2008-02-12
Madam Speaker Aagaard took the Chair at 10.10 am.
DISTINGUISHED VISITORS
Madam SPEAKER: Honourable members, I advise of the presence of many distinguished guests in the Speaker’s Gallery. In particular, I advise of the presence of His Honour the Administrator, Mr Tom Pauling QC, and Mrs Tessa Pauling. On behalf of all honourable members, I extend to you a very warm welcome.
Members: Hear, hear!
Madam SPEAKER: Also in the Speaker’s Gallery are representatives of local government: the Right Worshipful the Lord Mayor, Mr Garry Lambert, the Lord Mayor of Darwin; and His Worship the Mayor of Palmerston, Mr Robert Macleod. On behalf of all honourable members, I extend to you a very warm welcome.
Representing our religious communities are the Very Reverend Jeremy Greaves, representing the Bishop of the Anglican Diocese of the Northern Territory; the Reverend Wendell Flentje, the Moderator of the Northern Synod of the Uniting Church of Australia; and the Venerable Medhankara Thero (Bhante), the Spiritual Adviser for the International Buddhist Centre. On behalf of all honourable members, I extend to you a very warm welcome.
Representing our Defence Forces are Air Commodore Ian Meyn, Commander Northern Command and Mrs Sharon Meyn; and Brigadier Michael Krause, Commander 1st Brigade and Mrs Jacqui Krause. On behalf of all honourable members, I extend to you a very warm welcome.
We are pleased to have representatives of foreign regions: Mr Harbangan Napitupulu, Consul for the Republic of Indonesia and Mrs Murtiani Siregar Napitupulu; Mr Harry Maschke, Honorary Consul for Germany and Mrs Janice Murdoch; Mr Keith Aitken, Honorary Consul for Poland and Mrs Lea Aitken; and Mr Hugh Bradley, Honorary Consul for Sweden and Finland, and Mrs Sue Bradley AM. On behalf of all honourable members, I extend to you a very warm welcome.
I also acknowledge the presence in the gallery of members of the Larrakia Nation, and the Chinese community and the Chung Wah Society. On behalf of members, I thank the Larrakia Nation for the smoking ceremony, and the Chung Wah Society for the blessing of the Chamber.
Members: Hear, hear!
Madam SPEAKER: There are many more people, but I particularly recognise the young people who have joined us today from schools across Darwin: students from Year 6 at Leanyer Primary School, accompanied by Mrs Lindy Maddock and Ms Fiora Breuer; Year 5/6 from St Mary’s Primary School accompanied by Mr Terry Cullen; Year 7 Dripstone Middle School accompanied by Ms Jessica Goegan; Nightcliff Middle School students - and may I say a particular warm welcome as the member for Nightcliff - accompanied by Ms Lyn Hollow, the principal; Year 4 to 6 students from Wulagi Primary School accompanied by Ms Tania Kolomitsev; Year 10/11 Marrara Christian College students accompanied by Mr Stuart Taylor; and Year 5/6 students from Anula Primary School accompanied by Ms Judy Evans. On behalf of all honourable members, I extend to you a very warm welcome.
Members: Hear, hear!
Madam SPEAKER: It is wonderful to see full galleries for the opening of our parliament. It reminds honourable members that we are all elected to represent each of you here and I hope you are interested in what our members are doing. I invite you to come to any session of our parliament. Question Time is always an interesting time and we have tours of Parliament House as well. Once again, welcome to Parliament House.
Madam SPEAKER: Honourable members, I have received a letter from the Deputy Speaker, Mr Ted Warren, the member for Goyder, noting that he has resigned from the position of Deputy Speaker and Chairman of Committees.
CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES
AND DEPUTY SPEAKER
Appointment of Member for Port Darwin
Madam SPEAKER: Honourable members, following the resignation of the member for Goyder, there is now a vacancy.
Mr HENDERSON (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, I propose to the Assembly for its Chairman of Committees and Deputy Speaker the member for Port Darwin. I move that the member for Port Darwin be appointed Chairman of Committees and Deputy Speaker of this Assembly.
Madam SPEAKER: The Chief Minister has nominated the member for Port Darwin. Is there someone to second that?
Ms SCRYMGOUR (Arafura): Madam Speaker, I second the motion.
Madam SPEAKER: Member for Port Darwin, do you accept that nomination?
Ms SACILOTTO (Port Darwin): Madam Speaker, I accept the nomination.
Madam SPEAKER: Are there any further nominations? There being no further nominations you are duly elected member for Port Darwin.
Members: Hear, hear!
Ms SACILOTTO (Port Darwin): Honourable members, I express my sincere thanks and appreciation for the high honour you have conferred upon me. Thank you.
Madam SPEAKER: Congratulations on behalf of all honourable members. We look forward to working with you in our parliament.
Madam SPEAKER: Honourable members, I advise that I have received letters from the Leader of Government Business and the Opposition Whip proposing changes to membership of Assembly committees as follows:
Substance Abuse Committee: the member for Port Darwin be discharged and the member for Arnhem be appointed;
House Committee: the member for Stuart be discharged and the member for Arnhem be appointed;
Standing Orders Committee: the member for Daly be discharged and the member for Goyder be appointed;
Sport and Youth Committee: the members for Port Darwin, Sanderson, Millner and Blain be discharged and the members for Daly, Stuart, Arnhem and Greatorex be appointed;
Environment Committee: the member for Millner be discharged and the member for Stuart be appointed;
Legal and Constitutional Affairs Committee: the member for Sanderson be discharged and the member for Stuart be appointed; and
Subordinate Legislation and Publications Committee: the member for Stuart be discharged and the member for Port Darwin be appointed.
Honourable members, I table the letter.
I also received from the Opposition Whip changes to the membership of those committees:
Sport and Youth Committee: the member for Blain be discharged and the member for Greatorex be appointed.
Ms LAWRIE (Leader of Government Business): Madam Speaker, I move that the Assembly agree to the changes to the membership of Assembly committees as contained in the letters tabled.
Motion agreed to.
Mr HENDERSON (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, I table the Administrative Arrangements Order of Government dated 30 November 2007, Northern Territory Gazette No S36:
PAUL RAYMOND HENDERSON
MARION ROSE SCRYMGOUR
DELIA PHOEBE LAWRIE
CHRISTOPHER BRUCE BURNS
KONSTANTINE VATSKALIS
ELLIOT ARTHUR McADAM
CHRISTOPHER WILLIAM NATT
LEONARD FRANCIS KIELY
MATTHEW THOMAS BONSON
Mr HENDERSON (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, I also advise that the member for Barkly has resigned his ministerial portfolios this morning. I will be assuming his portfolio responsibilities until a new minister is elected and portfolios allocated.
Madam SPEAKER: Honourable members, pursuant to the provisions of Standing Order 12, I hereby revoke all previous warrants nominating members to act as Deputy Chairmen of Committees and nominate the following members to act as Deputy Chairmen of Committees: Ms Alison Anderson, Mr James Burke, Mr Karl Hampton, Mr Rob Knight, Ms Malarndirri McCarthy, Mr Ted Warren and Mr Gerry Wood, when requested so to do by the Speaker.
Given under my hand this 12th day of February 2008.
Madam SPEAKER: Honourable members, I have received from his Honour the Administrator Message No 25 notifying assent to bills passed in the November 2007 sittings of the Assembly.
The CLERK: Madam Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 100A, I inform honourable members that responses to petition No 67 and petition No 69 have been received and circulated to honourable members. The text of the responses will be placed on the Legislative Assembly website and a copy of the response will be provided to the member who tabled the petition for distribution to petitioners.
Response
Response
Mr HENDERSON (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, it is fitting that we join with our Chinese community to celebrate Chinese New Year in 2008, the Year of the Rat, and Gong Xi Fa Cai to everybody in the Chamber.
We are privileged to live in a society enriched by vibrant and diverse multicultural communities. In the Northern Territory, multicultural communities have made a very substantial contribution to our social, economic and cultural development. Our cultural diversity was on striking display this morning with the smoking ceremony performed on behalf of the Larrakia Nation, and the Chinese New Year blessing ceremony supported by the Chung Wah lion dancers. I am sure all honourable members will join with me in expressing appreciation to both groups. It is the only parliament in Australia which celebrates the opening of the parliamentary New Year, but I also acknowledge that in the federal parliament this morning we had a similar indigenous welcoming.
Members on both sides of the Assembly will be familiar with the long association of the Chinese with the Territory. The first Chinese migrants came here in the late 1800s, many with dreams of striking it rich on our goldfields. By 1881, the Chinese outnumbered Europeans by six to one. Indeed, for much of its early history, Darwin was a Chinese town. Since those pioneering days, the Chinese community has contributed significantly to the Territory.
Today, family names like Chin, Lay, Mu, Lee, Quong, Lowe, Fong Lim, Jape, Ah Kit, and many more, are well known in our community. Chinese businessmen and women run thriving enterprises and our local Australian Chinese community, together with the Territory government, maintains strong links of culture, friendship and trade with China. China is now a major player in the world economy and an engine of economic growth.
While the Territory and Australia as a whole seek a broad based relationship with China, trade and investment linkages will be a particular focus for the foreseeable future. My government will continue to be proactive in supporting trade in resources and services with China. We will continue to build on the initial successes of the China Minerals Investment Strategy.
Tourism is another area where our links with China will only strengthen in the years to come. The Territory government will continue to develop these important commercial relationships with China. The contribution of the Chinese community locally will always be important to our success. Organisations such as the Chung Wah Society, the Timor-Chinese Association and the Hakka Association bring a community focus to Chinese culture and tradition. The Chinese community in the Territory is known for its generosity and commitment to family and hard work. It has been an honour for me and many of my government colleagues and other members of this Assembly to join with the Chinese community in celebrating New Year.
On 7 February, it was my privilege as Chief Minister to host a reception in Parliament House to usher in the New Year. I was delighted to see the community turn out in such large numbers to join the celebration. Those present were enthralled by the enchanting music and traditional dancing. Congratulations to all the dancers, Mrs Leah Jongue for her renditions on the Chinese harp, Meimi Louie for her keyboard music, and the Chinese Language and Culture Centre of Darwin.
Last Saturday, I was delighted to attend a Chinese New Year celebration hosted by the NT Timor-Chinese Association. The music, food, dancing and the community involvement was superb. The event saw the baptism of the new kitchen at the community hall. Congratulations to the Association President, Rui Mu, and all those involved in the event.
I also look forward to attending the Chung Wah Association’s Chinese New Year Banquet at the SKYCITY Casino. I thank the President, Adam Lowe, for his kind invitation.
The government is committed to continuing support for the Territory’s multicultural communities. I am uplifted and inspired by their contribution to the Territory. I am certain that Chinese Territorians will continue to play a key role in the future of the Northern Territory. We will work together for continuing harmony and prosperity, and a secure future for our children.
For the next two weeks or so, the Chinese New Year will be celebrated with lion dances and blessing ceremonies. I thank and congratulate all those involved. I am sure all honourable members will join me in extending best wishes to our Australian Chinese Community for a prosperous and rewarding 2008. Gong Xi Fa Cai.
Mr MILLS (Opposition Leader): Madam Speaker, the opposition concurs with the sentiments that have been expressed by the Chief Minister. I, and other members from this side, have attended a number of those functions. The strength that we gain as a culture from our understanding of the Chinese culture is the strength of family. That is encouragement to us all to value those things which are most important. In order to progress and to develop, we need to develop a greater understanding and respect for the Chinese culture.
As the lions came into the Chamber, I reflected on the important role the Chinese community has had in the history of the Northern Territory. At the turn of the last century there were 10 Chinese for every Caucasian. They had a significant impact on the development of the Northern Territory and are woven into the culture of that which is Territorian.
