The Week That Was – 22nd March 2024

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Well, it is the most listened to our and territory
radio and there is a lot going on this week.

Speaker 2 (00:05):
For the week.

Speaker 1 (00:05):
That was in the studio with us this morning, the
Deputy Opposition Leader Jared Maylee, good morning.

Speaker 3 (00:10):
Good morning Katie, and good morning listeners.

Speaker 1 (00:12):
Well and here from Alice Springs, we have got Robin Lamley,
Good morning to you, the Member for.

Speaker 4 (00:16):
Our Low Good morning Katie.

Speaker 1 (00:18):
Lovely to have you in the studios from Central Australia.

Speaker 2 (00:21):
The Attorney General Chancey PA good morning to.

Speaker 5 (00:24):
You morning Katy. In a shout out to everyone tuned.

Speaker 1 (00:26):
In, Yeah, everybody, Well, Central Australia representing this morning, and
we are expecting Matt Cunningham from Sky News to be
here in a couple of moments. But look, let's talk
about the cyclone evacuation. I'm keen to get a bit
of an update because we know that evacuations are continuing
in the inundated remote community of Boro Lula. Authorities expecting

(00:46):
the MacArthur River to hit a record flood peak sometime
yesterday afternoon following heavy rains associated with ex tropical Cyclone Megan.

Speaker 5 (00:56):
Now.

Speaker 2 (00:56):
About one hundred Boro Lula residents were.

Speaker 1 (00:58):
Evacuated to Darwin the ADF aircraft on Wednesday evening, after
Emergency Services said the town, about fifty kilometers inland from
the Golf as we know, and surrounding regions were bracing
for a one in one hundred year flood. It has
been a very interesting time, to say the least for

(01:18):
the people of Borolula and surrounding areas. Chancy, do we
have any idea just how many have been evacuated now?

Speaker 6 (01:24):
Yeah, so these planes have brought one hundred and thirty
people through to Darwin. The river was recorded to peak
at eighteen meters this morning, so certainly we've been doing
that evacuation plan rolling it through.

Speaker 5 (01:40):
Four tons of water and.

Speaker 6 (01:42):
Food have been brought into Borolula and they are obviously
monitoring those evacuations and getting people to the airport. Obviously,
some of the issues that the police have been working
around is getting people to the airport.

Speaker 5 (01:56):
Having to get them in.

Speaker 6 (01:57):
Across in some areas by boat to the airport has
been a bit of a challenge, but look they've got
it at hand and they're just working through it.

Speaker 1 (02:03):
And look, criticism earlier in the week that the government
didn't move fast enough, or that authorities didn't move fast enough,
and that there were hundreds of people sort of there,
you know, waiting to be backed. Earlier in the week
before the cyclone hit. The ide of plane circling around
unable to land, I mean, should the government have moved faster? Oh?

Speaker 6 (02:22):
Look again, the government didn't work through based on the
recommendations that were coming through part of the emergency management plans,
working with the Bureau of Meteorology and certainly putting in
the notifications to the ADF around getting those planes organized. Obviously,
the weather is something that you know, we can try
as best we can to predict its pattern and its flows.

(02:44):
But certainly the response has been adequate. Absolutely working through
now that we're in a different phase of the emergency
management plans around the floods, and certainly watching that that
is a weather pattern that has been moving across the
territory in plan and activating plans.

Speaker 5 (03:02):
For other parts of the territory.

Speaker 7 (03:03):
Yeah, it's interesting the chance, he says, is adequate because
I saw some footage and I spoke to some people
in relation to it, and on the Sunday when the
wind was starting to blow up, that's when evacuation should
have been ordered, not on the Monday, because the Monday came,
the wind was there, the clouds were low, the rain
was there, and these planes couldn't come. And just have
to look at the track record in relation to the
labor government and these emergencies. You know, look what happened

(03:25):
when they moved the people to Howard Springs. There was
a disaster there. Those people were put at risk. There
was alcohol, there was domestic violence. Pigeonhole was a disaster,
The VIC Highway was a disaster. We had people basically
helicopters flying over them leaving them screening.

Speaker 1 (03:40):
Are we expecting in total and are they just staying
at Fosky Pavilion or are they also going to.

Speaker 2 (03:45):
Be at Marara. And Matt Cunningham has just joined us
as well.

Speaker 8 (03:48):
Just I've literally been out there filing on this story.
So my understanding was that there's about three hundred and
I think it's three hundred and fifty nine and forty
eight who were flown in last night. The last plane
came in yesterday evening just after seven, I think, so
there were a bit over one hundred who were flown
out the day before, and then another two hundred and

(04:10):
fifty year roughly flown out last night. At the moment,
I think they're all at Fosky Pavilion, but marras set
up just in case they need that space as well.
And Matt Hollanby was saying at the press conference last
night that there's no evacuations at the moment for other communities,
but they are keeping it close eye on places like Calgaryine, Pigeonhole,

(04:30):
Daga Argue in case there's flooding because that area has
already been flooded by tropical cyclone or x tropical cycling.

Speaker 4 (04:36):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (04:36):
Look, it's an interesting time to say the least, and
we are expecting that it's going to mean a bit
of rain for you guys in Central Australia as well
over the coming days and no doubt going to be
interesting to see how our roads are tracking as well
in terms of supplies supplies of food. So we'll keep
a really close eye on things. But look we're going
to take a really quick break when.

Speaker 2 (04:56):
We come back.

Speaker 1 (04:56):
There is so much to cover off this week when
you talk about int politics, so stick around.

Speaker 2 (05:01):
Lots to discuss.

Speaker 1 (05:02):
Well, if you have just joined us this morning in
the studio, we've got Jared Maylee Robin Lamley, Matt Cunningham
and Chancey Paike and Well. Late yesterday Steve Edgington notified
the Leader of the Opposition that he's resigned from the
role of Shadow Minister for Prevention of Domestic Family and
Sexual Violence. He said, I will not let a job

(05:23):
title distract debate on what is a critical crisis across
the Northern Territory. I've always been and will continue to
be a strong advocate for driving down the shocking rates
of domestic family and sexual violence, which have increased by
eighty three percent under the last eight years of labor,
he says. Now we know that the country liberal parties well.
Steve Edgington had resisted calls earlier in the week to resign,

(05:46):
claiming that he did not know the extent of his
staff as criminal history. So the Aboriginal liaison officer for
the Barkley electorate, Well, he was suspended without pay on
Wednesday morning after it was field that he'd been jailed
three times in the past four years for breaching bail
and domestic violence orders. Now, this was an issue that

(06:09):
was certainly discussed at length throughout Parliament throughout the week
and I've got to say it got to a point
where the you know, the whole debate. I played some
of the audio yesterday. It was pretty wild, to put
it mildly. But first off, do we think that Steve's
done the right thing here?

