going to eradicate
38:07
Speaker 7: the virus. Now the government, he has done a really
38:09
Speaker 7: good job, don't get me wrong. They've kept the virus
38:11
Speaker 7: out of remote communities, which I think was the biggest
38:13
Speaker 7: fear at the beginning. But we cannot for the next
38:16
Speaker 7: two three five years have a situation where every time
38:19
Speaker 7: there are cases pop up, a city goes into lockdown
38:21
Speaker 7: because it's killing businesses and it will destroy our tourism
38:26
Speaker 7: industry altogether. So I think by the end of this
38:28
Speaker 7: year we're going to have to get to a point
38:29
Speaker 7: and Gladys Bearogicallian is floating it today, but even if
38:32
Speaker 7: there are cases in big.
38:33
Speaker 5: Cities, we can't be constantly going into lockdown.
38:35
Speaker 3: Well, and then we.
38:36
Speaker 1: Saw throughout the week I thought that the Chief Minister
38:38
Speaker 1: had said at some point throughout the week that even
38:41
Speaker 1: if we do get to seventy percent or eighty percent
38:43
Speaker 1: vaccination right here in the Northern Territory, that we are
38:46
Speaker 1: still not going to mean it's still not going to
38:48
Speaker 1: mean that for us in the territory that we're open
38:50
Speaker 1: for business sort of thing to the other states.
38:52
Speaker 4: I think Katie those comments where it can't just be
38:54
Speaker 4: eighty percent of the population in Darwin. We need to
38:56
Speaker 4: see that across the spread. But the Doughty Institute have
38:58
Speaker 4: done their modeling and we've also asked some questions and
39:00
Speaker 4: we're sitting on a national group with them to work
39:03
Speaker 4: through that. We have got those appointments and I encourage
39:06
Speaker 4: anyone online. There is appointments right across the territory in
39:09
Speaker 4: the urban areas to get vaccinated. So it's head to
39:12
Speaker 4: that COVID website. And in terms of our remote program,
39:15
Speaker 4: we're rolling it out very strongly. We're working with our
39:17
Speaker 4: aboriginal medical organizations to get that vaccine. We've got some
39:20
Speaker 4: communities where there's excellent coverage and we've got other communities
39:24
Speaker 4: where we need to work with community leaders. But we
39:26
Speaker 4: are seeing that. Sammy Bush, the chair of the NLC,
39:30
Speaker 4: a great picture of him on social media getting his vaccine.
39:33
Speaker 4: So we really will work community by community so that
39:36
Speaker 4: people can understand the importance of being vaccinated.
39:38
Speaker 1: So what is the rate that's going to be deemed acceptable?
39:41
Speaker 1: Is it going to be what the Dougherty Institute is indicated,
39:44
Speaker 1: Is it eighty percent or seventy so, Katie, that hasn't.
39:46
Speaker 4: Been a final decision, So there's a lot of work,
39:48
Speaker 4: there's a lot of discussion going on, and we'll need
39:51
Speaker 4: to make sure that we have the correct health advice
39:53
Speaker 4: because we do have the unique circumstance of a particularly
39:56
Speaker 4: vulnerable population. But we'd certainly happy to continue that discussion.
40:00
Speaker 4: But right now the message is if you can get vaccinated,
40:03
Speaker 4: please do so. There's appointments available pretty good in the alis.
40:08
Speaker 6: Look not in remote areas. There's a lot of concern
40:12
Speaker 6: from Central Australia about this idea being floated at national
40:16
Speaker 6: cabinet level to open up the country basically at eighty
40:20
Speaker 6: percent vaccination at that point. I don't think that that's
40:26
Speaker 6: going to work for Central Australia when you've got such
40:28
Speaker 6: vulnerable groups of Aboriginal people that aren't vaccinated. I knows,
40:33
Speaker 6: as Natasha just said. Some communities have got on board
40:37
Speaker 6: and I have got a high vaccination rate, but there's
40:41
Speaker 6: still a long long way to go.
