Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Joining us live on the line. What of our listeners
nominations for the next Administrator of the Northern Territory. I
don't know that he's keen Matt Cunningham.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
Ah, well, will be given in the past about the
excess of that particular office. They were definitely their cost
saving measure, I'll tell you that much.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
Maybe it's a job share.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
A third government house into like a restaurant or some
kind of a comedy. Didn't print Charles that day there once,
and we could just have a little office in the
Smith Street mall. And I'd also drop the the honorable
you know, all that garbage that comes before the title.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
I mean, seriously, well, Matt, look, I don't know that
they I don't know they've written to the PM asking
for him to approve you as the administrator on me
but make What I do know is that the Chief
Minister's written to obviously written to the PM's office to
get that approved and they're still waiting. They put forward
(00:57):
that nomination in July, she told us on the show,
and hopefully it'll be yeah, hopefully it'll be done by
the end of the year. Can you believe us, we asked,
she wouldn't tell us, but she did tell us she
will reveal it for us at some point soon.
Speaker 2 (01:14):
Wow. Yeah, So I don't know it's taking so long.
Speaker 1 (01:18):
Well, she's pretty annoyed about her She and expressed that
opinion earlier on the show, saying that you know, she
can't understand why it's not being signed off like it's.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
An maybe Shane Stone, do you think is that why
the time?
Speaker 1 (01:33):
I don't think so, she reckons. Well, she didn't sort
of give us any detail, but she said she thought
it would be somebody that people would you know, that
people would think was a great choice. We've had some
suggestions coming through Charlie King, Kezia Puric, Jerry Wood.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
I think King was unlucky the last time around, you know,
he should have been the last administrator, and I think
there were a bit of internal politics that went on there. Yeah,
you know, in the sort of immediate post COVID era. Yeah, yes,
but yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
The other the other suggestion was Rhys Kershel, the former
Police Commissioner of the Northern Territory and also former Commissioner
of the Australian Federal Police.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
Yeah. Well I heard that. I heard that last week,
but then I but then I'd being assured that it
wasn't it wasn't going to be him, so you know,
I mean he would be someone who has He could
probably be a better choice than you or me. Look
(02:32):
about your mate, what about your mate, Bill war Lee?
Speaker 1 (02:36):
Yeah, well I thought Auntie Billa Wara might be a
good one as well.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
I don't think you've had an aboriginal administrator before. Yeah, yeah, well,
you know what I like.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
I think Billa Warra is excellent. Last time she joined
me on the show, she you know, she gave a
really frank and honest discussion of some of the state
of affairs following on from the terrible situation with the
death of Linford Fike, and she was really honest and
upfront about it. I thought she'd done a phenomenal job
of speaking her mind. But yeah, I don't know, Matt,
(03:07):
who they're going to choose. Well, they've already chosen, but
the Prime Minister isn't allowing them to make the announcement.
By the sounds of things.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
That's interesting. I wonder whether that means it's a somewhat
controversial choice of whether the TMO is just dragging.
Speaker 1 (03:22):
She reckons that it was more a matter of the
PMO just dragging their heels and basically you know that,
you know, not really not really respecting the territory.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
Yeah, yeah, well I thought I heard you've got Gazola
on the case now, So for the people on the
other end of that phone call, I.
Speaker 1 (03:42):
Mean, look, Matt, you and I have known Kathleen for
a long time, but a lot of our listeners happened.
And if there's one thing that Gazola won't exempts, no answer.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
Anyway, Matt, we better talk about what we actually got
you on the show for, and that is the fact
that the Greens held their national conference here in Darwitt
over the weekend and then they've just held a media
event as well.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
Yeah, they're n't about, don't they. That was Larisa Water,
the Greens leader, held a press conferences now with katmak
Damara and Kersey Howie from the Environment Center. So they
were talking about a few different things. They were talking
about the issues with some of the leaks from the
gas plants. The main focus with these new sort of
nature positive environment laws that are being considered by the
(04:31):
federal government at the moment, and they're not happy this
the situation there, in particular, the fact that the federal
government will be basically handing control over a lot of
things like water to the states and territories. And so
their argument is that here in the nt that they
don't believe that the NT government and the NTADA properly
(04:51):
equipped to be able to regulate some of these things.