Speaker 4 (06:26):
Absolutely, he's done the right thing. In fact, I think
Labour need to take a page out of Steve's book.
Finally he's owned the fact that he's made a couple
of pretty bad decisions and he's withdrawn from that portfolio. Labor,
on the other hand, have a police minister that is
sitting in the back row there in the chamber with
a long history of racism and sexism and all sorts

(06:48):
of other isms that is reflecting very badly on the
integrity of the government. So good on Steve.

Speaker 7 (06:54):
And I think Steve in relation to this, you know,
he made a decision might have been wrong. But ultimately
this is a it's such an important issue that we
can't let the media talk about Steve and the distraction.

Speaker 3 (07:03):
That's because that's what Labour want.

Speaker 7 (07:05):
They don't want Labor talking about themselves because of the
stuff up to they've made.

Speaker 3 (07:08):
They haven't owned it.

Speaker 7 (07:09):
Where Steve realized he'd made a mistake, he's gone in
he's done it, so we can really focus on domestic violence.
We know the rates have gone up eighty three percent
under Labor, and labor we've cut it, They've failed territory.
So instead of talking about the issue and actually dealing
with it, what Labor tried to do this week is
talk about Steve trying to cover up their own face.

Speaker 8 (07:27):
The media want to talk about the issue generally, and
I can't fathom and try and explain it to me, Jared,
how you can know that a guy has got two
domestic violence offenses and then you still hire him in
that role where he's traveling around bush communities where we
know DV is prevalent. But I just don't understand how
it could happen in the first place.

Speaker 7 (07:47):
Well, we don't know the facts of what how, what
the offenses are, all the facts in the know that
he breached domestic violence, Say is enough enough and put
someone out there on the rope and never give him
a chance?

Speaker 3 (07:59):
Spoken is Steve Hall asked me a question.

Speaker 7 (08:03):
Stephen had a decision, he made a risk assessment. I
spoke to him about it, and he said, it's an
opportunity to get this to break the cycle and that's
what he did.

Speaker 5 (08:10):
So you just said that you spoke to him about it.

Speaker 6 (08:14):
He just said earlier that he didn't know about it.
It's a little bit of mis truths there now. You know,
and I know, and everyone in this room knows. Tenant
Creek is a small town. It's a bit like Alice Springs.
Everyone knows everyone's business. The Member for Barkley's electorate office
is fifty meters down from the local court. You know
who's coming in and who's coming out. And absolutely this
is smoke and mirrors from the COLP because he's still

(08:38):
remaining in the shadow portfolio of the Attorney General, the
potential first law officer of the territory. And domestic and
family violence absolutely is the rates of this around the
nation are discussing.

Speaker 5 (08:51):
A woman loses.

Speaker 6 (08:52):
Her life every week across the country to domestic and
family violence. And we have the Member for Barkley who
has employed someone who is stood down with pay in
this area.

Speaker 5 (09:05):
He has not sapped that point.

Speaker 1 (09:09):
I will say Jared that earlier in the week, a
simple Google search of this person's name and I found
the court lease from earlier two weeks ago that actually
showed that he was appearing in court as well, and
Steve then revealed on the show that yes, he appeared
for high range Drenk driving. I mean, look, at the
end of the day, he's employed somebody that he should

(09:31):
not have employed. By the sounds of it. He should
have done his due diligence. He should have actually done
a proper check. I think you can literally, quite literally
google someone's name.

Speaker 8 (09:43):
He knew that there were two offenses there, and he's
still hiding.

Speaker 3 (09:45):
Yeah, he admitted that.

Speaker 1 (09:47):
But then also it was revealed, I believe yesterday that
he had gone into business with somebody else who allegedly
also had had some kind.

Speaker 4 (09:54):
Of back in twenty sixteen. Yeah, I mean that was
before he was even a member of parliament. Steve has
done the wrong thing. He's owned up to it. He's
acknowledged that he made a poor judgment decision. He's employed
this guy thinking that he'd give him the benefit of
the doubt. He was on Radio ABC Radio yesterday. I

(10:16):
think it was saying that that at what point do
you give someone a break and give them a pathway
forward after what he thought was a completed sentence and story.
Over Look, I'm not going to defend Steve, But I
do think he's done the right thing from stepping out
of this portfolio. Let's just go back a couple of
years and look at what's happened in the history of
the labor books. They had Kent Row there, who was

(10:40):
a sex offender, who went to jail for historical sex offenses.
What happened as a result of that in the labor
ranks absolutely nothing, And yet he was the party leader
and he was the chief advisor to the then Chief
Minister Michael Gunner. Nothing happened a much more severe store

(11:00):
of possibly harboring a criminal.

Speaker 2 (11:04):
And look the thing is as well.

Speaker 1 (11:06):
I think it's worth pointing out right now that it
was raised by our listeners earlier in the week.

Speaker 2 (11:10):
One of our listeners message through and see.

Speaker 1 (11:12):
Katie, how low can the bar go when you talk
about some of the behavior that we're seeing from politicians
in the Northern Territory. And he had said, you know,
they could be having a game of limbo right now,
and that relates to Chancey your shares, that relates to
the situation that we saw with Brent Potter. Obviously, with
those posts, we also know that Joshua Burgoyne had to

(11:34):
face court just a week or so ago. I mean,
we are in a situation right now where Territorians are
literally screaming out going just do your bloody jobs. Just
get on with actually doing what people want you.

Speaker 8 (11:49):
To do it do your jobs. But I think accountability
absolutely when something is revealed, like.

Speaker 2 (11:57):
If you've done the wrong thing, front up.