With the emerging economic presence of China in the world market, we are strategically located to capitalise on that changing dynamic within the region. It is critical that we develop a better understanding of that dynamic and that change so that we can respond to it in a proactive way. I encourage the government to continue down the path that is already outlined. You have the support of the opposition. I am aware, as are members here and members in the business sector, that there is a changing dynamic within our region and we must be well positioned.
I note the grassroots activities of Queensland and Western Australia, in particular, in getting close to those markets in a more proactive way than I believe we are, and taking advantage of the opportunities that we do have, particularly when we reference the unique history that the Territory has in its earlier stages of development.
We support the statement and we look forward to further developments in this area.
Mrs BRAHAM (Braitling): Madam Speaker, I agree that it is most important to continue our links with China, not just from a business point of view but also from a cultural point of view. Admittedly, we did not have such an influence in the Centre as you have had in the Top End even though there were some Chinese who ventured down in the early days of Central Australia and those of you who come from Central Australia will recall the Fan family. It must have been a terrific expedition to do that in the harsh climate in which they ventured.
Coming from Bendigo, the Chinese community has been part of my life for many years and, like the Territory, Bendigo has embraced the Chinese community and every year we have this wonderful celebration of the Chinese New Year.
I know that your emphasis on dealing with China and the influence of the people in this city will greatly enhance the opportunities for the Northern Territory. I say to everyone here that we should be embracing all cultures, no matter where they are from, as this population has certainly benefited from many people who have come to the Territory. Most of us have come from somewhere else. We come to contribute, and let us hope that we all work together in harmony from now on.
Mr HENDERSON (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, today I report on the impact of tropical Cyclone Helen and the lessons learnt. After tracking west as a depression, Tropical Cyclone Helen intensified in the Joseph Bonaparte Gulf and, in line with Bureau of Meteorology predictions, reversed course.
The unusual track of this system reduced the normal warning time issued by the bureau. Helen crossed the Top End coast at Channel Point as a Category 2 system at 10 pm on Friday, 4 January 2008. Maximum wind speeds at Channel Point were estimated to be 130 km/h to 140 km/h. Darwin recorded a maximum gust of 102 km/h, which equates to a Category 1 system. This was not a particularly severe cyclone, yet it is estimated that 700 trees were blown over, about 15 500 residences were left without power, and a small number of houses damaged. Fortunately, the weather system was fast moving and, although some rivers rose quickly, no flooding of townships occurred.
I am pleased to begin this report by stating that, overall, the cyclone plan for the region worked well. That is not to say that everything worked perfectly. Preparing a city the size of Darwin for a cyclone is a major undertaking and, inevitably, there are things that we can be doing better. Whilst we have learnt much, it is nevertheless clear that we have a sound basis on which to improve our responses to cyclones.
The overriding issue which caused the most public concern has been the power outages caused by fallen trees. This raises a number of issues. As I reported, around 15 500 residences from Darwin to Batchelor were without power on the Saturday morning after the cyclone. Notably, by Sunday afternoon, about 90% had their power restored. Of the remainder, about 560 properties were restored over the next few days. The delays, in most cases, were caused by access difficulties due to flooded and washed-out roads.
We have a beautiful environment here in the Top End but, obviously, there is a balance to be struck between having enticing shady gardens and public spaces and clearing trees that might threaten power lines. Clearly, government will need to consider whether the current balance is correct; whether Power and Water requires greater powers to extend their tree clearing operations, and whether other measures to improve the robustness of the power supply should be contemplated. As part of this, individual homeowners need to consider how well they have prepared: do they have trees that pose a threat to their own or a neighbour’s house which they need to lop or remove? Business also needs to consider their continuity plans in the event of an emergency and ensure that their risk is minimised.
The most important point I raise here is the magnificent effort put in by employees, contractors, volunteers, and Power and Water workers who worked hard to quickly clear the roads and reconnect the power. This was a large task done under difficult conditions and I am very proud of their results. Effective coordination of the efforts of many agencies responding to an emergency is, obviously, a fundamental principle. Cyclone Helen emphasised the importance of close relationships and mutual understanding between agencies. To improve this coordination, we will step up our Emergency Operation Centre training activities. We will also work with councils to improve recovery planning and coordination should Darwin be struck more severely by another cyclone.
Providing clear advice to the public is always an important issue in an emergency. As a result of Cyclone Helen, the official advice provided to the public by the media has been reviewed. News scripts are being issued to media outlets to improve advice to the public. There will be a further review after the cyclone season. This review will also look at improving the understanding of compliance with these messages. Unfortunately, during Cyclone Helen, a number of businesses remained open too long and some people remained outside too late. In different circumstances, this could clearly place lives at risk unnecessarily, and government is working with appropriate agencies to improve this outlook.
I finish this report by emphasising that one of the most important lessons learned from Cyclone Helen is that all cyclones are dangerous and their potential to cause damage should not be underestimated. Cyclones can be difficult to predict. Had Helen intensified unexpectedly overnight and come closer to Darwin, the damage from fallen trees alone would have been substantially greater. Consequently, we must all heed the warnings. Safety is a partnership between government and the community and everybody must play their part. We need to clear up our own back yards, identify where we will shelter, and look to our own safety and that of our families by ensuring we have a cyclone plan and our 72 hour kit. We should close our businesses at an appropriate time. These are individual responsibilities which we should take seriously as not doing so puts our own lives and the lives of others at risk.
Madam Speaker, I conclude by taking the opportunity, on behalf of government and everybody in this House, to thank the hundreds of people who were involved in preparing and responding to Cyclone Helen. This involved Territorians from all walks of life doing many different jobs. I cannot name every group, however, I am sure all in this House appreciate the efforts of everyone involved in preparing and responding to Cyclone Helen. You have our sincere thanks.
Members: Hear, hear!
Mr MILLS (Opposition Leader): Madam Speaker, I thank the Chief Minister for his report because, after an assessment of the response of this community and the agencies that have the responsibility of responding to an incident such as Cyclone Helen, we stand encouraged at the capacity, particularly of Power and Water, to respond in difficult circumstances. It also provided a test for the relationship between the Territory government and councils. It is good to see that we have the Lord Mayor of Darwin and the Mayor of Palmerston here, because it does bring an influence to bear upon that relationship and who bears the full responsibility of cleanups. Cyclone Helen has given us an opportunity to check our systems.
It also raises the question of, and I would like it responded to if you are able to, Chief Minister, the stories from Mandorah. There have been a number of reports, of which the local member probably already knows, that it took a long time for the concerns of Mandorah to be addressed. There have been members from that community contacting me saying they wanted some clarification as to why their power was out for two days. It has a different effect on those who are in a rural environment as to urban.
It is an opportunity to test the communication plans. I am very pleased that you mentioned that. Those communication plans, where there are many different lines of communication, must be coordinated. A number of concerns were raised that there was a discrepancy in the messages that were being delivered. This is a great opportunity to revisit those and I am pleased you are doing so.
The cyclone season has not finished yet. We were very fortunate that school was not in when we had the visit of Cyclone Helen, which means that we now need to assess our response capacity as it relates to the communication to schools. We have had some problems in the past. Cyclone season is not over. I ask and urge the government to attend to that as a higher priority before we have another cyclone, before the end of the Wet Season.
Mr WOOD (Nelson): Madam Speaker, I welcome the report from the Chief Minister. There are a couple of issues the Chief Minister raised that need to be considered. The Chief Minister spoke about power lines and trees. It is one of those difficult areas, and the more we can put power lines underground, the better. However, while that may not be economical or appropriate in some circumstances, perhaps we need an education campaign, as we used to have, where the government put out books on species of plants that were appropriate to grow, especially in urban areas, and the distance trees needed to be planted from power lines.
In the rural area, people have planted mahoganies on the fence thinking: ‘That will be nice. I do not want to use up too much of my block with trees’, but half the mahogany goes over the road and over the power lines and that causes major problems. People get a bit cranky when their trees get lopped, so an education campaign about the species of trees we should plant, and the distance from power lines these trees should be planted, would be a good idea.
I thank the lady on the switchboard at Power and Water. There were many people who had power out for a long time in the rural area who would keep ringing me up. I am not sure of the lady’s name, there were probably several of them, but they did a fantastic job. They are at the coalface of complaints, and it takes a lot of skill and diplomacy to handle those complaints. I thank those people who do that job.
I thank the Power and Water people, especially the rural maintenance people. They have had a lot of work. The rural area is a difficult area because you have to travel long distances to find out where the problems are, and they did a fantastic job as well.
The Chief Minister mentioned Darwin and the Opposition Leader has mentioned Mandorah. The Chief Minister said that the cyclone crossed at Channel Point. I know that my relations who live near Channel Point could not get home simply because there were so many trees over the roads. It is an isolated area and we should remember that the isolated areas are just as important as …
Madam SPEAKER: Member for Nelson, your time has expired.
Mr WOOD: Thank you, Madam Speaker.
Mr HENDERSON (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, I thank the Leader of the Opposition and the member for Nelson for their contribution. The major lesson learned from this is that we can always do better in improving our systems, our planning, our training and our communication. Those lessons have been learned, and contingencies and amendments to plans will be put in place.
I congratulate and thank, given that the Lord Mayor of Darwin and the Mayor of Palmerston are here this morning, the respective councils and their crews who worked really hard to clear the roads and get the roads open. It was a fantastic effort. It really shows the spirit of this community that everyone can come together and work so hard.
I am advised that a hotline was put in for the people at Mandorah. Power and Water with 15 500 customers without power worked as hard as they could to get supplies back to normal. Many people in the rural area have their own generators and maybe that is something people should look at in their own personal plans. I thank everybody for their contribution.
Mr BONSON (Sport and Recreation): Madam Speaker, I am pleased to deliver my first report to the Assembly as Sports minister.
I have to say, for someone born and bred in the Territory, being the Sports minister is a dream job. That is because sport is such an integral part of the Territory’s unique way of life. I am particularly proud to be Sports minister in a government committed to developing both grassroots Territory sport, and also giving Territorians the opportunity to watch the best of national and international events.
Since becoming Sports minister in November, I, together with thousands of other Territorians, have had the chance to see some truly exciting sporting events, and there is more to come.
In mid-January, Darwin hosted the stand-out Rugby League tournament, the Hottest 7’s in the World. The government is proud to support the Hottest 7’s competition. In December last year we announced a further $300 000 over the next three years to ensure the event’s future. Fiji won this year’s competition, making it their third win in a row. The finals saw a magnificent display of running rugby by the Fijian side. They won quite easily.
One of the features of this year’s Hottest 7’s was the introduction of the women’s competition, adding to the family appeal of the event. As Sports minister, I am keen to promote women’s sport.
Another real bonus from the Hottest 7’s competition came thanks to the other rugby code, Rugby League. The North Queensland Cowboys fielded a team in the competition. Their party included Queensland, State of Origin, and Australian Halfback, Jonathan Thurston. I met with representatives of the Cowboys, including Jonathan Thurston while they were visiting, and they have committed to promoting opportunities for their club for talented young Territory Rugby League players.
Last Wednesday, I had the pleasure of being part of the sell-out crowd at Marrara Indoor Stadium which saw a fantastic National Basketball League match between the Territory’s adopted side, the Perth Wildcats, and the West Sydney Razorbacks. The Wildcats won the match despite being 10 points down at half time. Apart from the game itself, the spectators were also treated to the full NBL hype, which has helped to get the crowd fully involved. It was a great family night. We are currently two years into a second three year agreement with NBL. Given the great support the Territory public is showing to these games over the years, the government remains committed to bringing more NBL matches to Darwin. Congratulations to the Wildcats on their community activities. They held clinics for juniors, visited hospitals and remote communities. They did a fantastic job.
