Mrs FINOCCHIARO - 2015-02-19
Mr Vowles: You are a knob.
Mr Giles: I beg your pardon? Madam Speaker, offensive remarks. I ask the member for Johnston to withdraw that.
Madam SPEAKER: Member for Johnston, if you made an offensive remark withdraw it please.
Mr Vowles: Withdraw what?
Madam SPEAKER: Withdraw whatever you said, otherwise you will be leaving the Chamber.
Mr Vowles: I withdraw whatever the Chief Minister thought I said.
Mrs FINOCCHIARO: Can you please outline to the Assembly the activities planned for Friday to retrace the footsteps of Albert Borella, the Territory’s only Victoria Cross recipient?
ANSWER
Madam Speaker, I thank the member for Drysdale for the question, especially in her role as parliamentary secretary, and for her assistance around the Anzac Centenary. I am looking forward to heading off early tomorrow morning on an aeroplane to Tennant Creek, where the member for Drysdale will be joining me. It will be a great opportunity to start the Borella program.
I do not know if many people know about Albert Borella, but he worked on a pastoral property in Tennant Creek at the outset of World War I and wanted to enlist in the army. His journey, without going through every step, required him to get to Darwin. He walked, rode horses, rode bikes and swam across crocodile-infested rivers to Darwin, only to be told he had to jump on a ship and go to Townsville to enlist. When he got to Townsville on the boat, which was challenging in those days, he was then told that after enlisting he would have to go to Perth to sail on to the war.
It is a fantastic story of a person who, while not born in the Northern Territory, is a Territorian. We have his Victoria Cross displayed in the hall of parliament for a month. I encourage anybody who is listening or who reads the Hansard to duck out and look at the only Victoria Cross obtained by a Territorian. I can see it through the glass doors of parliament right now.
A range of things are going on in regard to the $4.5m Anzac Centenary program. I was happy today to sit with a young lady on the dispatches for the Bombing of Darwin, who did a lovely reading on the commemoration.
We are doing a range of other things in regard to the centenary program. Most important is the Chief Minister’s Anzac Spirit Study Tour, where a number of Territory students have been selected to visit Gallipoli to participate in Anzac commemorations.
Ms Lawrie: That was a good initiative from Hendo.
Mr GILES: I do not think you should be interjecting on this, when we are commemorating Anzacs.
It is quite exciting for those young Territorians to see what it is like at dawn in Gallipoli. Those are the learnings young Territorian kids of today can take back to their fellow Territorians and their schools, and can share the cold shivers down their spines. That is what must have gone through the minds and bodies of those Australians who fought in World War I. I hope the centenary program goes well; we are very happy to support it.
Mr Giles: I beg your pardon? Madam Speaker, offensive remarks. I ask the member for Johnston to withdraw that.
Madam SPEAKER: Member for Johnston, if you made an offensive remark withdraw it please.
Mr Vowles: Withdraw what?
Madam SPEAKER: Withdraw whatever you said, otherwise you will be leaving the Chamber.
Mr Vowles: I withdraw whatever the Chief Minister thought I said.
Mrs FINOCCHIARO: Can you please outline to the Assembly the activities planned for Friday to retrace the footsteps of Albert Borella, the Territory’s only Victoria Cross recipient?
ANSWER
Madam Speaker, I thank the member for Drysdale for the question, especially in her role as parliamentary secretary, and for her assistance around the Anzac Centenary. I am looking forward to heading off early tomorrow morning on an aeroplane to Tennant Creek, where the member for Drysdale will be joining me. It will be a great opportunity to start the Borella program.
I do not know if many people know about Albert Borella, but he worked on a pastoral property in Tennant Creek at the outset of World War I and wanted to enlist in the army. His journey, without going through every step, required him to get to Darwin. He walked, rode horses, rode bikes and swam across crocodile-infested rivers to Darwin, only to be told he had to jump on a ship and go to Townsville to enlist. When he got to Townsville on the boat, which was challenging in those days, he was then told that after enlisting he would have to go to Perth to sail on to the war.
It is a fantastic story of a person who, while not born in the Northern Territory, is a Territorian. We have his Victoria Cross displayed in the hall of parliament for a month. I encourage anybody who is listening or who reads the Hansard to duck out and look at the only Victoria Cross obtained by a Territorian. I can see it through the glass doors of parliament right now.
A range of things are going on in regard to the $4.5m Anzac Centenary program. I was happy today to sit with a young lady on the dispatches for the Bombing of Darwin, who did a lovely reading on the commemoration.
We are doing a range of other things in regard to the centenary program. Most important is the Chief Minister’s Anzac Spirit Study Tour, where a number of Territory students have been selected to visit Gallipoli to participate in Anzac commemorations.
Ms Lawrie: That was a good initiative from Hendo.
Mr GILES: I do not think you should be interjecting on this, when we are commemorating Anzacs.
It is quite exciting for those young Territorians to see what it is like at dawn in Gallipoli. Those are the learnings young Territorian kids of today can take back to their fellow Territorians and their schools, and can share the cold shivers down their spines. That is what must have gone through the minds and bodies of those Australians who fought in World War I. I hope the centenary program goes well; we are very happy to support it.
Last updated: 09 Aug 2016