Speaker 8 (11:58):
And standing Jared and correct me if I'm wrong. But
my understanding is that Steve Edgington offered to resign from
all of his portfolios, and that his cabinet is party
wing members talk him out of that.

Speaker 3 (12:10):
But his decision is that he resigned from that one.

Speaker 8 (12:12):
Because did he offer to resign from all of them?

Speaker 3 (12:15):
Well, you have to talk to him about that.

Speaker 7 (12:16):
But I'm asking you, you know, I'm saying what happened
radio that he resigned because he knew and a chance
he was speaking about a small town. But if you
talk about Brent Potter when he brought those shares, you
talk about the theory I've been a small office. Well,
he was an advisor in the small offers and the
government's response was he wasn't advising in that particular section.
So if you want to use the theory that chance

(12:37):
he just put out the attendant creeks a small town. Well,
that office is a small town where in the policemanister.

Speaker 1 (12:45):
He can't look just one situation because there is there
is a lot to cover off here.

Speaker 2 (12:53):
And don't worry, We've got time. I've already played a set.

Speaker 1 (12:55):
Of ads, So, Jared, I do want to ask, firstly,
so is Matt Wright Steve try to stand down all together?

Speaker 3 (13:01):
Well, Steve made all sorts of different things.

Speaker 7 (13:03):
He was talking about doing one, he's talking about staying there,
but his decision in the end was to stand down
for one.

Speaker 8 (13:09):
It's an important test here because we give this mold
chances of a hard time all the time about openness, transparency,
being up front. It's a simple question. Did he offer
to stand down from Ulipo.

Speaker 3 (13:19):
He didn't offer, but he spoke about it.

Speaker 7 (13:21):
So he didn't say you would, but he certainly spoke
about it, but he said in the end his decision
is to stand down from one.

Speaker 6 (13:25):
I think, Katie, we're also talking about, you know, about
accountability and.

Speaker 1 (13:30):
Robin, please tell the integrity as well, because the question from.

Speaker 6 (13:34):
You this month as well that Robin has raised around
you know doing the right thing, Well, you know I
met with the domestic and family violence sector this week
for a separate matter. But the fact is that, following
the allegations that the Member for Barkley has been in
broad in, he has still not reached out to the
domestic and family violence sector to talk to them. Because

(13:56):
what we know is that this staff member that he
was carting around he was taking to events in Tenant
Creek where there were women who were previously felt unsafe
because of that environment.

Speaker 5 (14:08):
So we do need to actually make a point.

Speaker 6 (14:11):
Yet, Brent Potter is absolutely meeting with the domestic and
family violence sector to talk about the issues that have
arisen out.

Speaker 4 (14:19):
Of those axonerate him.

Speaker 5 (14:21):
I'm not saying that.

Speaker 6 (14:21):
It does, but it gives what that sector need is
a chance to absolutely talk to those individuals and absolutely
tell them how they're feeling and how the events that
have unfolded this week have made them feel, and how
they want things to change.

Speaker 4 (14:36):
If anyone needs to go, it's Brent Potter, not just
from his portfolio of police but also completely from the cabinet.
His behavior is despicable.

Speaker 6 (14:45):
Brent has absolutely been out, He faced the media and
been out to all.

Speaker 5 (14:49):
Of those sectors of the community.

Speaker 6 (14:52):
To absolutely talk about those posts from from years ago,
and absolutely there's still.

Speaker 1 (14:58):
The opportunity actually to ask about it. Chatsy, how did
you feel about his posts? Like, how do you actually
feel about them? Because you and I have spoken before,
and you've spoken about, you know, about race based politics
and the fact that you don't like, you know, people
bringing up things like race. You've talked about that when
you talk about alcohol legislation and that kind of thing.

(15:20):
So how did you feel about it when you saw
these posts?

Speaker 6 (15:23):
I'm black, I'm gay, my father is German, and I've
got Jewish families. Absolutely, Katie, when we talking about this issue,
I wasn't happy. I spent a number of hours talking
to the member for Fanny Bay and looking at talking
about what I wanted to do.

Speaker 1 (15:40):
With that, with your personal experience and with your background,
what did you say to him?

Speaker 6 (15:44):
Look, I told him that I was obviously hurt by
what I had seen and heard, and I told him
absolutely that I wanted to make sure that he was
absolutely facing the music and talking to the groups in
our community who had been absolutely directly hurt by what
he had said.

Speaker 2 (16:00):
And was he told to pull his head in Look.

Speaker 6 (16:02):
I've absolutely had a very firm conversation with him. But
I've also worked with him as a colleague and he
was very supportive of me putting through the anti discrimination
legislation that he was a member of our government with.
And you know, I'll say now, every member of the Parliament,
as we've just heard being talk about here, deserves a

(16:22):
second chance.

Speaker 5 (16:23):
And I think.

Speaker 8 (16:26):
Steve Edgings says with Darius Plumber, well, I thought he
deserved a second chance because you know, he's a you know,
he's obviously got issues in his past.

Speaker 5 (16:34):
But I want to get into that's more than that
second chance.

Speaker 8 (16:38):
I'm just using your I'm just using your analogy and
what you say with Brent Potter. I mean, how many
times did Brent Potter post racist, homophobic, sexist, misogynistic, anti
Semitic stuff on Facebook?

Speaker 5 (16:50):
I mean again, and the other.

Speaker 7 (16:52):
Question, che were you acted the same it was a
CLP person who posted those things when you said the
same thing, kept quiet or would you have been out
there in the media.

Speaker 5 (16:59):
Mate.

Speaker 6 (16:59):
I think if we looked at the CLP's post is
probably a few members of yours there.

Speaker 3 (17:02):
But I'm talking about I'm talking about this particular one.

Speaker 7 (17:04):
If that was the saying if the CELP married post
of those posts, will you remained quiet of the LPA
member or just you remain quiet because it's a Labor member.

Speaker 6 (17:12):
Well, i'd absolutely talk to that CLP member who it was,
as I talked to the member for Fanny Bay and
said that this is what you need to absolutely do,
and now this is what he's done.

Speaker 4 (17:21):
You can see how hypocritical this sounds. Chancey.

Speaker 6 (17:25):
I absolutely would be talking to the CLP member who
had made those comments and say.

