Latest / 360 with Katie Woolf / Darwin Lord Mayor Kon Vatskalis is expecting up to 4,000 people will attend Bombing of Darwin ceremonies this Saturday

Transcript

Darwin Lord Mayor Kon Vatskalis is expecting up to 4,000 people will attend Bombing of Darwin ceremonies this Saturday · 360 with Katie Woolf

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Joining me in the studio is the Lord Mayor of
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Darwin conbat Scarlet's goodboarding con, Good morning kid.
• 0:05
  Speaker 2: And was listening closely what Ruth had to say and
• 0:08
  Speaker 2: knowledge with her that there are a number of very
• 0:10
  Speaker 2: good buildings in town that they're very all rendered and
• 0:13
  Speaker 2: there are some of them that they're not rended. And
• 0:16
  Speaker 2: I know very well that there's some new players in town.
• 0:18
  Speaker 2: Casurina was bought by Sendinel. Ye now I sent bought
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: the old health house. They're going to upgrade it. They're
• 0:26
  Speaker 2: going to actually put some new buildings, accommodation, build to
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: rent in Casurina.
• 0:32
  Speaker 3: And of course they flooted.
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: With me the idea of the student accommodation and the
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: frog Hollors.
• 0:38
  Speaker 3: But yeah, let's make it. That's not the park.
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: It is the old Darwin School, the one that actually
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: exactly behind the the they proposed or the new campus.
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: You know, the old Darwin School that actually now it's
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: all locked up boarded with fencing around it, because it
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: was a heaven of behavior.
• 0:59
  Speaker 3: That's the they're talking.
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: They're not talking about the actual part because and.
• 1:03
  Speaker 2: I thought, but if you really what they said is
• 1:06
  Speaker 2: actually the.
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: Old school, and so how like how big an accommodation
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: setting are they proposing.
• 1:13
  Speaker 3: For their a sky no butter, how.
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: Many you know, I do other ideas.
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: What they're told me, they're prepared to go to the
• 1:19
  Speaker 2: full height what they're allowed by the This year there's
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: a big.
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: Foot scrip, massive building there.
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: It can be an ned story building, ten story building,
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: tall story buildings. I mean this year allows that one.
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: But again it's something they certainly revitalize the city. The
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: other thing, of course is if developers they have got buildings,
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: they can't rent to the government because Asrul said, it
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: don't fulfill.
• 1:39
  Speaker 3: That requires the government what convert them to units.
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: So I'll bring people in the city, activate the city
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: and see how the city is going to change.
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: Well, what I think is interesting is something that has
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: activated different spaces, and that's Austin Lane. I do like
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: what's happened down there, you know, in terms of what
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: the councils helped to facilitate with the lights and having
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: a bit of an area that's outdoors and eating and content.
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: And council and encourage is that the council now for
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: the past two years we had no fresh coffees. How
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: many in you are a fresh because you've seen I
• 2:08
  Speaker 2: haven't seen any any I mean, this is the place
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: where everybody wants it outside from March to August September
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: because the weather is beautiful. As a matter of fact,
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: I went somewhere the other day and people were still
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: sitting outside because the weather was mild. But here you've
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: got a beautiful city, beautiful views, and you encourage to
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: encourage people to activate the lanes the outdoor areas, but
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: very few people that do that well because we're still
• 2:33
  Speaker 2: stuck in this idea.
• 2:34
  Speaker 3: We want to have air condition even in the dry.
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: Just to go back to the proposal for frog hollows
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: for that area, is that something that the council supports
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: or is that just is that something that you was
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: the main thing would be a good idea.
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: I will support anything that actually is reasonable, and it's
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: going to activate the city. Putting another four hundred students
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: of four thousand students in the city is going to activate.
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: Not only the city will activate, the streets will activate,
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: their footpaths, will activate, the foreshore. We'll given centy four
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: people to establish the fink You cafe that the Rosy
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: is talking about. I'm in the same boat with Rose there.
• 3:09
  Speaker 2: Let's activate the city, bring more people in. Let's actually
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: stop thinking the way we're thinking about Darwin being the
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: nineteen fifties. Bring Darwen the twenty twenty twenty three. Let's
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: make Darwin the city that ought to be, an open city,
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: a beautiful city, an outdoor city.
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: Con I want to ask you about a concern that
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: was raised with one of our listeners yesterday. Now this
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: one is a bit, you know, a bit I guess,
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: a bit off topic, certainly not to do with the city.
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: It's more so about a location around near Tippery Waters
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: where they're looking at they want a footpath basically. So
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: I'll play a little bit off that interview that we
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: had yesterday with this listener Sam and get your take.
• 3:47
  Speaker 4: So, if you come out of diner Court and you're
• 3:49
  Speaker 4: heading left towards the city, there's no path that actually
• 3:52
  Speaker 4: takes you up to the intersection up where the Duck
• 3:55
  Speaker 4: Pond is. The road itself has got numerous potholes.