40:42
Speaker 2: Yeah, And that's why, you know, you can put a
40:45
Speaker 2: figure on it, or we can all just get on
40:46
Speaker 2: we getting vaccinated. And you know that's why we were
40:48
Speaker 2: calling really hard on government to really look at that
40:51
Speaker 2: vaccine portal, you know, because a lot of people were
40:53
Speaker 2: going on and weren't able to understand that there were
40:56
Speaker 2: GPS and other clinics offering the job. So I think
40:59
Speaker 2: Natasha for I think that got implemented yesterday. I understand
41:04
Speaker 2: that the cover portal has now been updated so that
41:06
Speaker 2: people can get much clearer information about where they can
41:09
Speaker 2: get vaccinated. Of course, vaccinating remote communities has been slow. Unfortunately,
41:15
Speaker 2: there's a lot of misinformation going on in some communities,
41:18
Speaker 2: and so it's important that the government and the original
41:22
Speaker 2: controlled health organizations are getting in there and ensuring that
41:25
Speaker 2: communities have confidence. We know there is some reluctance in
41:28
Speaker 2: some communities, and so extra work needs to be done
41:31
Speaker 2: to make sure that people understand it's safe, it's in
41:33
Speaker 2: everyone's best interest, and we can pump those vaccine numbers
41:36
Speaker 2: up and get everyone done.
41:37
Speaker 7: And I think it's worth pointing out that the vaccine
41:40
Speaker 7: hesn't is not something that's unique to Aboriginal people, because
41:44
Speaker 7: we're seeing it within certain groups within Darwen and I'm
41:48
Speaker 7: sure Alice springs as well around the country. What I'm
41:52
Speaker 7: curious about now is whether from what you guys are saying,
41:55
Speaker 7: whether we could head to a position where the rest
41:57
Speaker 7: of the country opens up.
41:58
Speaker 5: But because of our uniqu sit in the Northern Territory.
42:01
Speaker 5: We still have lockdowns. Well, I mean we still have
42:03
Speaker 5: border closures.
42:04
Speaker 6: I'm saying it's a good thing, but I think that's
42:06
Speaker 6: a reality.
42:06
Speaker 2: All we might just get our skates on and you know,
42:09
Speaker 2: we've got we never got more vaccines coming in. Of course,
42:12
Speaker 2: there was a whole arjibardjie with Pfizer and AstraZeneca. As
42:15
Speaker 2: more Pizer comes in, obviously our deployability of vaccine increases.
42:19
Speaker 2: So we do have a small population. I think there
42:21
Speaker 2: is an opportunity for us to really push full steam
42:25
Speaker 2: ahead and just get it done.
42:28
Speaker 4: I think the message is if you are in the
42:30
Speaker 4: Northern Territory, there is vaccine available. We're opening will open
42:33
Speaker 4: a new vaccine Hubbert Palmerston. But just head to the
42:36
Speaker 4: COVID nineteen TG just literally google that with vaccine. You'll
42:40
Speaker 4: come up to the online booking portal.
42:42
Speaker 2: You can choose your.
42:42
Speaker 3: Date and time.
42:43
Speaker 4: It can be flexible. When you go to your first appointment,
42:45
Speaker 4: they'll book your second appointments. You don't have to worry
42:47
Speaker 4: about booking two appointments. And we have we're working on
42:50
Speaker 4: the workforce to support that and in terms of remotes,
42:52
Speaker 4: we're working really closely with both our Aboriginal communities, a
42:56
Speaker 4: Land Council and the Aboriginal medical organizations. There's some communities, Katie,
42:59
Speaker 4: where we have to celebrate their achievements. They've done better
43:01
Speaker 4: than urban areas. There's other communities where we need to
43:04
Speaker 4: work with them for them to understand the importance of
43:07
Speaker 4: the vaccine.
43:08
Speaker 3: We are going to have to wrap up.
43:09
Speaker 1: That has been the week that was brought to you
43:11
Speaker 1: by Desilver, Hebron Lawyers, Leafanocchiaro.
43:13
Speaker 3: The opposition leader. Thank you so much for your time
43:15
Speaker 3: this morning. Thank you.
43:16
Speaker 2: I just want to do a shout out to Adha
43:18
Speaker 2: and everyone down and Alice Springs. I hope you're not freezing.
43:20
Speaker 2: We love being able to talk to you now, so
43:22
Speaker 2: great job aging and the team down there.
43:24
Speaker 3: Matt Cunningham from Sky News, thank you for your time today.
43:27
Speaker 5: Thanks Katie.
43:28
Speaker 3: Thank you, Robin Lambley, thank you Katie, and thank you
43:31
Speaker 3: Natasha Files. Thanks Wilfee. You are listening to Mix one
43:34
Speaker 3: O four point nine three sixty