Speaker 1 (17:31):
All right, when you were skirting around it. But the
thing is, the Labor government came in on a promise
of being open, transparent, honest, and we've now got a
situation where Steve Edgington has you know, I stepped away
from that portfolio. But we've seen obviously from you just
a few weeks ago, the situation with the shares fiasco.
You still haven't told us whether you did declare at

(17:52):
the beginning of all of those cabinet meetings around discussions
with alcohol legislation or the stronger futures legislation, whether you declared.

Speaker 2 (18:00):
That in those meetings.

Speaker 1 (18:01):
We now know the IYEKAC isn't able to access you
know Cabinet documents. I don't know whether it's into that
particular issue or something else. But then we've also got
a situation where you've got Brent Potter, that's obviously you know,
I posted these posts. We've still got like members of
the community that message through to say, Katie, I cannot
believe he's been able to retain his position. I am

(18:21):
personally offended by different things that he has said, particularly
when he joined us on the week that was and
spoke further about the posts that had been put up,
you know, that were anti Semitic, and had sort of
said that part of that was related to his train
of thought I guess to paraphrase here when he was
a member of the ADF. So you've now got a

(18:43):
situation where the COLP, Steve Edgington, has been prepared to.

Speaker 2 (18:48):
Fall on his sword, albeit a paper cut.

Speaker 1 (18:50):
You know, he's not totally stepping aside, but he's doing that.
But members of the Labor Party seem like they are
not prepared to front up and actually do what's right.

Speaker 5 (19:01):
Katie.

Speaker 6 (19:02):
I have always declared they were on the members register
of interest where anyone could are on.

Speaker 5 (19:08):
There for years.

Speaker 6 (19:10):
As I've said always, I have always declared whether there's
a possible, perceived or real conflict that you did not.

Speaker 4 (19:17):
Recuse yourself from the debate around alcohol strategy.

Speaker 7 (19:21):
And that's where the problem is, trying to make money
out of the c trying to do money.

Speaker 6 (19:28):
For the inability that the Member for Barkley took a
DV perpetrator that he was employing around to events in
direct putting direct women in harm's way.

Speaker 5 (19:38):
That's what the story.

Speaker 1 (19:39):
So then we did see and Matt, you may have
it on you at the moment, we did see the
response from the Senator just Enter Price earlier in the
week because I know earlier in the week you had
said throughout Parliament you'd called the Country Liberal Party the
criminal Liberal Party I think it was, and you had asked,
you'd ask the question, how would the Senator of the
Northern Territory just Into Price respond what had happened? Matt,

(20:01):
I don't know whether you've got that response in front
of you or you don't.

Speaker 8 (20:05):
I don't, but I do think on the broader issue
because Chancey you had a decent crack in Parliament at
the CLP on this issue and you called them the
criminal Liberal Party and various other things and said that
they didn't care about victims of domestic and family violence.
But I just wonder how that weighs up with the
eual government's decision not to put those alcohol bands back

(20:26):
in place in Alice Springs for so long when you had,
I mean, just think the price in their maiden speech,
Marion Scrimger in air maiden speech, I've just got that here.
I mean, this is what she said, Marian Scrimshaw in July,
late July last year, just after those bands had been lifted.
She said, when a government puts in a protective regime
of that kind and leaves it in place for that long,
you can't just suddenly pull the pin on it without

(20:46):
any protection, sanctuary, or plan for the vulnerable women and
children whom the original measure was supposed to protect. To
do that is more than negligent at the level of
impact on actual lives, It is tantamount to causing injury
by omesh. That's Marian Scrims' standing up in the Federal
Parliament late July twenty twenty two. And your government didn't
do anything until Elbow came to town in January.

Speaker 6 (21:08):
So let's make it clear the stronger futures legislation is
Commonwealth legislation that the Commonwealth.

Speaker 5 (21:15):
Did not they walked away from that as a government.

Speaker 6 (21:22):
The government absolutely, I do support alcohol restrictions as long
as they're blanket prohibitions and they're not targeting Aboriginal people.
Directly bring in alcohol restrictions for everyone, not just Aboriginal people.
And the government did bring in alcohol measures.

Speaker 4 (21:39):
Another one has failed domestic violence victims more than your government,
and you personally to be back right across more domestics
than you were responsible.

Speaker 2 (21:55):
Well, look, we are going to take a quick break.

Speaker 1 (21:57):
There is still so much to discuss this morning, and
we we are going to talk a little bit more
about alcohol policy in a minute when we talk about
the palis on those bottle shops in Alice Springs, but
also very keen to discuss the school lockdown that had
to happen a little earlier this week after a thirteen
year old who doesn't attend school allegedly punched four students,
sparking a lockdown.

Speaker 2 (22:17):
That's coming your way in just a moment.

Speaker 1 (22:19):
And as I said earlier, it has been an incredibly
busy week. Now if you've just joined us, we've got
the Attorney General Chancey Paik. We've got Matt cunning Had
from Sky News. We've got the Independent member Farra Lun
Robin Lamley and the Deputy Opposition Leader Jared Mayley in
the studio.

Speaker 2 (22:33):
Now.

Speaker 1 (22:34):
Earlier in the week and yesterday we spoke to two
anti Catholic schools about o'lachland Catholic College in Darwin being
sent into a lockdown earlier in the week after youth
entered the school grounds. Now the thirteen year old who
does not attend the school, allegedly punched four students, sparking
the lockdown. Police entered, they attended and the lockdown was

(22:55):
lifted a short time later. Investigations are indeed ongoing. We've
had a number of parents getting contact with us about this.

Speaker 2 (23:02):
We've had, you know, we've.

Speaker 1 (23:03):
Had quite a few people speak to us about this
who are really pretty mortified at the fact that they.

Speaker 2 (23:10):
Sent their kids to school.

Speaker 1 (23:11):
You know, a kid that does not go to the school,
that is unknown from what we are told by the students,
then getting in and assaulting them. And it's not the
first time that we've seen kids who should be at
school doing the wrong thing. I mean, it's been well
documented on this show just in the last month alone,
the different occasions where you've got kids that should actually

(23:32):
be at school that are then engaging in bad behavior.
But I think it reaches a whole new level when
they're then actually impacting on other kids who are doing
the right thing, who are actually in their school. It's
your worst night me as a parent, to send your
kid to school and have something happen to them through
absolutely no fault of their own.