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: Either side.
• 3:58
  Speaker 4: The road heading left out of Dinocourt and into Stuart
• 4:01
  Speaker 4: Park is just dirt. There's trucks that have been heading
• 4:04
  Speaker 4: in and out of the quarry there beside the Dina
• 4:06
  Speaker 4: Beach Shot clubs.
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: Yep.
• 4:07
  Speaker 4: In time, the side of the road have just started
• 4:10
  Speaker 4: to crumble away, and instead of I guess listening to
• 4:12
  Speaker 4: the crime of a footpath needed to be constructed maybe
• 4:16
  Speaker 4: on the on the right hand side of that road
• 4:18
  Speaker 4: heading into the city, they've just flapped Fitcherman on the
• 4:22
  Speaker 4: side of the road to stop it from crumbling away.
• 4:24
  Speaker 4: And it's a safety issue. We have to stay basically
• 4:26
  Speaker 4: on the road to be safe, to not fall over,
• 4:29
  Speaker 4: to not get injured, to not be met with potholes.
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: So that was Sam on the show yesterday. Now I
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: went for a ride along there yesterday, or I ran
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: and my son rode his bike. So it's just you know,
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: if you're driving along Tiger Brendan before well before you
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: get to that beautiful part of Goromilla Boulevard and you
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: turn sort of up towards towards Stuart Park or in
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: towards the city, so there's no footpath there. It is
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: just the road and it is all that residential area.
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: I don't know if it falls under the government or
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: if it falls under the count.
• 4:56
  Speaker 3: So that's what I would to find out.
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I want to find out about the location that
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: I'm just talking about I'll suddenly go back and check
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: it out because it's a very interesting situation there. Part
• 5:05
  Speaker 2: of it is city down, part of it is not
• 5:08
  Speaker 2: territory government. But even if it's not the government, we're
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: happy to talk to people and see how we can
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: solve this.
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: Yeah, because I reckon it's like it does seem as
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: as a simple fix, so to me, you know, to
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: the lineman, it seems like a simple thing.
• 5:20
  Speaker 2: A lot of time things look like simple fix until
• 5:22
  Speaker 2: you find out who owns it. Because you know about
• 5:24
  Speaker 2: the car that's still wrapped around the fix it now
• 5:28
  Speaker 2: about eight months because it was not our land.
• 5:30
  Speaker 3: It was actually part of water land and we couldn't
• 5:33
  Speaker 3: touch it. Because we.
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: Will check it out and we'll come back to it.
• 5:37
  Speaker 2: Because we're discussing the footpaths and one of them was
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: actually in the old Ulna. In the Ulna, there's an
• 5:46
  Speaker 2: area in the Wulna there's no foot path that we're
• 5:47
  Speaker 2: talking about it.
• 5:48
  Speaker 3: They saw.
• 5:49
  Speaker 2: There are number of footpaths we're actually addressing at the moment.
• 5:51
  Speaker 2: We have the budget to install them. The only thing
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: we have to find out is who owns what and
• 5:55
  Speaker 2: who is responsible.
• 5:56
  Speaker 3: If it's our responsibility. We can.
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah, And as I said, I ended up going there yesterday.
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: I thought I'll go and have a look at it.
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: And we didn't continue up there because my young fellow,
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: I thought, I don't feel comfortable letting him run right
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: up on the road.
• 6:08
  Speaker 2: I will go back and find out and we'll come
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: back to your next program.
• 6:11
  Speaker 3: We talked together about it.
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: Sounds like a plant now corn bombing of Darwin Commemorations
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: series A lot on this weekend, isn't.
• 6:18
  Speaker 2: There nineteenth of February on Sunday. I hope that a
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: lot of people will come there. It's a significant day
• 6:24
  Speaker 2: for Darwin w It's actually it's a sad day, but
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: also it's a glorious day because actually we prove once
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: again that we can spring back from adversity.
• 6:33
  Speaker 3: We've done it before and will do it again.
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: I expect three thousand and four thousand people. I hear
• 6:39
  Speaker 2: the grape vine there might be a lot of dicingdis
• 6:41
  Speaker 2: from down south and even the Prime Minister. The interesting
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: thing is last year was the eighth anniversary, just dressing
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: up to go to the ceremony, my phone ring was
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: my son and congratulate me for becoming a grandfather with
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: the beautiful granddaughter. So I will not forget here Thursday's
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: ever because would be the bombing of Darwin eightyth birthday.
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: But I expect everybody to come there. It's not about
• 7:07
  Speaker 2: celebrating wards about commemorating the victims that they died there
• 7:10
  Speaker 2: quite a lot of them. The people were uprooted that
• 7:12
  Speaker 2: they never came back. The people actually found a new
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: direction of their life. And the fact that Darwin became
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: the only place in Australia that the war came to
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: our doorstep. Other places were bombed, but not as severe
• 7:24
  Speaker 2: as Darwin. And this is a tragic commemoration, but significant one.
