Mrs BRAHAM - 2005-10-13
Madam Speaker, it is going to be a little difficult if Question Time is going to be dominated by this issue from the government when members on this side of the House cannot get a chance to respond until the motion is put. We have to continue with Question Time …
Madam SPEAKER: Member for Braitling, what is your question?
Mrs BRAHAM: In light of the escalating violent deaths in Alice Springs, accompanied by the increase in rate of assaults, and this terrible article in The Bulletin, ‘A Town called Malice’, when will you honour your election commitment to provide Alice Springs with an adapted, fully-equipped cargo van that will be used as a patrol base around Alice Springs? This mobile police station will have self-generating power, radio communications, office facilities, and it was to be purchased and fitted out for police needs early in the new financial year. It is now October. Can you tell me when will you honour that promise?
ANSWER
Madam Speaker, the first mobile van will be deployed in the first quarter of next year. We have increased police numbers over the last year in Alice Springs quite significantly, and one of the …
Mrs Braham: So you have not fulfilled that promise?
Ms MARTIN: Madam Speaker, the issue of community safety in Alice Springs is a very important one.
Mrs Braham: It is of concern to all of us.
Ms MARTIN: I am not dismissing it at all. We have significantly increased police resources. I am trying to think of the number - I believe it is about 37 additional police, something of that magnitude in Alice Springs. We are keeping our commitment to increase our police force across the Northern Territory by 200 by the end of 2007.
Mrs Braham: But you made a promise.
Ms MARTIN: We have made a commitment to two new mobile police vans, which will happen in the first quarter of next year. In the interim, it is not as though the police are not there and active. That will be an additional resource for the police. It will enable them to have the mobile police presence where they can interview people on the spot and they do not have to remove people to the central police station to do that. It is not going to change the number of the police presence, or the energy they are putting into tackling the issues in Alice Springs. It will be another component in their armoury. We are committed to doing it and it will be deployed in Alice Springs in the first quarter of 2006.
Madam SPEAKER: Member for Braitling, what is your question?
Mrs BRAHAM: In light of the escalating violent deaths in Alice Springs, accompanied by the increase in rate of assaults, and this terrible article in The Bulletin, ‘A Town called Malice’, when will you honour your election commitment to provide Alice Springs with an adapted, fully-equipped cargo van that will be used as a patrol base around Alice Springs? This mobile police station will have self-generating power, radio communications, office facilities, and it was to be purchased and fitted out for police needs early in the new financial year. It is now October. Can you tell me when will you honour that promise?
ANSWER
Madam Speaker, the first mobile van will be deployed in the first quarter of next year. We have increased police numbers over the last year in Alice Springs quite significantly, and one of the …
Mrs Braham: So you have not fulfilled that promise?
Ms MARTIN: Madam Speaker, the issue of community safety in Alice Springs is a very important one.
Mrs Braham: It is of concern to all of us.
Ms MARTIN: I am not dismissing it at all. We have significantly increased police resources. I am trying to think of the number - I believe it is about 37 additional police, something of that magnitude in Alice Springs. We are keeping our commitment to increase our police force across the Northern Territory by 200 by the end of 2007.
Mrs Braham: But you made a promise.
Ms MARTIN: We have made a commitment to two new mobile police vans, which will happen in the first quarter of next year. In the interim, it is not as though the police are not there and active. That will be an additional resource for the police. It will enable them to have the mobile police presence where they can interview people on the spot and they do not have to remove people to the central police station to do that. It is not going to change the number of the police presence, or the energy they are putting into tackling the issues in Alice Springs. It will be another component in their armoury. We are committed to doing it and it will be deployed in Alice Springs in the first quarter of 2006.
Last updated: 09 Aug 2016