Speaker 7 (23:50):
This is another classic example of the failure of the
labor government. You know, there's about consequences for these youth
offenders going and they think they're untouchable. Now, Katie, and
I'm sure we all hear story, you know, about what's happened,
and these kids just do what they want because they
think I'm not going to get into trouble. And I
speak to lawyers and I speak to a police officers say,
these kids just really go there and they flaun the

(24:10):
fact that they're untouchable in this labor government of raise
the age criminal responsibility, taking away breach of fail You know,
there's been a bail review which was no recommendations at all.
Now they're doing a youth justice review because they changed
the law in twenty nineteen. We had a bailer review
last year, no recommending. Now I heard the Chief Menster
sale maybe there's going to be some sort of special
youth bail Why can it happen last year? Why are

(24:30):
we're doing it now? Why are these children having to
get a soldered at school? And the answer is because
they've becoming a failed territory.

Speaker 1 (24:36):
The interesting thing I think that we're seeing as well
as in New South Wales, the Labor government in New
South Wales and making some fairly significant changes. Chris Means
is making some significant changes and I will say that
he has got different groups of like of lawyers, child
advocates screaming out at him, telling him not to do it,
but he's realizing that hang on, there actually is some
change that needs to come into play here because we

(24:58):
can't continue down the that we are where there is
harm being caused to a lot of victims. You know,
there's so much sort of going on for them, and
it is a similar situation here in the northern territory
where there is so much going on and people are
literally screaming out for help. I mean in New South
Wales they have said that they're amending the Bail Act,

(25:18):
So it's going to They're going to amend the Bail
Act to include a temporary addition bail test for young
people between fourteen and eighteen charged with committing certain serious
break and enter offenses or motivehicle theft defenses while on
bail for the same offenses. So it means that the
bail authorities such as police, magistrates, judges, they're going to
need to have a high degree of confidence that the

(25:40):
young person will not commit a further serious offense. Now
there is also a new offense for posting and boasting,
So the new South Wales government is going to introduce
legislation that will create a new offense in the Crimes
Act imposing an additional penalty of two years imprisonment for
people who commit motive theft or break and enter offenses

(26:02):
and share material to advertise their involvement.

Speaker 4 (26:05):
That sounds good, Katie, and we definitely need that in
Alice Springs. Chance he's nodding. We know that a lot
of the crimes that are committed by kids young people
in Alice Springs are reported widely through social media. They
get a lot of satisfaction. In fact, I'd go as
far to say they get all their satisfaction from posting
those sorts of things their criminal behavior, and it has

(26:27):
to stop.

Speaker 5 (26:27):
Yeah. Look, I actually not disagree agree in chancing with Robin.
I think we need need to look at it.

Speaker 6 (26:34):
I think there's a whole bunch where certainly reaching out
to New South Wales, understanding those changes and looking at
how we can look at those here. Because Robin is
when she's talking about it, it's young people posting and
boasting and encouraging other people to do that type of thing.

Speaker 5 (26:49):
It's completely unacceptable.

Speaker 6 (26:50):
But also young people are looking at what people are
posting about when they unfortunately and sadly have been broken
into and they.

Speaker 5 (26:58):
Know they're getting they're getting a kick out of it.

Speaker 6 (27:01):
So looking at those social media laws is really important.
Even you know, people tiktoking videos around what's happening is unacceptable.

Speaker 1 (27:10):
I think my kids have shown me videos before on
TikTok of kids going up to security guards in Casuarina,
for example, you know, trying to assault them.

Speaker 8 (27:22):
So far behind on the technology, it's not funny, you know.
I see TikTok videos when they finally make their way
through to the Boomer's favorite social media channel of choice, Facebook,
but the ones where people are waiting for kids to
get off buses and then they're attacking them from my
mind and posting it on TikTok.

Speaker 3 (27:39):
I mean, it's just like.

Speaker 5 (27:40):
Everyone is in agreeance. We do need to do the work,
and I think we.

Speaker 1 (27:44):
Can text asking this question from when Natasha Files was
the Chief Minister.

Speaker 2 (27:50):
So I actually can't understand why it's taking so long.

Speaker 1 (27:52):
I can't understand why we've got to see what somebody
does in another state before we go all right, we
should do this too, Like let's be brave, let's.

Speaker 4 (27:59):
Keep bleeding the way.

Speaker 7 (28:01):
You know, this government has been in power for eight years.
Why are we doing it now? Why has it taken
so long? Why is the people in our spring someone
got killed, you know when the car rolled on them,
you know, getting a soldier and these children, that affects
them for a long time. Why has it taken eight
years for this labor government to even look at something
else about doing it. They had a bail review, remember
us year, there's no recommendation, so they had the opportunity, and.

Speaker 4 (28:21):
That opportunity, Katie, we've got to go back to good
old fashion, common sense. We've got to go back to
good old fashioned discipline where there are consequences. I think
the best thing you can do for kids when they
misbehave is disciplined them. I'm not saying throw them in jail,
but we just have to go back to really basic
principles and that's what we've lost in the Northern Territory chancy.

Speaker 2 (28:44):
How soon.

Speaker 6 (28:46):
That the new Chief Minister is absolutely really committed to
doing this in this space, I think talking about what
Robin's been talking about as well.

Speaker 5 (28:54):
You know, it's we've been out.

Speaker 6 (28:56):
I've been out with the Chief Minister to meetings with
average organizations and communities and land councils, and one of
the issues people talk about is being able to discipline
their kids and being you know, the fear of not
being able to do it as a result of the intervention.
Now Robin is right, you actually can discipline your child.
Under the Care and Protection Act, you are allowed to

(29:18):
discipline your child. There is a miss I think understanding
of what discipline means. You know, you can you can
discipline your child. You just can't, you know, belp them
with a chain and those types of things. But you
can discipline your child. I think also the foundation here
is just acknowledging. We started off the question about o'lachland College.

(29:38):
They did have emergency management plans there. They did, emergency
services were called.

Speaker 2 (29:43):
The school did everything they need.

Speaker 6 (29:44):
Investigations afloat the young person thirteen is criminally response and
will be going through the processes as an outcome.