So they're not happy with those changes.
Speaker 1 (04:57):
Yeah, right, And so I mean, match, I guess it'll
be interesting to see what sort of flows from what
they're calling for. Do you reckon, do you think the
Greens have got much support here in the Northern Territory.
Speaker 2 (05:11):
Well, I think there's sort of an interesting political phenomenon
that's going on at the moment, well for you, I reckon,
and not just in the Northern Territory, but in politics
more generally, more broadly, where there's kind of this increasing
support for the fringes of both the left and the right. So,
I mean, if you look at the last News poll
(05:32):
where the Coalition's primary rooted dropped to twenty four percent
and One Nations was up to fifteen percent, So that's
fairly remarkable that there would only be a nine point
gap between the Coalition and One Nation. And then on
the other side, I think you're seeing a drop generally
in support for labor and that and an increase in
(05:53):
support for the Greens, although you would have to say
that at the last federal election the Greens did really
badly and I think they went from from four Upper
House seats to none, so you know, it's kind of
a little bit all over the shop. Here in the
territory was interesting because you know, you had what was
(06:14):
largely a swing to the right everywhere out of the
swing to the c LP right through the northern suburbs
and wipeout in Palmerston and pretty much everywherewhere else on
the on the back of concerns about crime, et cetera.
But then you had these pockets like Nightcliff, Johnston, you know,
Fanny Bay that Greens did very well, and also Braitling
in our springs where the Greens did very well, which
(06:38):
is sort of those more sort of certainly when it
comes to Fanny Bay, Johnston, Nightcliff, they're sort of more
well off progressive areas. So you know, we might we
might yet see an increase in the number of Greens
that we said. I think the Greens are a real
chance in Brakling at the next NTI election, you know,
after Hill's just been elected the mayor down there, and
(07:01):
I would hazard a guess she'll stand against Josh berg
On in that seat. So it'll be interesting to see
what happens there. I think here how the Green go
will largely depend on how people think Kat McNamara performs
as a local member. I mean, you know, territory politics
is such a local thing, you know, and there are
(07:23):
so many votes to be had just by you know,
being the face in the community, attending you know, school assemblies,
holding pizza in the park, getting to know all your constituents,
acting when your constituents raise a concern, and I know
certainly in Nightcliff, you know, and Natasha Files held that
seat for a long time. You know, that was her
(07:45):
bread and butter, and she probably suffered in the end
from you know, her performance as Chief minister, but as
a local member. You know, if she'd never become Chief minister,
she had probably held the seat of Nightcliffe forever, forever.
So it will be interesting to see what happens in
those seats. I mean, Fanny Bay is a good one
to look at, you know, if you look at the
(08:06):
history of that seat. I think Michael Gunner held onto
it by the skin of his teeth back in twenty
or two thousand and eight. Yeah, two thousand and eight,
he just held on in Fanny Bay when Claire Martin
stood down, and you would have thought, oh, that seat
right for the picking four years later when the CLPE
when there was generally a swing to the CLP. But
(08:27):
you know, he worked his ass off in that seat
and held it forever. So you know it's Laurie Zo.
He's a hard working Remember, even though she's got a
ways thin margin, you would say that come second term
she's she's a massive chance to hold onto that seat.
Speaker 1 (08:43):
It'll be a tough one margin. And so Matt do
I reckon that's why we're seeing the Greens sort of
here having their national conference and that kind of thing
and trying to really increase that presence.
Speaker 2 (08:53):
I dare say, yes, you know, they're probably buoyed by
what's happened here at the last end election where they
picked up their first seat ever, and then subsequently the
local council elections in our springs where they not only
had the mayor elected, but a local councilor as well.
So you know, and I think the other thing is
that they see here, you know, there's a lot of
(09:16):
projects and there's a lot of potential development happening here,
and you know, they see their voice as being important
in all of that. I mean, I think, you know,
I think the comment was made today at this press
conference that you know, most Territorians and whatever political persuasion,
don't support tracking. I'm not convinced that's the kind to
(09:39):
be honest, I don't know about you will think that.
