Ms MARTIN - 1999-08-11
I quote from Barry Coulter’s crisis call. I’m sure you’ll all enjoy hearing this again:
We have made great headway over the years by presenting the CLP to the voters as the Territory’s own, homemade political party, independent from the rest of Australia. This image is suffering, and I suspect will continue to dissolve. I’m sorry, but it just does not sell well in the face of the national president of the Liberal Party now being a sitting member of the CLP. We can try to distance ourselves from it. However hard we might try, the punters out there will at least be confused.
My question to the Chief Minister is, is Coulter wrong or is he right? If he is right, why don’t you take control of the party you are supposed to lead and get the Liberal Party president out of your party room?
ANSWER
Mr Speaker, the day – which will never come - when I need advice from the Labor leader is the day I might cease …
Members interjecting.
Mr SPEAKER: Order!
Mr BURKE: Anyone who watched television last night would have seen Barry Coulter in full flight, wearing a lovely gold tie, giving his presentation to the CLP conference. Now, that’s the way the CLP operates. We are open to the media. We don’t care about criticism. We enjoy criticism. The reason we enjoy criticism is that we have one fact very clear in our minds: We continue to enjoy government by the faith and trust of Territorians. We can only maintain that faith and trust if we continually interrogate our own efforts. Where there is room for improvement, we certainly will move to improve.
What we don’t do is have private, confidential meetings and a whole range of reviews that are hidden from the public – ‘private and confidential’. We are seeing a weakly-led opposition, not trusted to govern, which says: ‘We’ll come up with policies to detach the Aboriginal vote from the CLP’ - the sort of stuff that I showed yesterday in that letter of lies that was put out to Aboriginal communities in order to try and somehow get their vote away from the CLP. That’s how the Labor Party operates. They get Barry Jones and others up to tell them how to do it. We are still waiting, as I said, for any sign of policy. All we get is criticism. Anyone can sit on the other side of the table asking dorothy-dixer questions. If this is the pretender to the leadership, she has to do a lot more than that.
As for Barry Coulter’s comments, I simply say this. He is a respected member of the CLP. He was invited to give a speech to the conference. That speech was open to television and any other media that happened to be there. He had a personal opinion. He made comment about the member for Port Darwin. My position and the government’s position and the CLP’s position with regard to the member for Port Darwin is absolutely clear. We are proud of the fact that a Territorian and a member of the CLP has risen to the height of federal president of the Liberal Party, but we remain cautious that that should not be seen as any sort of closer relationship in terms of policy.
Members interjecting.
Mr SPEAKER: Order! The Chief Minister has the floor.
Mr BURKE: They can laugh. That’s about the extent of their effort. The inescapable fact is that CLP policies are developed in the Territory by Territorians. The Labor Party can strut as much as they like, but their policies are developed in Canberra, by Canberra, with Barry Jones’ or someone’s hand straight up your back, the same way you have yours straight up ...
Members interjecting.
Mr BURKE: It was like a nodding head in the last election. The CLP stands proudly on the fact that our policies are developed in the Northern Territory by Territorians. In the case of the member for Port Darwin, we can use his added influence to great advantage in a number of areas. If you had the slightest understanding of the machinations of government at the federal level, if you had any understanding of the relationships and the advantages that could be gained by his position, you certainly wouldn’t criticise. The substance of the question is simply nonsense.
Mr SPEAKER: We have had three questions in 20 minutes. I would appreciate it if answers were kept a little shorter.
We have made great headway over the years by presenting the CLP to the voters as the Territory’s own, homemade political party, independent from the rest of Australia. This image is suffering, and I suspect will continue to dissolve. I’m sorry, but it just does not sell well in the face of the national president of the Liberal Party now being a sitting member of the CLP. We can try to distance ourselves from it. However hard we might try, the punters out there will at least be confused.
My question to the Chief Minister is, is Coulter wrong or is he right? If he is right, why don’t you take control of the party you are supposed to lead and get the Liberal Party president out of your party room?
ANSWER
Mr Speaker, the day – which will never come - when I need advice from the Labor leader is the day I might cease …
Members interjecting.
Mr SPEAKER: Order!
Mr BURKE: Anyone who watched television last night would have seen Barry Coulter in full flight, wearing a lovely gold tie, giving his presentation to the CLP conference. Now, that’s the way the CLP operates. We are open to the media. We don’t care about criticism. We enjoy criticism. The reason we enjoy criticism is that we have one fact very clear in our minds: We continue to enjoy government by the faith and trust of Territorians. We can only maintain that faith and trust if we continually interrogate our own efforts. Where there is room for improvement, we certainly will move to improve.
What we don’t do is have private, confidential meetings and a whole range of reviews that are hidden from the public – ‘private and confidential’. We are seeing a weakly-led opposition, not trusted to govern, which says: ‘We’ll come up with policies to detach the Aboriginal vote from the CLP’ - the sort of stuff that I showed yesterday in that letter of lies that was put out to Aboriginal communities in order to try and somehow get their vote away from the CLP. That’s how the Labor Party operates. They get Barry Jones and others up to tell them how to do it. We are still waiting, as I said, for any sign of policy. All we get is criticism. Anyone can sit on the other side of the table asking dorothy-dixer questions. If this is the pretender to the leadership, she has to do a lot more than that.
As for Barry Coulter’s comments, I simply say this. He is a respected member of the CLP. He was invited to give a speech to the conference. That speech was open to television and any other media that happened to be there. He had a personal opinion. He made comment about the member for Port Darwin. My position and the government’s position and the CLP’s position with regard to the member for Port Darwin is absolutely clear. We are proud of the fact that a Territorian and a member of the CLP has risen to the height of federal president of the Liberal Party, but we remain cautious that that should not be seen as any sort of closer relationship in terms of policy.
Members interjecting.
Mr SPEAKER: Order! The Chief Minister has the floor.
Mr BURKE: They can laugh. That’s about the extent of their effort. The inescapable fact is that CLP policies are developed in the Territory by Territorians. The Labor Party can strut as much as they like, but their policies are developed in Canberra, by Canberra, with Barry Jones’ or someone’s hand straight up your back, the same way you have yours straight up ...
Members interjecting.
Mr BURKE: It was like a nodding head in the last election. The CLP stands proudly on the fact that our policies are developed in the Northern Territory by Territorians. In the case of the member for Port Darwin, we can use his added influence to great advantage in a number of areas. If you had the slightest understanding of the machinations of government at the federal level, if you had any understanding of the relationships and the advantages that could be gained by his position, you certainly wouldn’t criticise. The substance of the question is simply nonsense.
Mr SPEAKER: We have had three questions in 20 minutes. I would appreciate it if answers were kept a little shorter.
Last updated: 09 Aug 2016