Speaker 1 (29:53):
Do you know what the punishment is or do you
know where we're at with those charges already say that'll be.

Speaker 5 (29:58):
A matter that's with the police.

Speaker 6 (30:00):
When those charges are pressed, it will be a matter
of again for the court. I think Jared's point the
Chief Minister has been very clear with standing up this
Youth Bail Review and the number.

Speaker 5 (30:11):
That the people relied people.

Speaker 6 (30:15):
The Chief Minister said that absolutely we want to purpose
Youth Bail Act rather than just using the entire ballet.

Speaker 3 (30:22):
Complete at the end of this year you already happened.

Speaker 6 (30:26):
The point is that this is an opportunity for Jared Mainlee,
for Robin Lamley, for you know, Matt Cunningham and everyone
in the community to actually put in a submission to
that that the review can look at and work through.

Speaker 7 (30:38):
You're the government, why you've got to leave us to
fix it, way to fix it. We know there's been
a youth buyol review. Why don't you release that? How
long it's just wor.

Speaker 5 (30:51):
Based on no evidence?

Speaker 6 (30:53):
Now position you said to me in a briefing consult
you said, can you developed legislation?

Speaker 3 (31:01):
Garanty?

Speaker 8 (31:04):
Do you think Chancy that the bail laws are working
as they should be at the moment, because I know,
even with the new South Wales thing, I mean the
discretion still lies with the judge. Even in that case
where there's a second serious offense after the first one
was on bail. It just says the judge has to
have high confidence that there won't be reoffending. We've got
presumption against bail here. But I mean you spoke about

(31:26):
this case earlier this week. Cap There was a case
that went through the Supreme Court earlier this month, Chancing
where there was a fourteen year old and seriously it
was like seven times serious violent offending, seven times bail, bail, bail, bail, bail, bail, bail, Like,
do you think that's acceptable and that's working?

Speaker 6 (31:41):
Look, we've got the new Chief Minister has absolutely initiated
this review.

Speaker 5 (31:46):
She said to the review, I.

Speaker 6 (31:47):
Want you to absolutely look at the development of a
Youth Bail Act to address any of the outlying concerns
we've brought in the presumptions against bail. There's always going
to need to be at work in this space. But
you know, we also need to look at what additional
supports we can put in for the judiciary to have
a range of options to.

Speaker 5 (32:07):
Bail young people too.

Speaker 6 (32:08):
That's what the youth residential Justice facilities are as well,
options for the judiciary to sentence young people to or
to bail young people to where they have an environment,
where they've got accommodation and where they can receive programs.

Speaker 7 (32:22):
You said that you weren't going to write radio you
can responsibility and bring it into how these programs in
place come in and programs aren't in place, so these
children have got nothing consequence.

Speaker 6 (32:32):
No consequence is absolutely absolutely consequences, and there are absolutely
programs and if you actually got.

Speaker 5 (32:40):
Out of your services sector, it's a range of programs.

Speaker 1 (32:45):
The problem though that we've got at the moment is
that the community doesn't feel as though the response from
the government is strong enough now to those four kids
that got punched in the face earlier this week. You know,
I'll step away from what adults think right now, And
I would go so far as to say, how does
a kid feel then when something like that happens to them?

(33:05):
If there is not a consequence to the child that's
saying jump the fence. From what our listeners have said
with an ankle monitoring bracelet on, I do not have
that confirmed. But jump the fence, punch them in the face.
You know, how can the kids on the receiving end
of that be sure that something like that's not going
to happen to them again, but also that there is
a consequence, because you know, I'm raising my kids to

(33:29):
tell them that there is a consequence when they do
the wrong thing, and those consequences will vary. And I
know that not everybody is raised in the same way,
and I know that not everybody is as fortunate as
my children are to grow up in the kind of
home that my kids are growing up in. However, you've
got a duty of care to those other children that
are at school.

Speaker 2 (33:49):
Doing the right thing.

Speaker 1 (33:51):
They're learning and being educated for them to not get
punched by somebody when they're there in their school grounds.

Speaker 6 (33:57):
Absolutely, Katie, And you know, to be clear, there absolutely
the behavior is not okay and there absolutely needs to be.

Speaker 2 (34:05):
Do you see as being an adequate response to that?

Speaker 5 (34:08):
Again?

Speaker 2 (34:08):
Too, Like, let's step away from that that.

Speaker 1 (34:10):
Incident, because I know that you won't want to, you know,
to to sort of talk about just one particular individual.
But what would you see as being an adequate response
to a kid that does that that you know punches
other children unprovoked.

Speaker 6 (34:25):
I think there's a range of options and programs that
could be offered to that young person one to address
their behavior to They need to be assessed around their cognitive.

Speaker 5 (34:36):
Name company program to absolutely understand that.

Speaker 1 (34:39):
Hang on, So what about then for a child that
for a young person that holds a knife to somebody's throat,
or holds a knife up to somebody and steals their vehicle,
what would you see as being an appropriate consequence to that?

Speaker 6 (34:54):
Again, Katie, every situation is different, but the behavior needs
to be addressed, and there are a range of programs
delivered in our community controlled sector and the Aboriginal community
around understanding and teaching people wrong from right doing, the
victim offender conferencing doing programs like we've got in Central

(35:15):
Australia and the top end with Aboriginal people taking people
out onto country and doing those programs. But also there
are men's behavior change programs around addressing the technical aspects
of changing someone's behavior.

Speaker 4 (35:30):
But if they're under twelve, chancy it's not mandatory, is it.
It's all off. They don't even have to do any
of this. They can just say no, I'm not doing it.

Speaker 6 (35:38):
If they're under twelve, there are absolutely programs, and there's
absolutely under the Care and Protection Act, there are measures
that can be enacted to bring that young person into
and under the care of the department to work with
them and make them age. Like the colp are suggesting
does nothing because what we've or Underling's.

Speaker 1 (36:02):
Work, and you know, the situation we've got now is
the community, rightly or wrongly, it feels like what is
happening now is not working, like with the with some
of the behavior that we're seeing from young people. I
mean even myself, I've witnessed it myself sitting down the
road here when someone tried to steal my phone and
then went into the servo allegedly with a knife and

(36:24):
and you know, held up the servo and did various
other things. You know, some of the kids engaged in
that behavior were as young as ten. Now, I'll give
an example, I say to I actually asked my children
this earlier in the week, what do you think would
happen if you held a knife up to somebody and.