• 7:28
  Speaker 3: This is history. This is real history, history of Australia.
• 7:32
  Speaker 2: That rematch everybody that we're the four Front of Australia
• 7:36
  Speaker 2: with the tropical capital of Australia, were the closest to
• 7:39
  Speaker 2: the Asian region Australia and people prepared for everything.
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I interviewed last year Brian Winsby, the one hundred
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: and one year old veteran, and I'll tell you what
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: it was people were calling it. It was very like
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: it was very emotional to hear from him and to
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: hear what as such a young Blower kid being through.
• 7:57
  Speaker 2: It's incredible that actually people in Australia still don't realize
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: the significance of Darwin. It took me ten years for
• 8:04
  Speaker 2: me to find out what happened. Only when I went
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: to Broom and find out that Broom had been bombed.
• 8:09
  Speaker 3: By the Japanese.
• 8:10
  Speaker 2: And then of course I came to Darwin and then
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: my first ceremony. I had never realized that actually Australia
• 8:16
  Speaker 2: had been bombed by the Japanese. Interesting thing is I
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: was celebrating Anzac Day in Chinese prison in Singapore and
• 8:24
  Speaker 2: I was talking with a friend next to me about
• 8:26
  Speaker 2: the bombing of Darwin. Behind me, I get a top
• 8:28
  Speaker 2: on the turn around was an American high rank officer Navy.
• 8:32
  Speaker 2: I said, said to me, what are you talking about
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: bombing of Australia. I said, way, Dower was bombed by
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: the Japanese in nineteen forty three and quite a few
• 8:41
  Speaker 2: Americans die there.
• 8:42
  Speaker 3: Said to me, I have to go back and read history.
• 8:44
  Speaker 3: I was never aware of that.
• 8:46
  Speaker 2: Yeah, not many people are aware of the role that
• 8:48
  Speaker 2: Darwin played during World War two, and we have to.
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: Remember that absolutely. So con what time do things get
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: underway on the weekends.
• 8:56
  Speaker 2: Don't forget that just before ten o'clock dawn was bombed.
• 9:00
  Speaker 2: Be starting about nine point thirty and as long as
• 9:03
  Speaker 2: it takes cage. Because it's a significant day, it's going
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: to be hot and humid. I know that one and
• 9:07
  Speaker 2: of course I'll be wearing my robes and I'm going
• 9:09
  Speaker 2: to be even more hold and humid. But it's a
• 9:12
  Speaker 2: small price to pay to commemorate such significant event.
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: I certainly is Lord Mayor of Darwin convat Scarlets. Thank
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: you so very much for your time this morning. Anything
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: I need to know about. Very briefly, we.
• 9:23
  Speaker 3: Put a submission to the Alcohol Review.
• 9:25
  Speaker 2: Yes, we ask for reduction of sale at Tako take
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: away alcohol from ten o'clock to twelve o'clock. We also
• 9:32
  Speaker 2: ask to buy back licenses from shops that they rely
• 9:35
  Speaker 2: heavily to alcohol. We ask for bringing back the tu
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: kilometer law and policit and I'd have to say that
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: I don't have a problem make it being drunk and
• 9:43
  Speaker 2: stub it in a public place. Have you a drunk
• 9:45
  Speaker 2: a stubbit, or smoke marijuana and be stubbid, or ice
• 9:48
  Speaker 2: and be scubid, have the.
• 9:50
  Speaker 3: Book thrown at you. You deserve it.
• 9:52
  Speaker 2: The reality is we are going to see an influx
• 9:55
  Speaker 2: of people coming from outside. And let's face reality, because
• 9:58
  Speaker 2: unless we actually REALI we've got.
• 10:00
  Speaker 3: A problem, we will not find a solution.
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: And the government he has to realize, has got a
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: big problem in their hands, both political problem and a
• 10:07
  Speaker 2: social problem.
• 10:08
  Speaker 3: If they don't fix one, they're going to lose the other.
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: Have I got their heads buried in the sand at
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: the moment, corn.
• 10:14
  Speaker 2: Look, I think there was done that the after effect
• 10:19
  Speaker 2: of allowing acc the communities. Sometimes you've been caught short
• 10:25
  Speaker 2: and they didn't act quickly. The federal government moved very quickly.
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: Of course, when you've got the same political side from
• 10:33
  Speaker 2: a federal government giving you a lecture, you tend to listen.
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: I think Discomment now is prepared to something. I hope
• 10:39
  Speaker 2: they're prepared to something, because if they don't, are their
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: own per bill in politics, and I know what happens
• 10:44
  Speaker 2: every four.
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: Years conveat scarlets. I'm gonna have to leave it there.
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: Thanks for your time this morning.