This week, the Imparja Cup for Indigenous Cricket started in Alice Springs. The Imparja Cup competition features 25 teams from across Australia. The Territory government has committed an additional $10 000 for the purpose of this event which will allow the best indigenous cricketers in the country to come together for this competition. I am very much looking forward to travelling to Alice Springs on Saturday to watch the final of this match.
Before the final of the Imparja Cup, Territorians will also get the chance to see the pre-season AFL NAB Cup match between the Western Bulldogs and the North Melbourne Kangaroos in Darwin this Friday. Football Park Marrara is the Bulldogs’ home away from home, and there will be strong local support for the Bulldogs when they run out on Friday night. Local fans will get the chance to see the likes of Jason Akermanis, Brad Johnson, Nathan Eagleton and Adam Cooney in the Bulldogs side in this first round NAB Cup match. It does not get any better.
Apart from the prospect of seeing the opening round of the AFL pre-season competition, local football fans are also gearing up for the finals of the AFL NT. With just one minor round match to go before this year’s final series it is shaping up to be one of the tightest in years. Three teams - Southern Districts, Saint Mary’s and the Tiwi Bombers - are locked on equal points on top of the ladder. The Palmerston Magpies and Waratahs have both shown that they can beat all the top three.
Madam Speaker, this government recognises the value of sports to Territorians, and we will continue to support grassroots level sports to give as many Territorians as possible the chance to become involved. However, we also want to support the elite level of sporting competition which has proven so popular with Territorians over recent years.
Mr CONLON (Greatorex): Madam Speaker, I thank the minister for his report. I congratulate him on the portfolio. It is a lot of fun being the shadow spokesperson for sports, so I can only imagine it is great fun being the Sports minister. He has a big job; I know that because sport plays such a vital role in the Northern Territory in the development of young people and, in particular, young indigenous men in Central Australia with the Clontarf Foundation.
It is a big year, as the minister mentioned. The NAB Cup is this weekend in Darwin and the NAB Regional Challenge is in Alice Springs on 29 February. That is going to be a big turn-out as it is always is - in fact, you get almost a third of the town going depending on who is playing. If it is a game between Collingwood and Essendon we usually get around 12 000 people at Traeger Park. It should be a great event on 29 February in Alice Springs. The Imparja Cup is under way and the final is on this weekend. The Alice Springs Masters Games are later this year. So it is a very big year.
I urge the minister to address the situation - I noticed a media release he put out earlier in the week - about Imparja Television effectively cutting free-to-air AFL by dropping Channel 10 programs. This effectively reduces free-to-air televising of AFL games to Alice Springs by half - which is all the Saturday games. I know the minister is a keen footy player and footy fan, and I hope that he, the Minister for Communications and the Minister for Central Australia will address this situation. I have written to the AFL and the federal Minister for Communications asking what they are going to do with still no sign of Warren Snowdon on the issue. I am sure the Northern Territory government will follow that up.
The minister also met earlier this year with some sporting bodies in soccer and athletics in regard to facilities in Alice Springs - a soccer/athletics super stadium if you like for the lack a better word at this stage of negotiations. I am interested to have a brief on that to see how those developments are going.
Congratulations to the minister. I look forward to a big year in sport and recreation.
Mr WOOD (Nelson): Madam Speaker, I congratulate the minister for receiving this job. I will be following his movements in the job keenly. He is a Hawthorn supporter and if, in his term as Sports minister, he does not get at least one game in the Territory with Hawthorn playing, I will ask him to resign! I think he has an enjoyable job and the minister has a sporting background.
There has been much said about the importance of sport, especially in relation to helping young people develop, to keep out of trouble, to improve their self-esteem, and you do have an important job from that point of view. It is not just about whether the Bulldogs turn up here next weekend or whether we have a major sporting event. There are big social advantages in encouraging youths and older people - and we should not forget that older people are in sport. I can still trundle around Marrara at 9 am as an umpire. We should encourage more people to do that and keep active and to be involved in sport.
One area we need to look at is the facilities at many of our remote communities and in some of our smaller towns. Those facilities need to be improved so they are up to standards so that people who are using those facilities can come up to a standard which will enable them, hopefully, to represent the Northern Territory and perhaps represent Australia.
I congratulate the minister, I wish him all the best. I hope he will stick to his traditions - he knows that brown and gold is the team!
Mr BONSON (Sport and Recreation): Madam Speaker, the member for Greatorex raised issues regarding Imparja Television. My office has been speaking with Imparja Television and we will be working with them to ensure that people in Alice Springs have every opportunity to watch their football.
Yes, I have met representatives from a large number of sporting bodies in Alice Springs, Darwin, and right across the Territory. There are a number of issues that arise when you meet people face-to-face - they are based on elite level sports and grassroots level and facilities, etcetera.
I know the member for Nelson has a deep understanding of sport in the Territory, both at the elite and grassroots level. I give both those members and every member in this House the undertaking that I will work with them as closely as I can at the grassroots and the elite level. Please feel free to contact my office regarding grievances. Facilities are a big issue. As a government, we have to manage where we put our money. I am very interested in promoting grassroots level sports, elite level participation from teams internationally and in the national context. However, I am also very interested in youth and getting benefits from sports.
There is one group of people I believe we can do a far better job for when all sports are working together. That is women in sport. It is an untapped resource. As we know, they do the volunteering, the work behind the scenes, sometimes they cater, and sometimes they bring players. I am looking forward to working with women.
I give an undertaking to every member in this House that I will work with them in Sport and Recreation and my other portfolios to get the best benefit for the people of the Territory.
Reports noted pursuant to standing orders.
Continued from 28 November 2007.
Mr MILLS (Opposition Leader): Madam Speaker, I say at the outset that the opposition welcomes this amendment. There will be no opposition and we are pleased to see a move down the right track. It must be pointed out, however, that the act as it applied before this amendment imposed some serious restrictions on the processes of common sense of ordinary folk solving their problems. It is probably best typified by a gentleman who, when spoken to, had to go through a convoluted process involving a pink sign when he was merely putting up a bit of shade cloth in his back yard.
It did not take too long to impose those kinds of measures and regimes to the Planning Act, but it has taken a full 12 months to remove the shackles and the obstructions from the process. Therefore, we do welcome the change; we think it is a step in the right direction. It is a win for common sense, it is freeing up the system and allowing local decisions of a smaller nature to be resolved in a better and more sensible manner. It is for that reason that the CLP in opposition gives it our full support. We note that it has taken some time, but good on them.
Mr WOOD (Nelson): Madam Deputy Speaker, congratulations on your appointment.
I also support the legislation, but I have some concerns. I can either raise them at the committee stage or raise them now. That is in relation to section 5(3), which states:
Subsections (1) and (2) of the existing act state:
Minister, in your second reading, you said two things: ‘The Act provides for the precinct to be excised from the municipality of Darwin and for owners of land within the precinct to pay rates to the corporation’, and then you say that the bill clarifies that unless …
Ms LAWRIE: A point of order, Madam Speaker! I have a concern. I believe the member for Nelson might be referring to the wrong legislation.
Mr WOOD: The Darwin Waterfront.
Ms LAWRIE: No.
Mr WOOD: I thought …
Ms LAWRIE: No, sorry, my apologies, member for Nelson, the Whips have been in communication, so we should have ensured you were in the loop there.
Mr WOOD: I know. That is my fault.
Ms LAWRIE: No, the Clerk read reference to the planning legislation, which I understand you have been briefed on. I was anticipating your contribution to debate because you have a keen interest in issues of planning.
Mr WOOD: All right. Actually, it is my fault, minister. I thank you for reminding me and I will go on to the other one.
In relation to – and I will make sure I have the right one – Planning Amendment (Development Applications) Bill 2007 (Serial 130).
Ms Lawrie: That is the one.
Mr WOOD: Thank you. I have a number of concerns in relation to this bill. We did have a briefing yesterday, for which I thank the minister.
However, under section 47A ‘Development application not requiring public notice’, it said that there were certain matters that were to be specified by the regulations. I know we were told yesterday what was in those regulations, but I would have thought, because this particular amendment is dealing with a change to the planning, that the regulations should have been here at this stage of the debate because we can talk about the regulations. If we do not know what is in them it is debating something that we are not sure of.
From that debate, one of these sections, 47A(1)(b), is related to things such as a women’s refuge, or a child’s safe house, or something like that, and 47A(1)(c), which related to development that would not have a significant impact on existing and future amenity of the area in which the development was carried out, related to waivers, especially where, for instance, sheds or buildings may not be a problem if they are closer to the boundary than normally allowed.
I understand that and, if we can produce planning that reduces the red tape, then that is good. I am not criticising that except to say that the regulations should have been given to us today, and said this is what those regulations refer to.
My concern is, when you get to section 7 and 7(5), which is the very last clause, it states:
which I have been talking about
… 47A applies.
Already existing in the Planning Act, under section 102(3), it says that if the Chairman directs under subsection (2) that a meeting is closed to the public, the meeting is closed to the public. I would prefer that subsection (5) is not put in there, and my understanding from the briefing is that that was more a drafting insert rather than a government insert, because the principle that has been put forward here is that the public, when dealing with issues in 47A, should not be allowed to attend.
If you took the three items that are written there, one is the consolidation of land. It is not controversial in the sense that it is not secret. I know the chances of the public getting to attend that meeting is probably about nil, but why take it out? Why refuse them the ability to turn up? It is the principle of removing the public ability to attend the meeting of the DCA in relation to consolidation of lands that seems to be overkill.
In relation to section 47A(1)(b), where it could be a women’s refuge and it is something which you do not particularly want advertised in the wider world, that might be okay, but under your existing act, the Chairman would immediately say: ‘Sorry, this is closed to the public.’ Then, when you get to section 47A(1)(c), which is about whether your shed should be 1 m or 2 m from the side fence, it is not something that is too secretive, one would have to say surely you do not need to tell the public that they cannot attend the meeting where that might be discussed. I would think that from a practical point of view your chances of the public turning up for a meeting in relation to this where you have already contacted the owners would probably be nearly zilch.
However, the principle is then do not apply something that nibbles away at a small piece of freedom, a small piece of open and transparency in government when it is not necessary. Leave that up to the discretion of the Chairman of the Development Consent Authority. He obviously will know if something really needs to be dealt with in private and, as we have said, I agree that section 47A(1)(b) would be one of those cases. Then to install a clause which I believe is an overkill, which is clause 7(5), it is the last clause in the act, I ask that the government consider removing that section. It is simply unnecessary and I believe it sends out a signal that one is tightening the ability of the public to have a say, no matter how minor it would be, in what we regard as a public process.
I support the bill as it is. However, I believe that reference should be removed. I do also say that with an understanding that this appears to be put in by the Parliamentary Counsel rather than the government itself.
Mrs BRAHAM (Braitling): Madam Speaker, to reinforce what the member for Nelson was saying, this was a concern raised yesterday at the briefing. I am not sure of the officers concerned; I thought in part they agreed. It was the wording of what is being inserted after 102(4) – ‘A meeting of the Development Consent Authority must not be open …’. I suggest that the word ‘must’ should have been changed to ‘may’ not be open. That still allows the Chairman the discretion to close it in certain circumstances, for instance, if it is a crisis centre or it is some shelter that you do not want the public to know that is occurring. Surely using the word ‘must’ makes it much more pedantic. We felt that the word ‘may’ would have covered all the avenues. It still gives the Chairman the discretion in circumstances, but it does not prohibit anyone from attending in cases which are not controversial. There may be times when it is not a controversial application for a particular shelter and perhaps the general public should be allowed to come and have a say.
For instance, we had great concern with a house in Alice Springs which was being rezoned to allow for what the residents thought was going to be a permanent home for aged people in a very private, upmarket area. However, when they looked into it, it was not so. It was purely a day care-type arrangement for aged care people. It was resolved because it was made open and they were told exactly what it was all about.