Speaker 2 (36:40):
Stole their car?

Speaker 4 (36:41):
It's life changing?

Speaker 1 (36:42):
Well, Mike, no, I asked them, what do you think
would happen if you did that to somebody?

Speaker 3 (36:46):
Oh?

Speaker 1 (36:47):
Yes, And my kids said, go to jail, Like that's
you know, So that's kind of You've got. You've got
kids that are thinking, they kind of can't believe some
of what's going on, and and kids are witnessing it themselves.
Kid's a victim to it now themselves as well some
of the bad behavior.

Speaker 2 (37:03):
That's going on.

Speaker 1 (37:04):
And then you've got, you know, you've just got a
community at the moment that doesn't feel as though the
government is responding in a way that they think's appropriate.

Speaker 5 (37:14):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (37:14):
Look, I can acknowledge absolutely people's frustration, and there's always
investments that we're putting across to address this. I think
some of that as well, Katie, is when people do
see people doing it on social media, and they see
one aspect of people doing the wrong thing, and they
don't see the authorities apprehending the young people encouraging people.

Speaker 2 (37:34):
Police are apprehending That's what I'm saying.

Speaker 6 (37:36):
When you're only seeing a kid sharing their video on
TikTok or Facebook and you're not seeing what the consequence
is after it, that plays a role in encouraging people.
So that's why we're absolutely looking at change.

Speaker 2 (37:47):
Those changes going to come into it time.

Speaker 5 (37:49):
Do those as soon as we can.

Speaker 1 (37:50):
But the New South Wales government able to change this.
You know the posting and boasting.

Speaker 5 (37:55):
Well, they haven't made the changes yet, Katie. They've talked
about them, but they've been haven't been introduced into the
New Southwest part.

Speaker 7 (38:01):
You could do it in one day, Katie, answer a
simple one day on urgency, the laws would be changed.

Speaker 2 (38:05):
Let's take a fairy.

Speaker 6 (38:06):
There's a lot more to legislation than just dancing in
Parliament and saying.

Speaker 3 (38:10):
You you could do it in one day and you
would make community. Say final, let's.

Speaker 2 (38:13):
Take a very quick break. You are listening to mix
one oh four nine's three sixty is the week that was?

Speaker 1 (38:18):
If you have just joined us, We've got Jered Mainlee,
Robin Lamley, Matt Cunningham and Chancey Paike in the studio
with us.

Speaker 5 (38:24):
Now.

Speaker 1 (38:25):
One of the other things I'm keen to discuss this
morning is the Northern Territory government obviously defending the abrupt
removal of police auxiliary liquor inspectors from Alice Springs bottle shops,
despite claims it has unleashed chaos at local liquor outlets.
Now I actually caught up with earlier in the week
Peter Holden from Laura Tippa, or the chair of Lura Tippa,
who had told me about a situation last weekend where

(38:47):
the supermarket firstly had to shot but the bottle shop
then had to shut down completely and that two staff
members were assaulted, that they had attempted to call the
Northern Territory Police.

Speaker 2 (38:58):
I'm not sure whether they were able to.

Speaker 1 (38:59):
Get the police out there, but was saying that they
have got really serious concerns as a disaster.

Speaker 4 (39:05):
Katie. Surely after all these years of having police outside
of bottle shops, the government would realize that this is
one of our best strategies for reducing alcohol harm in
Alice Springs. But no, under the new Police Minister, we've
seen a lack of full coverage of our nine bottle
shops in Alice Springs and what has ensued has been
a crisis.

Speaker 1 (39:25):
Jerry would text me a little earlier in the week
and he said, labor forgets that the Liquor Review said
that there should not.

Speaker 2 (39:31):
Be police outside bottle shops.

Speaker 1 (39:33):
The Police Association at the time, I believe Vince Kelly
had agreed that this meant police were being taken off
the beat. The review said that there should be liquor
inspectors doing the job. I guess the hard thing is though,
right now, is people you know like it is effective.
It seems to be effective.

Speaker 4 (39:49):
This is totally effect.

Speaker 8 (39:51):
You probably know, Katie that I've looked at these alcohol
policies closely over the.

Speaker 2 (39:55):
Last I wouldn't have ever guessed that.

Speaker 8 (40:00):
Police on the bottle shops or the palis is the
one thing that you can track right the way through
from when the government, the Henderson government first introduced the
first BDR. The one thing you can track that works
is the police on the bottle shops, which I think
is a race based policy to be honest, but it
absolutely works. The BDR. I haven't seen one sceric of

(40:20):
evidence that it works. The floor price since it's brought
in I don't think is had any impact. But if
you track when the police go on the bottle shops
and when they come off the bottle shops, there are
spikes and there are falls that correlate almost directly with
when that happens. So I just can't understand why you
would remove that given the importance of given the effectiveness

(40:40):
of that policy.

Speaker 1 (40:40):
I guess the other side of the argument is that
you want you want palis to be able to transition
to constables. And you know, from what I can gather
from what the Police Commissioner and also the Police Minister
has said, is that you want to give them those opportunities.
You want to give people the opportunity to transition into constables.

Speaker 2 (40:58):
But by the look of.

Speaker 1 (40:59):
It, you know, there maybe should have done some more
preparatory work in terms of making sure that there was
others to step into the role while they transition.

Speaker 4 (41:06):
Katie, that's well and good to upskill the palies to
become constables. That's a good thing to do. It's a
nice thing to do, but what it's done has put
the whole community at risk. I mean, Chancey, you know
how this works. This is a very very bad move
of your government.

Speaker 7 (41:23):
It seems to be a stronger futures two point zero. Again,
I think the mayor is our those things are talking
about that. Then we asked a question of Brent Potter,
when's the next pali. They're taking it out up to Gillingham,
So are they going to replace those and have like
a pathway of work and he didn't. He refused to
answer the question so much say that there is going
to be no more palis, which is a.

Speaker 2 (41:39):
Was it the wrong move to make?