I get the feeling that things feel like, for the
first time in a long time economically, they're picking up
in Darwin at the moment. You know, that might be
imagined at some level, but certainly when you look at
the increase in house prices that we've seen recently, it
does feel like there are projects that are on the
(10:00):
customers happening, including in the blou Basin, and there's a
little bit of optimism for the first time in a
long time around all of that.
Speaker 1 (10:07):
Well, even when you look at the latest com sept
report and I know that the former Chief Ministry used
to throw it in the bean, as did the one
before and the one before that, you know, and it
was but like when you look at those reports, you
go Okay, well, you know it's showing a slight population growth.
As you touched on, you know, those housing prices. There
are some indicators that things are starting to get a
(10:28):
little bit better. And you know, depending on who you
talk to, and particularly when you look at some of
those the different industries, if some of those projects get
off the ground, many believe that it could you could
end up seeing you know, quite an uptick for the
Northern territory.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
Yeah, I mean absolutely, and that's the optimistic view. I
mean Dave Malone, who is someone's who's viewered sort of
regard highly on these thoughts of issues, and he sends
around to a group of people sort of some analysis
of these type of things, and when it comes to
that report, he says, you have to remember that it's
sort of comparing the ten year average, so you know,
(11:07):
and the misfortune for the Gunner Files government was that
the State of the State's report was always basically making
a comparison to the impecs peak, whereas now the State
of the States is making a comparison to the cliff
that we fell off after impacts. And so you sort
of need to read that report with a bit of caution.
(11:27):
You know, and even our population growth, which I think
is encouraging and it's sort of on a sort of
comparative level, it's the best in the country, but it's
still you know, still going very low.
Speaker 1 (11:44):
Long and that's the problem with a lot of those indicators.
Speaker 2 (11:49):
The key driver I think will be, you know, to
see positive interstate migration, which we haven't seen I don't
think since I look twenty ten. Possibly, you know, and
in that sense, you know, we'll see that if if
we see some of those big projects get off the
ground here and you see more well paid jobs here.
(12:13):
And at the same time, if you see things start
to go south a bit inter state, which you know,
there is an indication that that sort of is starting
to happen if you look at some of the latest data,
so you know. Anyway, Yeah, that's exactly right.
Speaker 1 (12:29):
That's how it's got to be mad. As you're talking
about Dave Malone, maybe he could be the next administrator.
Speaker 2 (12:35):
Yeah, there you go.
Speaker 1 (12:36):
It'd be good, wouldn't he He would be good Dave Malone, Yes, he's.
Speaker 2 (12:39):
A good to get stuff done.
Speaker 1 (12:40):
He certainly would. I'll tell you what what it makes
me think is we've actually got some real life we
do have some great people who could do a good job,
you know as administrator. Someone else has just messaged and said,
what about Dave Dolner. There you go, that'll get people talking.
Maybe that's why it's being held up on the Prime
Minister's there. I miss our days with Dave Tolder and
(13:07):
Damian Hale in here for a chat.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
Well, Matt he got he was always good at arguing
his port point. Dave Ton, It's funny, you know the
last one time you made me come on that show
because Damien Hale was away, right, and we had a
discussion about this is the like twenty eighteen, twenty nineteen,
we had a discussion about green hydrogen of all things.
(13:31):
For some reason, we were talking about these environmental issues
and renewable issues, and I said, oh, you know, well
green hydrogen, that's the fuel of the future. It's going
to be amazing. And Dave told had just ripped shreds
off me, and then he rocked around to the office
the next day with this binder that was about four
inches thick, proving his point about why green hydrogen was
(13:54):
going to be a dut and six or seven years on,
I'd have to sort of offer an apologic as much
as it hurts me to say it will be proven right.
Speaker 1 (14:09):
Oh too funny. Oh well, Dave, if you're out there
listening this morning, mate, what do you reckon next? Administrator
of the Northern Territory Let me know, Matt, we better
leave it there. Always good to catch up with you.
Thanks so much for the chat this morning.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
All right, mate, thank you