If you constantly use the word ‘must’ in your legislation, you are prohibiting anyone from being able to know exactly what it is going to be. It is not an open process. I understand that there are times when the Chairman may say, ‘we do not want this to be published’. Fine, I can understand that, but let us not have it so that we judge all cases like that. Let us say to the Chairman that he can have that discretion to do so. That was the point we raised most of all at the briefing.
Ms LAWRIE (Planning and Lands): Madam Speaker, it is a joy to start the new parliamentary year with consensus across the Chamber. I thank the opposition for their support.
Indeed, it may have taken us a while to get here but I have been heavily engaged with industry and homeowners in understanding the impact of the planning system. These changes are intended to reduce the regulatory burden on developments where there are few, if any, impacts on adjoining land.
In the instances of developments such as refuges for women and children escaping domestic violence, the intention is to ensure that their location is not widely broadcast to the community. The bill proposes to exempt the following development applications from public exhibition. One, consolidation of land: the consolidation of one or more lots into a single title is most often a requirement of a development permit where it is proposed to build across existing lot boundaries. The condition to consolidate also serves to highlight the consolidation will also be a requirement under the Building Act to satisfy fire separation requirements. In such circumstances, public participation really serves no sensible purpose because the determination has already been made. The process merely delays what should be a simple assessment process of the technical requirements of the applicable related legislation.
In terms of setbacks and single dwellings, when the application is to vary either side or rear boundary setbacks to a single dwelling, there is no potential effect on the amenity other than to an adjoining property. There is no basis, therefore, for broadly advertising the proposal. The amendment proposes only that owners and occupiers of adjoining properties be notified, offering the standard 14 days to lodge any objection. Should they do so, they will have the opportunity to be heard by the Development Consent Authority - an important provision. This process will largely replicate the current process, until the introduction of the new planning scheme, that is undertaken under the building regulations other than in Alice Springs and Tennant Creek where such variations have been dealt with under the form of town plans. In other words, what this amendment does is no more than mirror a system through the planning scheme that has delivered satisfactory outcomes for many years.
To the variations for industrial developments, where an industrial development is proposed in an industrial zone, it does not abut land in another zone, and that development seeks a variation, it is similarly proposed that the application not be advertised. Typically, such variations are to building height, car parking requirements or the like. There is little purpose to require advertising when experience demonstrates that rarely, if ever, there is an adverse submission from any other party. After all, it can be expected that an industrial use will occupy an industrial lot, and that amenity considerations of adjoining holdings will be less than would be expected elsewhere. The existing process only serves to delay and frustrate what should be a straightforward assessment of the development and a commonsense determination of the application.
In terms of women’s refuges and the like, for many years the planning regulations have been exempt from broad advertising proposals. It is proposed that this practice continue in the interests of preserving the anonymity of the address. This does not preclude targeted consultation with the immediate neighbourhood at the discretion of the Development Consent Authority.
The Independent members have raised an important matter in relation to whether there is a provision inserted to require the Development Consent Authority to have closed meetings in relation to these issues. The members have quite rightly raised a concern. As we know, the Development Consent Authority Chair has the discretion to close a meeting when required to do so. I propose that the Assembly go into committee, and as the sponsoring minister, I would move to delete clause 102(5) to ensure that discretion of the Development Consent Authority chair remains.
Motion agreed to; bill read a second time.
In committee:
Bill, by leave, taken as a whole:
Ms LAWRIE: Madam Chair, in relation to Clause 4 of the bill I move that proposed section 102(5) be omitted.
Mr WOOD: Madam Chair, I thank the government for taking on this amendment. This is not about politics; it is simply a good, commonsense approach to something that was overkill, an oversight. I thank the government because there was an important philosophical concern I had with the Development Consent Authority which, where possible, it should kept as open as possible. I thank the minister for bringing forward this amendment.
Mrs BRAHAM: Madam Chair, I also thank government for listening to us and taking on board our recommendations. We feel as though we go to these briefings and we raise points and go away thinking ‘Nothing will happen’. I congratulate and thank the officers who are in attendance for listening to us, and bringing it to government’s attention. As the member for Nelson said, it is a commonsense approach. We look forward to a new era of cooperation between Independents and the government.
Amendment agreed to.
Clause 4, as amended, agreed to.
Remainder of bill, by leave, taken as a whole and agreed to.
Bill reported with amendment; report adopted.
Ms LAWRIE (Planning and Lands): Madam Speaker, I move that the bill be now read a third time.
Motion agreed to; bill read a third time.
Mr HENDERSON (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, when I arrived in the Territory 24 years ago, I did not really know what to expect. I was looking for a bit of adventure, a bit of fun. I was also looking for opportunity, for a chance to strike out a new path in what was a new world for me as a migrant to our great north. As for so many others, the Northern Territory has given me far more than I expected, and far more than I could have hoped for back then. I found a place, the Northern Territory, which ranks as the best place in the world to live and to work and, above all, the best place to raise a family. That is what the vast majority of Territory families seek – a safe and decent place to bring up their kids, a safe and decent place for our senior Territorians to live in their retirement, and a safe and decent environment for our businesses to operate in.
However, the antisocial behaviour and criminal activities of a small number of young people is affecting our whole community. To be brutally honest about it, there are a small number of parents of these kids who appear not to give a damn. These kids and these parents are denying the right of all of us to the quiet enjoyment of our day-to-day lives and the protection of our lifestyles. They are thumbing their noses at the vast majority of Territorians.
When moving around my electorate and talking to people in the street, it is clear that these kids, and their parents, are making life a misery through disgraceful acts of antisocial behaviour, abuse and crime, from petty thieving to serious assault. Every act of vandalism, every act of thieving, and every rock thrown is aimed at the heart of the lifestyle we all want to enjoy.
The Territory is not alone in experiencing these issues. There are many other towns and cities in Australia which continue to experience far more extreme situations such as we are seeing in the popular media. This is exactly what we want to avoid and what our strategies are designed to overcome.
Today I will advise the House about my government’s initiatives to tackle youth crime, and the ways we will move to reinforce those rights to protect our families in their right to enjoy a safe and decent place to live.
Much has been said publicly about the activities of a small number of young people who continually thumb their noses at the law. Today, I am pleased to speak about my government’s integrated strategy for addressing this issue.
Northern Territory police already perform an excellent job in tackling youth crime. However, notwithstanding police efforts, there is a small core of young offenders who engage in unlawful behaviour and this must stop. The measures I will outline will strengthen my government’s already tough stance on crime, especially youth crime. Whilst we will be even tougher on young repeat offenders, we will also strengthen our initiatives to stop people turning to crime. If we are to make a real difference in countering such behaviour over the longer term it is necessary to tackle the causes of youth antisocial behaviour and family dysfunction.
I am aware of the difficulties that young people face in the transition through adolescence to adulthood. These difficulties are sometimes exacerbated by a lack of appropriate parental guidance and support, family violence, or a family member’s substance abuse. In many cases, families of children with challenging behaviours are unable to access or are unaware of services which support young people.
My government’s Youth Justice Strategy will assist vulnerable young people by identifying at-risk behaviour early and providing assistance, support and, as a last resort, enforcement of the responsibilities of young people and their families. The strategy will address issues surrounding those young people who are on the fringes of unlawful behaviour and to prevent such young people from drifting into the small number of youth and young adults who are involved in serious crime. The strategy imposes tough treatments on the small minority of young people who are, unfortunately, involved in serious or escalating offences.
I will turn first to consider the legislative aspects of the strategy. As I announced last month, amendments to the Youth Justice Act will provide that diversion programs will no longer be an option for serial juvenile offenders. The Youth Justice Act has been in operation since 1 August 2006. It provides a sentencing plan for young people. Legal intervention where young people have broken the law is an important aspect in my government’s response to youth crime. Legal interventions currently include diversion and prosecution in the Youth Justice Court.
Under the principles set out in the act, young people are held accountable for their actions, and they must also be dealt with in a way that will maximise their opportunity to reintegrate into society and develop in socially responsible ways. Whilst warnings, youth justice conferences and diversion programs which are prescribed under the Youth Justice Act are often appropriate for young offenders and can be very successful, they are not the only answer.
Juvenile diversion programs play an important role in getting many young offenders back on track and away from crime. However, there is a small group of serial offenders who treat juvenile diversion as something of a joke, and who continue to re-offend. For this reason, the Youth Justice Act will be amended so that diversion programs will no longer be an option for young offenders who have already been sent to a juvenile diversion program twice. In these circumstances, serial offenders will be dealt with by the Youth Justice Court and will face incarceration.
Another key aspect of the legislative elements of this package is new legislation to be introduced in this sitting of parliament to provide for family responsibility agreements and family responsibility orders in circumstances where the child of a parent is engaging in antisocial behaviour. The scheme provides for a two step approach to engaging the parents of children who are repeatedly absent from school, or in public places late at night, or who participate in antisocial or criminal behaviour. Under the scheme, authorised officers from the Department of Employment, Education and Training, Justice, Police and Health and Community Services will be able to refer cases of children who are repeatedly truant, or in public places late at night, or demonstrating antisocial or criminal behaviour to a specialist service body which will enter into a family responsibility agreement with identified parents or carers on behalf of the agency.
Family responsibility agreements will be a written contractual arrangement. They will provide that the parent will, in exchange for agreeing to certain requirements, receive assistance from a dedicated officer to access government and non-government support services. Agreements will be entered into on a voluntary basis and will run for up to 12 months. Agreements may be entered into with the parents of children who have not yet turned 18 years of age. The sort of things an agreement could provide for include: that the parent attend parenting guidance counselling, parenting support group or other relevant personal development course or rehabilitation program; that the parent agree to ensure that the child attends school; that the parent ensures that the child is home by a certain time; or ensures that the child avoids contact with a particular person or place.
In exchange for agreeing to meet such conditions, the parent will have access to a dedicated officer who will assist the parent to access existing government support and service provider programs. The officer will provide the parents with any reasonable assistance necessary to help the parent comply with the agreement. If after substantial efforts to engage with the parents on a voluntary basis have not succeeded, and a parent refuses to either enter into an agreement or comply with an agreement, an agency may seek a family responsibility order from the court through the Chief Executive Officer of the agency.
Orders will only be sought if the Chief Executive Officer considers it to be in the best interest of the child and where an improvement in parenting skills is considered likely to improve the youth’s family situation and consequently prevent a repeat of the child’s behaviour. The agency will have to demonstrate to the court that the belief is based on reasonable grounds. The conditions of an order will be largely identical to those contained in the agreement but with greater emphasis on conditions assisting the parent to address those aspects of their own behaviour that are preventing them from taking responsibility for the care of the child. It might include compelling the parent to attend a drug and alcohol or anger management program, or a targeted parenting or problem gambling management program. An order may provide for the provision of in-home support if it is considered appropriate in the circumstances. Orders can be enforced for up to 12 months unless revoked earlier. Orders can be made for any child over the age of 10 years and under the age of 18 years.
To accommodate the Northern Territory’s broad demographic mix, the system of family agreements and orders will apply to any guardian of a child rather than limiting the scheme to parents only. This acknowledges that many children do not live with their parents and may be cared for by various other family members such as grandparents or aunts or uncles.
Under the scheme, police may proceed to bring applications for an order without undertaking an agreement with the parent in circumstances where a young person is charged with an offence or has breached a condition of bail. This application will be made separately from the prosecution of the offence. If it is a first offence, the order will largely replicate the conditions of bail to direct the parent to ensure that the child meets the conditions of bail.
If a child is charged with a breach of condition of bail and the breach is proved, the order will direct the parents to address those aspects of their own behaviour that are preventing them from taking responsibility for the care of the child. This may mean compelling the parent to attend intensive parental guidance counselling, a parenting support group, or other relevant personal development courses.