Speaker 6 (41:40):
Look, we're not removing palies from bottle shops. What the
Police Commissioner and the Police Minister have been talking about
this week is we've providing them the opportunity because we've
had trouble retaining palies because they want to become constables.

Speaker 5 (41:55):
We're going to have them deployed in all of those
bottle shops. But what we were.

Speaker 6 (41:59):
Doing is give them to skill so that if there
is an incidence across the road or in the vicinity
of a bottle shop, that they can absolutely respond to,
whether it's a DV altercation or so forth, rather than
at the moment they can only simply stand there and
call in. This is about providing the opportunity to do that,
and I just wanted to go on one point that
Matt raises. I think that the BDR is a very

(42:22):
effective tool because I have people from my communities town
camps who voluntary put themselves on the BDR so they
wouldn't get humbugged by family to go and buy them grog.
They could say, I'm on the band Drinkers Register, I
can't buy you moub grog.

Speaker 2 (42:38):
Which is fair enough if that means that you can
do that.

Speaker 6 (42:41):
Yes, I acknowledge that other people have other thoughts on it,
but I mean that part of it works.

Speaker 8 (42:48):
You think do you think do you think the BDR
is a race based policy too?

Speaker 5 (42:51):
Sometimes? I mean who?

Speaker 6 (42:52):
Because everyone that I talk to our Aboriginal people who
have voluntary put themselves on the BDR so they're not
going to get pressured by family to buy gron.

Speaker 8 (43:01):
Yeah, but if you think about the person who's least
likely to have a license or be able to present
the proper identification to be able to buy alcohol.

Speaker 6 (43:10):
As the as the attorney, I have absolutely rolled out
programs across the territory to offer a free licensing and
birth certificates and identifications, and we know that we've got
organizations who are funded to help people with ID cards.

Speaker 2 (43:24):
Look, I don't have a huge issue with the BDR.

Speaker 1 (43:26):
For me, it doesn't bother me. I don't care if
I've got to show my license when I go on.

Speaker 3 (43:28):
By about that.

Speaker 8 (43:29):
I care about whether it's an effective policy, and I
take chances point on board. Absolutely. But I think if
you look just at the statistics and whether it's had
any impact on alcohol field assaults or alcohol field emergency
department presentations.

Speaker 1 (43:42):
Well, whereas the palis on the bottle shop does seem
to have had an impact. And you've even got the
likes of Donna Archie sending out a pressure lease earlier
in the week from Central Australian Aboriginal Congress really calling
on the government to re implement them. I guess what
I found quite interesting earlier in the week as well
is and please correct me if I'm wrong, Robin, you
may be heard it at more than I did. But
my understanding is that Stuart Brash on the ABC and

(44:04):
Alice Springs had questioned the Police Minister about this, and
you know that Brash had sort of said, look, you've
got people on the ground saying right now, that they're
not on those bottle shops, and at first the Police
Minister was saying that they still were. You know, the
story sort of on the ground was not matching up
with what the police minister was saying.

Speaker 4 (44:23):
Putting it bluntly, Brent Potter, the Minister for Police, lied,
there isn't full coverage of the police outside of bottle
shops in Alice Springs. If you go there this afternoon
at three o'clock, there won't be I've been tracking it
a couple of times every week. In fact, I'll get
my elected officer to do a quick drive around this
afternoon and I'll put it up on Facebook. That's what
we've been doing to inform people of what's been going on.

(44:44):
People are just so fed up with this.

Speaker 5 (44:46):
You know.

Speaker 4 (44:46):
You've got people like John Boffer and Donna Archie who've
been a part of the People's Alcohol Action Coalition for
almost two decades, who I've been liaising with for two
decades in my capacity as elected member. We're on the
same page when it comes to police outside of bottle shops.
It is the single most effective alcohol strategy that we

(45:07):
have in Alice Springs and for this government to remove
it in any way, shape or form for any reason
is inexplicable. It's it's it's neglectful, and it causes untold
harm like we saw when Chancey lifted the grog bands
across the town counts and average communities.

Speaker 6 (45:27):
Government, you said let them fall down before sundown. So
let's be very clear here when we talk about alcohol policy.
There are six palies rostered on today. They are we need.

Speaker 5 (45:39):
Stupid, Robin. Just listen for a moment.

Speaker 6 (45:42):
We are absolutely providing training because we could not retain and.

Speaker 4 (45:46):
Recurry training safety domestic bottle This is the key reason
for people we're going.

Speaker 5 (45:54):
To be having.

Speaker 6 (45:55):
We're going to be having constables. Once those palis are
training to becomes of they will be deployed.

Speaker 2 (46:01):
To all bottle shops apart to do the work.

Speaker 4 (46:05):
We've got trained powlies as constables.

Speaker 6 (46:07):
Well that's great, that's absolutely not true, Robin. We are
training up the palis to be constables. They'll be back
on all the bottle shops. We have six palis who
will be roaming around Alice Springs today to all of
the bottle shops doing the ad hocs so people don't
know what times they're there, so that they can pinpoint
and if there are areas that are seeing an increase,
they will be deployed.

Speaker 4 (46:26):
The absolute carnage. Like last week, you let them.

Speaker 5 (46:36):
You've got no credibility.

Speaker 1 (46:37):
Would you believe we've run out of time on Matt,
we are going to have to wrap up.

Speaker 2 (46:42):
I know we could go for to us just sitting American.

Speaker 1 (46:47):
Jared Bailey, the Deputy Opposition leader. Always good to have
you on the show. Thanks so much for your time
this morning.

Speaker 3 (46:52):
Thank you, Thank you listeners.

Speaker 1 (46:53):
Robin Laveley, the independent member for our Lawn. Always great
to have you in the studio when you're in town.

Speaker 2 (46:58):
Thank you. Matt Cunningham from Sky News. Good to have
you on the show.

Speaker 3 (47:01):
Mate, great to be here.

Speaker 2 (47:02):
Katie Chelsey Pete. Great to have you in the studio
when you're in town as well.

Speaker 6 (47:05):
Thank you, Katie and Robin and I are off to
some cooler Country's going to be.

Speaker 2 (47:09):
Cool in Alice Spring.

Speaker 1 (47:10):
It's going to be nice and rainy. Thank you all
so very much for joining us this morning.

Speaker 2 (47:15):
For the week that was