If the parent has a drug or alcohol problem, the order may contain the condition directing that person attend drug and alcohol rehabilitation programs. An order may also provide for the provision of in-home support. A central body will be established to monitor agreements and orders. While every effort will be made to support parents to meet the conditions of an agreement or order, some parents may be unwilling to engage in the process and it is therefore necessary to have in place some element of compulsion. It is therefore proposed that a breach of an order will attract a penalty of up to $2000.
I turn now to consider the non-legislative aspects of the Youth Justice Strategy. As I mentioned earlier, the strategy is designed to identify children and young people with challenging behaviours at an early stage and to address the issues underlying the behaviour so as to prevent the drift of such young persons into the small category of youth who are involved in serious crime. Delivery of this strategy will vary from region to region, but will share the following common elements: coordination, links to family and youth case management, links from case management to sentencing options.
The first component involves coordination between and within government and non-government agencies. Key Northern Territory government agencies are police through school-based constables as well as operational stationed officers, Family and Community Services, the Department of Employment, Education and Training through schools and counsellors, and the Department of Justice through Youth Justice Court and Community Corrections. Key non-government agencies will vary from region to region but include the services that provide support to young people. Weekly interagency meetings will be convened to share information and intelligence and to assign client case management. Such case management could include alternative education and school attendance programs. Data on youth at risk in the region will also be collected and monitored.
In Darwin and Alice Springs, youth hubs will be established to provide a link to family and youth case management. Youth hubs will be a safe place where police can use legislative powers to bring young people at night if they are unable to be returned home or if there is no one at home to take responsibility for them. Outreach workers will also be able to bring young people to youth hubs with the consent of the individual.
Youth hubs will not be a traditional youth centre or drop-in centre but will be staffed by a coordinator and other staff sufficient to meet the expected needs and hours of operation. These facilities will include some space for young people in transition to home or another safe place as well as office and meeting space for staff in interagency meetings. The coordinators will also operate from these premises.
Staff at the youth hubs will undertake assessment of the young person’s immediate needs and current assessment tools will be further adapted as required. The coordinator or other staff will do a more thorough assessment of youth and family needs for a referral to appropriate youth and family support services. This referral will be managed through weekly interagency meetings.
Young people and their families who are referred for further help will have multiple needs requiring complex case management and intervention. All of the agencies which agree to provide referrals from this service will boost their capacity to provide this more complex case management. Case management plans will also assist police who are processing young people through the youth diversion program, as well as assist with the pre-sentencing conferencing and sentencing in the Youth Justice Court.
In smaller regional towns, a youth hub may operate through community organisations and appropriate community elders.
The third element of the strategy links to sentencing options in the Youth Justice Court and addresses the smaller group of young people who are offenders before the Youth Justice Court. It will utilise the existing provisions in the Youth Justice Act for pre-sentence conferencing and will provide advice to the court regarding case management of young people charged with offences and who are on bail. Aspects of case management can then be incorporated, where appropriate, into conditions of bail. Young people on bail will be monitored to ensure they comply with their case management plan and will be informed in clear language what their responsibilities are on release on bail. Repeated serious breaches of bail conditions or commission of further serious offences whilst on bail will be listed as specific factors in determining whether bail should be revoked.
A Youth Justice Court clinician will provide advice to magistrates about case management of young people charged with offences and will prepare and facilitate pre-sentence conferences to present the outcomes to the magistrate. The position will be an important link between the court and the youth and family services system.
Another key element of the Youth Justice Strategy is the establishment of youth camps to provide a residential setting where services tackling antisocial behaviour by young people in the Territory can be delivered. In December last year, I announced that the government will use existing facilities at the Hamilton Downs Station near Alice Springs to run a new youth camp. The facility has in place dormitories that can accommodate up to 65 young people, kitchen facilities, toilets and water supply. There is the option of development of further infrastructure as needs are identified.
This youth camp will get kids away from the cycle of crime by spending time at Hamilton Downs for intensive skills development programs. These young people will then be required to complete education and skills training programs which will help them make a positive contribution to the community. Government is also working with the Hamilton Downs Board to get the facilities ready to start running shortly.
Yesterday, I announced government funding for the Balunu Foundation at Talc Head and the Brahminy Foundation at Batchelor to provide opportunities for Top End kids to participate in a youth camp. Our work with these camps starts now. The Balunu Foundation is a not-for-profit body that currently utilises facilities at Talc Head. I anticipate that up to 30 young indigenous people could utilise the foundation’s program this financial year. This is the beginning of an important partnership. The Brahminy Foundation is also a not-for-profit foundation and operates from a facility outside Batchelor. The program run by the foundation works to build capacity and self-esteem whilst allowing participants to develop life and work skills.
By making funding available for young people in the Top End to participate in the program, I expect that up to 10 to 15 young people could be referred to the service by the end of the financial year by agencies such as NT Police, Family and Children’s Services, and the Youth Justice Court. I have asked the Attorney-General to develop further options for integrated youth camps to address antisocial and low-level offending behaviour of young people in the Darwin and Palmerston areas. I expect that this work will be completed towards the middle of the year.
In conclusion, I believe that my government’s Youth Justice Strategy provides a balanced, integrated approach. The long-term solution is to coordinate the activities of police, other government agencies and non-government agencies so that the individual circumstances of each young person exhibiting challenging behaviour or breaking the law are properly assessed and remedial strategies adopted.
The focus of remedial strategies is to get young people back on track so they set a positive course for their future. Where young people do not respond positively to this approach and they continue to offend or ignore court requirements concerning bail conditions, the new legislative provisions will send a clear message that such behaviour will not be tolerated and the consequences of such behaviour will be an appearance before the court and, ultimately, incarceration.
Entering politics a little over eight years ago was, and continues to be, about giving back to the Territory - giving back to a place that I and my family call home. In taking on the privilege and responsibilities of being a Labor member of parliament, a core belief that I take in my work is a commitment to do the right thing. It is this belief that lies at the heart of my commitment to Territory families.
Madam Speaker, doing the right thing and saying enough is enough must be the centrepiece of our task in protecting all Territorians in their desire to lead lives not blighted by crime and antisocial behaviour, whether that be in our remote townships, on our streets or in our neighbourhoods. Our community is paying the price for a small group of kids who do not respect the law, their parents, or the public - and enough is enough.
Juvenile diversion will no longer be a revolving door. Parents will be made more accountable and youth camps will help get kids back on track. We want to get those kids who are at risk of criminal offending back on the right path, as well as give guidance and support to others who need to build self-esteem, develop life and work skills, get back in to school and reconnect with family.
The work does not stop; I know that. My sleeves are rolled up. There is no simple solution to crime. I, and my government, will keep working on reforms to the legal process and giving the police the tools they need to get the job done. It is about making our streets safer for all Territorians.
Madam Speaker, I move that the Assembly take note of the statement.
Dr BURNS (Justice and Attorney-General): Madam Speaker, I support the Chief Minister’s statement setting out how the Henderson Labor government will attack youth crime. Since becoming Attorney-General, and at the direction of the Chief Minister, my top priority has been to develop legislative reforms and targeted programs to hit youth crime from every angle.
The community is justifiably sick of young thugs roaming through Darwin suburbs who think they are above the law. We are sick of seeing media reports of young people engaged in the destruction of property, intimidation of neighbours and, worst of all, violent attacks on innocent people. We are sick of parents who refuse to accept their fundamental responsibility to raise their children with respect for the community, the police, and the law.
Parenting is a serious business, and the vast majority of parents in the Territory take their responsibilities towards the young lives in their care very seriously indeed. We all know that our parents have been the most important influences in our lives. What parents teach their children invariably shapes the next generation. Occasionally, good kids from strong families drift into bad behaviour despite the best efforts of their parents.
However, what is becoming very clear is that some parents have abdicated their position as positive role models for their children. They do not know where their children are, they do not care what they are doing. Some parents have drug, alcohol, gambling or emotional problems which makes the care, support and direction of their children a secondary consideration at best. There is unambiguous evidence from around the world that negligent or negative parenting is amongst the strongest predictors of juvenile involvement in antisocial behaviour and criminal behaviour. So, if we are going to seriously tackle youth crime in the Territory that is where we need to start.
As the Chief Minister has made clear, a strong, supportive family is our community’s strongest bulwark against youth crime and destructive behaviour. The Family Responsibility Framework the government announced yesterday, which will roll-out immediately in major urban centres and, ultimately, throughout the Territory, will help those parents struggling to provide the necessary strength and support. This new approach is not about punishing parents, but providing them with the tools and motivation they need to be better, more positive, family leaders. We are not setting up parents to fail; we are giving them what they need to succeed.
This government recognises simply enacting legislation will not achieve our goals of reducing youth crime, stopping young criminals and removing the social factors that create them. That is why this legislation will be complemented by the introduction of a range of new support services. Most importantly, we will establish a dedicated specialist unit of officers who will case manage families whose children, through their poor behaviour, come to the attention of authorities. As the Chief Minister noted, this will not only be activated if a young person is arrested or charged with an offence, it could include children involved in repeated truancy or found out late at night with no excuse.
Authorised officers will enter into a family responsibility agreement with parents or care givers which will clearly set out the goals and requirements they must meet. In exchange, parents will receive the benefit of a dedicated case officer who will be able to link them into all available government support services, programs and resources. Requirements under an agreement will be matched to the problems in the parent’s lives that are contributing to their children’s behaviour. For example, an alcohol-dependent father may be required to attend a rehabilitation program, a mother who takes part in excessive gambling, taking her away from the family and wasting money, may need to attend gambling counselling once a week or refrain from entering a venue with gaming machines; or an agreement may contain something as simple as a requirement that the parent take their child to school each morning, or call the authorised officer if a child is not home by a specified time at night.
By giving these parents clear goals and proper support, they will be able to make a positive difference in their kids’ lives. However, if they refuse to do everything they reasonably can to get their kid back on track, they will face fines, community work orders perhaps working alongside their own children, and loss of non-essential household items. At the end of the road, there needs to be a form of compulsion everyone can understand. No one wants to pay a hefty fine or lose non-essential household items; no one wants to spend the weekend doing community service.
Madam Speaker, there has been some comment in the media over the last week about people who are impoverished, people who are not well off, that they are being penalised, either by fines or by the confiscation of non-essential household items. It was said during one media interview I heard with a child physiologist that being poor or of little means is no excuse, or it does not absolve you from your parenting responsibilities. Parenting responsibilities are something we all must live up to, so being poor does not absolve people from those responsibilities. Some people I have known through my life have not had very much means at all, but I have seen that their kids are fantastic kids and fantastic citizens compared to people who might be a bit more affluent and spoil their kids. This is not about poverty. This is about supporting those who need support and getting those kids back on track.
However, despite everyone’s best efforts, some young hoodlums will continue to try to capture a pathetic amount of notoriety by smashing lights and windows, hassling hard-working, late night staff and assaulting innocent passers-by. Under current laws, they think they can get away with it again and again. Some kids have attended diversion programs a dozen times or more, and whether they complete the course or not, they are back on the streets causing havoc. Well, no longer, Madam Speaker. The revolving door of diversion stops now. Now they will know that a line is being drawn.
Juvenile diversion will no longer be an option. They get to experience it time and time again. If juvenile diversion programs have not turned you around in two attempts, you lose your right to go there again. You will go to court and be prosecuted. The court has a range of options available in sentencing young offenders including good behaviour bonds, community work orders and, ultimately, detention.
Under the government’s Youth Justice Plan, courts will get another option: youth camps. The government’s youth camp initiative, both in Central Australia and Top End regions, will provide kids with the structure, self-development tools and support they need to break free from destructive or criminal behaviour. I put on the record here today, in terms of youth camps; this is an option that government has been considering for some time. In Central Australia, there has been consultation regarding the establishment of youth camps.
However, what we needed was a centrepiece of our strategy which is the legislation which is being presented in parliament tomorrow and will be debated. The legislation around family responsibility and juvenile diversion is the centrepiece. The camps are an integral part of that. It was important to establish the legislation, to get all the points of the legislation right before announcements were made about youth camps.
The Chief Minister set out in some detail the facilities where these camp programs will operate; I will not go through them again here. I thank the owners and operators of the Hamilton Downs, Balunu and Brahminy Foundations for their partnership in this exciting project.
Also, I want to make it very clear that the camps are not designed to punish or terrorise children into compliance. They will not try to break kids down and rebuild them in the way that some overseas systems operate. Instead, our camp program will act as a circuit breaker; a chance to get kids out of the spiral of crime, drugs and alcohol, and in some cases, a poor home environment. It will give them some clean air and some free space to think, to reconnect with who they are and who they want to be.
Most importantly, the youth camp program currently being implemented in Alice Springs regions and developed for the Top End will not just leave young people to sink or swim once they complete their time at the camp. They will be intensively case managed and supported through flexible learning and living arrangements so that they do not fall back into their old habits and with their old cohorts.
Some organisations and individuals may accuse the government of pushing these new policies into effect too rapidly. I strongly disagree. The Chief Minister’s statement today makes it very clear that we will not delay; it is time to act before the problem escalates even further. The community wants solid workable policies implemented now. This package goes to the heart of youth crime and attacks the factors that create young criminals. It gives parents the tools to help their kids before it is too late. It also hits the hardcore minority where it hurts. They will be stripped of their revolving door of diversion, their free ride and their followers.
The Northern Territory is a place of fantastic opportunity. We have full employment, there is so much sport for young people to play, and there are so many things to do. What we want to see is young people engaged in the community, making something of their lives, and to see parents supporting them to do that.
Madam Speaker, I commend the Chief Minister’s statement to the House.
Members: Hear, hear!
Mr MILLS (Opposition Leader): Madam Speaker, as I said in the media, when I heard that the government was choosing to go down this path, I marked that as a very satisfying moment: that there is now the will demonstrated by the government to approach the matter of juvenile crime, in particular, in this manner. Members opposite will know that this has been an area of interest that I have held even before coming into parliament. I find it a satisfying response, and on the face of it, it has support.
There is one line in the statement that refers to it being a coordinated and articulated response. I would concur that the entire package seems to be well thought out. It seems to articulate quite well, and it has all of its bases covered. There is even the injection of new language from the new Chief Minister to bolster the intent that is being demonstrated by government.
I am not a cynical person. Others are, however, and they will quickly recall other similar tough measures that have been presented to the Territory community at different times, usually not too far out from an election, which demonstrates this new extraordinary resolve of government that impresses them and they are able to back up that message with a fairly well coordinated, sophisticated communication strategy so it strikes deep into the heart of the electorate: they know that this government means business because the glossy brochure said so.
However, what we have as a reality, an honest fact, is that there have been other similar announcements and similar resolve shown. The anti-gang legislation was breathlessly described as ‘new tough measures’. There was a raft of new tough measures communicated to the community and those new tough measures impressed the electorate, but did not cause the Caz Boyz to think twice about their actions, or any other stone thrower or thug in the community who has little respect for the standards and values that good families hold.
There have been other alterations of existing laws, widening and enlarging, promotion and broadcast of new tough measures. Most recently, with the assault of a bus driver there was the creation of a new provision which, in fact, was an enlargement of an existing provision. This demonstrated that, at its essence, the existing law had failed and we are going to widen it. In its essence it was not applied. That is where the rubber is going to hit the road. I am very concerned that for those who hold the cynical view, that the description of this package, which is very well described - it looks good on paper - does not have the necessary values set to drive it all the way through. The real enemy here is not the necessity for a new program. It is the necessity to deal with this notion of victim-hood: that if we have the bureaucrat or the practitioner operating this new template and they still deliver it in terms of ‘do not worry, you are not ultimately responsible, the system is responsible and we are going to spend a lot of money to fix the system up’. You exempt that individual from responsibility. You do not drive that message home to the individual and their family. If that message is ambiguous, the whole system will fail.
I was pleased to hear the Attorney-General depart from his notes. I believe you are sincere in that it is nothing to do with your means, your background, or anything like that. It is : ‘if you have painted graffiti on a wall, I do not care what excuses you may give, you painted graffiti on a wall and it must be dealt with, as it is wrong. I do not care what your background is’. I like that kind of language and I think you mean it.
I am concerned that there has been extensive polling. We all know that polling is going on. We are not involved in that; I wonder who is. You are generating this view of the electorate, and what the electorate is really concerned about. Okay, you run through it like a marketing exercise; strategic planning it is called. The objective is to stay in power, so you find out what the community is really concerned about and you craft something that looks pretty flash. You communicate that through your electorate, ‘Hey, they have heard us, we are concerned’ and then you implement it.
If you are going to implement a program, it is not necessarily the policy itself. It is the basis upon which that policy rests; the philosophical base. What is the core of this? What are you really trying to achieve other than to maintain your hold on power with your 19 seats? At the last election we had a very strong measure articulated, the result of focus groups, that there was concern about drunks and itinerants. So you had new tough measures that impressed the person sitting at the bar having a drink and other people at barbecues, but once you were delivered to power you then softened them.
Now, do you have the necessary resolve to drive this all the way through? That is going to be the question and because of my background, my passionate interest in this area, my extensive lobbying and work in the community on this matter, I am not going to let it go. I want to hold you to account to ensure that you deliver what the community expects you will deliver.
I predict it will be a challenge to implement what has been described. For example, there is a measure already available – in fact, a number of them, and we can go into those in detail at a later stage. Measures are already in existence that even the former opposition Education spokesman, when Labor was in opposition, was concerned about; that was using the Education Act to fine a parent for not sending their kids to school. I went through the transcript of Estimates and there was former minister Toyne - and my thoughts to him and his family at the moment – describing his concern that this measure that was in the act had not been used to impose a penalty upon a parent. I think it is $200. Then Labor came to office. That same measure is there, able to be applied at any time and there is the same answer to the same question: how many times has that been used? None, never been used.
If the resolve is now there, I would expect that the measures that are already in existence – forget the marketing strategy and the promotion of a new tough approach; start using some of the measures you already have in place. Downplay the need to draw attention to yourselves and apply the measures that are already in place. Then, I think you will win, first, the confidence of the community, and second, some respect for the way in which power is administered and community leadership is delivered.
I have heard the phrase ‘doing the right thing’. That is what I am talking about: make sure you are doing the right thing for the right reasons; that you really mean it and are able to deliver these programs for the right reason, for the right purpose, and it is not the acquisition of power because we have seen you do that before. You have made many announcements that posture and present a tough image, but they are used largely for the purpose of acquiring and maintaining power.
I am listening carefully. That is why I waited for two of you to speak to hear what philosophy this rests upon and what value system this sits upon. I want to hear a more rigorous description of that notion of personal responsibility. I acknowledge that the Attorney-General made reference to that in a way which I really believe he meant. There is a distinct difference in the way we approach youth intervention and intervention with the families - personal responsibility. In order to hold a person responsible for their actions, there needs to be clearly defined standards.
That starts in the classroom. There needs to be a clearly defined standard set through our curriculum. This model here will not change unless we see a change in the way we deliver our curriculum, deal with truants, and respond to a child who is exhibiting all the signs of being at risk. You start to see that in about Year 3 or 4. You need the capacity to respond then. I urge you to consider the frame of the curriculum, the resourcing available to schools, particularly the primary schools, and the capacity to identify young people who are at risk. You can see the signs in the family at Year 3 and 4 - even earlier in same cases - and you see it in the student. The capacity to intervene then would save much more later on.
There have been a few comments made about the camps. I have researched a number of these camps, both interstate and overseas, and described what I believe is the right framework for these programs. There have already been comments made and it is part of the turf wars in this. They will say I am talking about boot camps, and boot camps seem to conjure up ideas of kids marching around and being brutalised. Members who are sincere about putting in proper programs will see that there is a whole range of programs available. Other jurisdictions have ranges of different programs. The Balunu Foundation, I think, fits a spectrum of response beautifully. Brahminy fits another sector well.
There is a place for the tougher approach, which some people call boot camp. I am not in favour of the term ‘boot camp’, but it has been used because it helps some people to understand what sort of action we are talking about. It is a broad approach that can go from the more rigorous approach that you might have seen in the brat camp-type programs applied in the Australian context all the way through to Brahminy, and then you have leadership development courses. It does not have to be punitive, but it is the way in which this whole range of programs can be delivered, and I am listening for more detail on the framework and the principles on which these programs would be delivered.
The key to all this, and I hope we will have the Treasurer speak, is to describe where the money is coming from to fund this program. Is it new money? Is it money being taken, perhaps, from other agencies, other sectors and other programs and applied in this new way? Will there be a resolve to deal with the world view that has society as the problem, we are all victims, particularly these poor kids are victims and their families are victims, and we just spend as much money as we can in a benign sense and a hope that by spending money on society we will end up fixing the problem. I do not subscribe to that view.
There is an element of compassion that is required to intervene in families that are in difficulty, but you must preserve the standard, the value, that the majority of our community holds as valuable. You start that in the education system, you see it echoed through the programs you deliver so that people are left with no misunderstanding that you mean business for very good reasons. You are defending standards, you are defending principles, and there are times that you will be required to be tough. There will be many in the community who will rail against this if it is properly implemented. If it is implemented in a manner which still gives a lot of nourishment to the notion of victim-hood, you will not get, say, the left wing, the do-gooders, screaming too much. They will just be asking for more money.
However, if you go down this path and you tread across that line of saying: ‘No, we mean business’, we are calling for people to be personally responsible for their actions. No ifs, no buts: ‘We do not care about your background or the excuses that you may bring to bear. We can deal with those later at another stage. We are dealing with the fact that you throw stones at cars, or that you repeatedly fail to turn up to school and show contempt for the school system’. We will deal with that, and then the other issues we can deal with later, but the action is dealt with in isolation. You chose to do something you should not have done, and the full weight of the law will be brought to bear on that person and their family. Then the other extenuating circumstances are dealt with separately. One does not feed the other: ‘I do not care about your background; you have done the wrong thing’.
Our community needs that kind of resolve. I hope that comes through the implementation of this. I hope it is more than a response to an obvious community need. For seven years, this government has made announcements of this nature that impress people because people need these problems responded to. You are in the driver’s seat; you must provide the leadership and the courage to implement this in the manner in which the community expects. There will be some opposition if you implement it properly. Do you have the courage to push through the opposition from those people who view the world entirely differently and think that everyone is a victim of circumstance and that we must do the best we can to deal with that problem first? You deal with that problem second in my view. I have a different approach, that being that the individual is responsible, the family unit is responsible, you strengthen that, and then you deal with the other matters. There must be a consequence.
I will finish the way I started. The look of this, the description of it, the language that is used, gives me cause for hope. I am satisfied that government has shown the resolve to depart from their inaction of the past and go down this path. I am aware that there is polling going on at the moment. I am aware that there is an election in the wind. I am aware that there are plans on the side of government to get ready for the election. I hope this is not that. I hope this is the real deal because the community needs this kind of leadership.
Debate suspended.
Ms LAWRIE (Leader of Government Business): Madam Speaker, I move that leave of absence be granted for two sitting days for the members for Arafura and Stuart. They are attending federal parliament at the invitation of the Prime Minister.
The Chief Minister will take questions on Indigenous Policy and Education, Employment and Training. I will take questions on Family and Community Services, Women’s Policy and Arts and Museums.
Motion agreed to.
Mr MILLS (Opposition Leader): Madam Speaker, I table a paper outlining the new opposition office holders:
Member for Blain, Terry Mills: Leader of the Opposition
MOTION
Note statement - Youth Justice Strategy
Continued from earlier this day.
Ms LAWRIE (Treasurer): Madam Speaker, I congratulate the Chief Minister on his statement on our Youth Justice Strategy. There is probably no greater issue confronting Territorians than dealing with youth crime. In providing both the carrot and the stick – the tough love approach in tacking youth - there is no excuse for youth crime. Youth who think that they can commit crimes and get away with it will feel the full force of the law come down on them. There are very important elements in the Youth Justice Strategy in regards to that.
In tackling the causes of youth antisocial behaviour and family dysfunction, we will also be looking to assist vulnerable young people by identifying at risk behaviour earlier. The Youth Justice Strategy provides assistance, support and, as a last resort, enforcement of the responsibilities of young people and the family responsibilities through legislation, those family orders, but also the enforcement of family orders if required.
It imposes tough treatment on the small minority of young people who are involved in serious or escalating offences. The amendments to the Youth Justice Act provide that the revolving door of our diversion programs will no longer be an option for serial juvenile offenders. This is a very welcome move. In travelling across the Territory, and having formerly held the portfolio responsibility of Family and Community Services, I know this is an area of concern whether you are in Alice Springs, Darwin or in a regional town such as Tennant Creek or Katherine, or in a remote community. Members of the community have been looking for a way to crack down on those serial offenders who are thumbing their noses at our society and particularly the law.
The system will provide appropriate options, such as warnings, youth justice conferences, and diversion programs. All of these play an important role in getting many young offenders back on track and away from crime. We will focus on that small group of serial offenders, those who treat juvenile diversion and the opportunities of juvenile diversion as something of a joke. Well, it will be no laughing matter in the future. There will be some very harsh options considered by the courts for those who want to continue to re-offend. As a former Minister for Family and Community Services, and as the member for Karama, I welcome these initiatives and these changes.
Serial offenders will be dealt with by the Youth Justice Court and ultimately they will face incarceration. The family orders, the element of the new legislation which will be introduced during these sittings, provide for those family responsibility agreements which are important in the sense of case management and mediation processes, but, ultimately with the sanctions of orders. They will be focused on parents with a child or, in some cases children, who are repeatedly absent from school or in public places late at night or who participate in antisocial or unacceptable criminal behaviour.
I believe the two step approach to engaging parents is a fair and reasonable approach. It is a tough approach. It allows for authorised officers from the Department of Employment, Education and Training, Justice, Police, and Health and Community Services to refer cases of children who are repeatedly truant, or in our public places late at night, or demonstrating antisocial or criminal behaviour to a specialist service which will enter into a family responsibility agreement with identified parents on behalf of that government agency.
Family responsibility agreements will be a written contractual agreement. They will be an arrangement that will provide that the parent will, in exchange for agreeing to certain requirements, receive assistance from a dedicated officer to access government and non-government support services. These agreements can be entered into on a voluntary basis and can run for six months with a capacity to extend. Agreements may be entered into with the parents of children who have not yet turned 18 years. The agreements could include that the parent attend parent guidance counselling, a parenting support group, or other relevant personal development course or rehab program which is critically important in looking at the catchment of parents we are referring to in these circumstances. We know many of them have drug and alcohol abuse issues. I believe the requirement of entering into a rehab program is a practical way of addressing these family agreements.
They will ensure that the parent agrees to ensure that the child attends school - this is fundamentally important for the child’s future; that the parent ensures that the child is home by a certain time – a curfew, if you like; or ensures that the child avoids contact with a particular person or a place.
In exchange for agreeing to meet such conditions, the parent will have access to a dedicated officer who will assist the parent to access important government and non-government services. The officer will provide the parent with reasonable assistance necessary to help them comply with the agreement. We will not be setting people up to fail and walking away; there will be dedicated services funded and resourced by this government to support the family agreements and the families who are bound to those agreements.
If a parent refuses to either enter into an agreement or comply with an agreement, an agency may seek a family responsibility order from the court through the Chief Executive Officer of that agency. It is a very high-level delegation. Orders must be based on reasonable grounds. The order will largely mirror the conditions contained in the agreement, but with greater emphasis on conditions assisting the parents to address aspects of their own behaviour that are preventing them from taking responsibility for the care of their child. As I said, it could compel a parent to attend drug or alcohol rehabilitation, or anger management programs, or a targeted parenting program. An order may provide for the provision of in-home support if considered appropriate in the circumstances. Orders can be in force for up to 12 months unless earlier revoked.
Family agreements and orders will apply to any guardian of a child rather than limiting the scheme to parents only because, as we know through practical experience, many of these children who are in the at-risk category or committing antisocial behaviour are not living with parents; they often find themselves in circumstances where they are living with extended family and guardians.
A central body will be established to monitor these agreements and orders. There are penalties of up to $2000 for parents who breach the orders - the carrot and the stick.
In Darwin and Alice Springs, youth hubs will be established to provide a link to family and youth case management. I believe this is a very critical element of the Youth Justice Strategy. Outreach workers will also be able to bring young people to these youth hubs with the consent of the individual. The youth hubs will be staffed by a coordinator and other staff sufficient to meet the needs and hours of the operation. There will be a strong link with the court, the youth, and the family service system to ensure that bail conditions are met.
I have had the opportunity for quite some years now to engage with the youth sector. I can appreciate the importance of these youth hubs in being able to provide a link between the youth who is case managed and a variety of youth services funded by the government. We provide funding in the order of $4.8m for youth programs across Alice Springs and $2.3m across the Top End. We have a raft of non-government organisations receiving this funding to run programs that are critical to working with youth. The youth hubs will be an ideal way of ensuring there is a much greater coordinated approach to their work.
Another important element of the initiatives in the statement is to do with youth camps. I am pleased that the work done for some time now by government behind the scenes to identify appropriate youth camp opportunities in the Top End and Central Australia will be delivered. The youth camps will provide a residential setting where services that tackle antisocial behaviour by young people in the Territory will be delivered. The government will use existing facilities at Hamilton Downs Station near Alice Springs to run a new youth camp. The facility has in place dormitories which can accommodate up to 65 young people, kitchen facilities, toilets and water supply. The youth camp will get kids away from the cycle of crime by spending time at Hamilton Downs for intensive skills and development programs. Young people at the facility will be required to complete education and skills training programs to help them make a positive contribution on their return to the community.
As announced yesterday, the government will be funding the Balunu Foundation at Talc Head. I have had occasion to meet with the Balunu Foundation. They are fairly young in terms of their time as a foundation but I have great confidence in their commitment and passion in running appropriate youth camps at that facility at Talc Head. The Brahminy Foundation at Batchelor has a sound track record in providing Top End kids an opportunity for a youth camp. These initiatives, delivered in a coordinated manner, will provide a balanced integrated approach to this Youth Justice Strategy.
Our key focus is to get young people back on track and to provide a hopeful future. There is a clear message here: antisocial behaviour will not be tolerated. This government will do its best to support and provide options for families to give the best opportunity for positive long-term outcomes.
Madam Speaker, I have every confidence in the Department of Family Community Services to pick up many of the operational aspects of the youth justice initiatives. They have the pre-existing relationships with the non-government youth service providers, they know where the programs exist and where the need for coordination can be pulled together under this Youth Justice Strategy.
I congratulate the Chief Minister for pursuing these initiatives. I know that the Justice minister has gone to a great deal of work with the Department of Justice to ensure that these initiatives can be delivered for government. I thank the Department of Family and Community Services and the Deputy Chief Minister for their commitment to deliver on a robust range of options to tackle antisocial behaviour by youths; deal with the diversion programs in their role within the youth service delivery system; introduce the options of the youth camps to get them away; to introduce challenging situations to those wayward youth; and, importantly, include education and skills training.
Madam Speaker, as the Chief Minister said, this is not a silver bullet solution. This is a range of initiatives pulling together and building on what we already have and what we already fund, with some $6m plus of government funding out into the non-government sector, which will have that strength and coordinated approach. Importantly, it will now have the legislative framework to back it up so that we provide the teeth within the court system to close the revolving door of the juvenile diversion that we have seen with those recidivous juveniles who seem to think that crime is a way of life. They will soon learn that in the Territory they will pay for their crimes. I commend the Chief Minister for his statement to the House.
Ms CARNEY (Araluen): Madam Speaker, it is a little difficult to know where to start with a statement like this so let us cut straight to the chase. For the most part it is intended to get headlines in a newspaper prior to the introduction of legislation. No doubt, the government will succeed in that objective.
I have listened carefully to the previous speakers and I have read the statement carefully. If this is not policy on the run, I do not know what is. How you people can look your fellow Territorians in the eye and say this is not policy on the run, I do not know. It beggars belief. This statement cobbled together - and I have done the work, I know where they are from - a bunch of ideas from all over the place, thrown in some stuff that the CLP has been talking about for some time, coming up with your puffery in a statement which will precede the introduction of legislation tomorrow.
When I heard from the Government Whip what the statement was going to be - I correct that, it might have been my office, my apologies. They called me and said this was going to be the statement. I went up to get it and it is a very thin statement. There is not a lot here. It is clearly intended for a headline.
Having said that, and subject to the detail in the legislation, the opposition is - as the Opposition Leader said - generally supportive of some of the measures to the extent that they are understood in a statement like this. We are generally supportive of them. Why? Because the opposition, together with many other Territorians, has been telling this bunch of arrogant rabbits on the other side for three or four years that crime in our local communities is out of control. If you look at Alice Springs, for instance, that is one of the reasons why 500 people turned up to the Convention Centre when parliament sat in April last year. It was only a few months ago when the now Chief Minister had gangs roaming around in his electorate. I think the member for Karama had them in hers as well. As the Leader of the Opposition said, the Caz Boys are alive and well.
That takes us back to the much lauded anti-gang laws passed in October 2006. I am holding the then Attorney-General’s media release of that date. Mr Stirling said: ‘The provisions in the bill are aimed at giving the police the tools they need to prevent and deal with gang activity’. Well, they did not, did they, Madam Speaker? If memory serves me correctly, the bill was subsequently amended. In any event, gangs continued to roam around electorates in the Top End and in Central Australia.
I made an adjournment speech in February 2007 in which I said in relation to my own electorate, calling it ‘a relatively recent phenomenon’, that we had youth gangs in Alice Springs. We had tended not to have them in Alice Springs. Not so long ago I went to a meeting of 20 constituents who were telling me about a gang of youths, around 30 to 50 of them, walking down their street terrorising the residents. Yet, we have the government saying they are on to it and they have produced the anti-gang legislation. Well, it did not work.
Let us go back and see how else the government has failed. I noted with great interest, I think it is page 9 of the Chief Minister’s statement, that he does not say the word ‘curfew’. If I heard the Treasurer correctly, I think she mentioned the word ‘curfew’. What an interesting word. The CLP went to the 2005 election wanting a youth curfew and we argued the case eloquently and well. This government returned to power and did not and has not taken up the curfew idea. However, it went further. In about 2006, the Alice Springs Town Council, feeling very aggrieved that the government of the Northern Territory was ignoring them, came up with their own youth strategy. I will come back to the words ‘youth strategy’. The Alice Springs Town Council came up with their youth strategy and it called for a youth curfew. The now Treasurer was the relevant minister at the time and she said: ‘No, no, no. It is seriously un-Labor’, or words to that effect, ‘and in any event you do not have problems and therefore we are not having a youth curfew’. My, how the worm has turned. Obviously we will not know until we have seen the bill but one wonders whether there is going to be a version of a curfew contained in the legislation.
I saw the interview with John Lawrence on Stateline the other night and I have it in front of me. Government pleases itself when they do and when they do not quote representatives of the legal profession. Anyone who saw or heard that interview or has read the transcript will know that the Law Society seemed to be unenthusiastic and underwhelmed with government’s pronouncements so far when it comes to dealing with youth crime and youth justice issues. The government has pleased itself. It goes to the Law Society and Criminal Lawyers Association when it suits them, ignores them at other times. I suppose that is politics; that is certainly Labor politics.
I stress, and I have said it numerous times in this Chamber, that there is a quantum difference between the government spin - and this statement is part of it - and the details of the legislation. The government has seriously bad form on this particular issue. I can assure members that I will be looking very carefully at the legislation when I get it.
Having looked, as I did, at the Chief Minister’s relatively vague and relatively brief statement, there are some other matters that I would like to raise on the way through as it were. I note on the first page the Chief Minister refers to the vast majority of Territory families seeking a safe and decent place to bring up their kids, a safe and decent place for senior Territorians, and so on. Well, the opposition has been telling members of government for six years that the Territory is no longer safe and the government’s own crime statistics prove it. One need only look again at the example in Alice Springs. The former member for Greatorex and I repeatedly raised concerns about Alice Springs. Every time we did, not only were we howled down, but the government had the audacity to pump out obnoxious media releases saying we were talking down our town. That was not the thinking of over 500 people who turned up to parliament - and I know them and respect them more than members on the other side.
The Chief Minister talked about his integrated strategy for addressing this issue on page 2. We look forward to seeing the integrated strategy. We have seen the words ‘integrated strategy’ and when the government has its strategy, as it presumably will with other strategies, it will come in the form of a glossy brochure and it should be tabled in the parliament. In his response, if the Chief Minister has his strategy, perhaps he would be good enough to table it.
I note on page 3, the Chief Minister refers to his government’s already tough stance on crime, especially youth crime. That does beg the question: if the government is already tough, then why is it going to other measures? Perhaps it is not working. We have said this repeatedly to government and they have howled us down. Halfway down on page 3, the Chief Minister talks again about his government’s Youth Justice Strategy. I formally call for it. Where is the Youth Justice Strategy? It does not have to be in a glossy document; it might be on a few A4 pages, we will have the black and white version. Please, any version will do. You cannot get away with just calling it a Youth Justice Strategy. You should produce it and you should table a copy in reply or by no later than the end of this first week of parliamentary sittings.
The Chief Minister goes on to talk about the strategy. I ask: where is it? The Chief Minister refers to the Youth Justice Act. He announced last week that amendments were required to the Youth Justice Act. I remember when that one came in as well - August 2006 or thereabouts – and the government lauded the Youth Justice Act just as it did with the gang laws and said that this was going to be the answer, this was the way forward, and no one should question them. Any questioning was outrageous because government had the answer. Here we are, back again and those on the fifth floor have deemed it necessary to amend the act.
While we are talking about the Youth Justice Act, let us go for a legislative trip down memory lane. Section 133 of the Youth Justice Act, for all intents and purposes, replaced section 55A of the good old Juvenile Justice Act enacted, on the basis of my documents, 8 March 1997. Now, I have not been able to do a straight up cut and paste, but mark my words section 55A of the old Juvenile Justice Act and section 133 of the Youth Justice Act are remarkably similar. What are the similarities? The CLP government prescribed under the Juvenile Justice Act this concept called parental responsibility. Not a new phenomenon, not recently discovered by the Chief Minister and his scheming colleagues. This concept has been floating around in the Territory easily since 1997. Section 55A of the Juvenile Justice Act provided for a parent or parents of a juvenile to pay an amount towards the cost of detaining the juvenile in a detention centre. It went on to say that the amount should not exceed $100 per week for each week during which the juvenile was detained. Section 133 of Youth Justice Act - and I do not have a copy in front of me - is remarkably similar. The CLP brought in the concept of family responsibility; Labor in about 2006 with its Youth Justice Act, rehashed and redid the parental responsibility.
I ask this question, Madam Speaker: how many times has section 133 of the Youth Justice Act been invoked? In other words: how many parents have actually been pushed to pay the $100 per week for detention? My guess is none. The Youth Justice Act referred to the Fines Recovery Unit, something brought in by Labor in about 2002. I ask now: how many fines, pursuant to section 133 of the Youth Justice Act, have been recovered by the Fines Recovery Unit? My bet is none. I will flag now, because it is blindingly obvious to anyone with half a brain, that I will be pursuing this matter in Estimates. Those of you listening on the fifth floor please start looking at your records and get your departmental heads to have a look at it also. We are going to ask some serious questions about the Fines Recovery Unit and how many times section 133 has been invoked.
Why do we ask that question? Because the new Chief Minister, who bluffed his way into the job - and we all know he did …
Ms Lawrie: Did not!
Ms CARNEY: … who bluffed his way into the job - said he had the numbers when he did not. He bluffed his way into the job. He is duplicitous, Madam Speaker. He is coming in here trying to persuade his colleagues - who seem to be constantly persuaded by him – and his fellow Territorians that family responsibility is a great new thing discovered by the member for Wanguri. Well, it is not, and it has not.
We look forward to details in Estimates but, more specifically and more immediately, we look forward to seeing the exact nature of the legislation to be introduced by the Attorney-General tomorrow.
Let us talk about a couple of serious issues. One is police on the beat. This government has famously failed to live up to its own promise of delivering, within its imposed time frames, 200 extra police on the beat - and we all know how the Attorney-General’s language started to change. He started to squib and duck and weave because he knew he could not deliver them. We know that he has not delivered them and the police officers know that you have not delivered them.
However, I digress. Let us talk about police on the beat. The Chief Minister talked in his statement about all these young‘uns who are going to face incarceration and the cheeky little buggers are not going to be able to avail themselves of juvenile diversion any more. Well, we have to catch them first, do we not? We have to catch them! Now, let us find out how we might catch the young‘uns around the length and breadth of the Northern Territory. I am thinking police on the beat. I am thinking that police on the beat, the active use of the mobile police van - and we all know the stories about that in Katherine and Alice Springs, and Alice Springs in particular. All well and good for the footy, but you tell the 20 people in my electorate with whom I met only a few weeks ago and ask them whether they would be well served by the police van being at the end of their street so that the 30 thugs walking past their house night and day were not going to further persecute them - and persecuting them is exactly what this bunch of people are doing. In any event, I am very interested to see no reference to police on the beat.
I have about five minutes left so I will move on to a couple of other things. However, it is interesting, is it not, member for Greatorex, that you can say that these young‘uns are going to face incarceration; you have to catch them first. They are quicker than all of us put together. These are quick little people and we know them. We know who they are most of the time in our communities and, boy, do they run! Any government needs enough police on the beat, and you should deliver that before you start to try to get your headlines in the Northern Territory News.
There are other interesting references throughout the statement. For instance, on page 5, it refers to ‘a specialist service body’, ‘a specialist service body which will enter into a family responsibility agreement …’ etcetera. What, I ask, is a specialist service body? I am not sure if I have heard of that before. There is no elaboration in the statement. Then I see on page 7 in the statement that there is a reference to ‘a central body’. So we have a ‘specialist service body’ that does something. We have a ‘central body’ that does something else. We have a strategy that we have not seen that is spread over this very thin statement.
My point is that there is no detail here. It is a bunch of words strung together, presumably as a result of polling, presumably as a result of some local members on the other side being marginally more active than others, saying: ‘We have real problems in our electorates, our people, we need to do something’. This statement, however, seems to be more along the lines of being seen to be doing something rather than actually doing it. We wait for details in the bill tomorrow.
I note further there is a reference, on page 6, to ‘a dedicated officer’. I wonder if the dedicated officer works for the specialist service body that may somehow be related to the central body, which somehow does something to protect our fellow Territorians. These are the sort of things that we will be looking for when the bill finally hits the table.
I note also with interest, on page 5, that it says, ‘Agreements will be entered into on a voluntary basis and will run for up to 12 months’ - an agreement on a voluntary basis. It was interesting to read that an agreement was going to have to be voluntary, given all that preceded it in the statement and the public utterances of ministers once they had announced that they were going to try desperately to be seen to be doing something about youth crime. I am not sure that an agreement on a voluntary basis is necessarily the best way to go. What if the parents of recalcitrant young’uns say: ‘No, I am not signing it.’? Reading on through the statement there is a very vague reference to, and it is almost muttered, that there is this possibility that people might end up going to court. We want to see much more detail about that one.
Dr Burns: It will be in the legislation.
Ms CARNEY: You have to catch them. You have to come up with good laws. You have to enforce it. There is no point in saying any young’un who does something wrong goes to gaol for 1000 years. You need to come up with fair dinkum practical legislation. You failed when it came to your anti-gang bill. That is regarded as a laughing stock and I think even you mob would concede that. The Youth Justice Act is not all that it was cracked up to be.
We look forward very much - in fact, I am so excited I will barely be able to sleep tonight as I look forward to the legislation. So, bring it on, minister. We look forward to having a look at it.
Mr VATSKALIS (Business and Economic Development): Madam Speaker, I still think the member for Araluen is the better leader for the CLP. The fact that Rick Setter does not like her reinforces my opinion. Yes, you are the better leader for the CLP. It is good to see that you have a supporter, too. The member for Greatorex supports you. He is prepared to jump up to give you some more time. It is really good for you. However, it is very bad for the current leader as he could not even manage three votes as it was two and two.
It is interesting to see the dynamics of political parties. It is great that we have our differences but you have to tell the truth. She is a better leader for the CLP full stop. She is not the only one who believes it. Many on my side believe it too. She speaks well, she has passion. She does not take a trip to Taiwan at a critical time like a political campaign of a fellow member. She sticks by her friends and she works hard.
It is very interesting to hear her saying we have to catch them first, when we know the capture rate of criminals by the CLP under the mandatory sentencing was 10%. For every 10 crimes committed only one person would ever get caught. The reason for that was there were no police. And who said that? It was the police themselves. In my 2001 campaign in Casuarina, police would stop me in the streets and tell me there were no police on the streets and that was confirmed later when we had the review into law and order which said that the CLP had stopped recruiting police in 1994, making up their numbers, using police behind desks rather than on the streets. We invested time and money to put extra police on the beat.
I am not going to deny there are problems. There are problems not only in my electorate, not only in the Territory, not only in Australia, but all over the world. Our society has become more violent. Recently, the Police Commissioners in Victoria and Tasmania expressed the same opinion that our young people are becoming violent. I do not know the reason. Is it the fact that there are a number of television programs that show violence every night? Is it because people actually see wars in their living rooms during dinner time and become de-sensitised to human suffering? Is it the breakdown of families, or is it because we live in a society where everybody has rights but no one has obligations? We have problems and we have to address the problems.
I have worked very hard with the police and the community in my electorate and have visited Casuarina Police Station to seek solutions to problems caused by youth. It has been a hard and heartbreaking job. I see the impact of these youths on the social and the commercial life in my electorate every day. I have seen the effect on my friends and my friends’ businesses. I see the people who come to my office to complain about the youths roaming late at night. Bus drivers tell me that they have seen 6-years-old and 4-years-old kids out between 10 pm and midnight. I have heard from police that when they take these kids home, they are abused by the parents, the parents do not want to know the kids, the parents are either drunk or stoned and do not take any care of their children.
We have had enough. Enough is enough. The community has had enough. I, like many other people here, have had enough. It is time for action. Our government is prepared to take tough action to show these little creatures that they cannot act like that without being punished.
The Chief Minister is correct. The number of children and parents involved is a small minority – we know that. If you have a look at the juvenile court list on the web every morning, the same names appear time after time. These little kids go to many schools. I know that for a fact because some of them go to where my wife teaches and these kids are a small minority with the same names. It is a small minority who cause the majority of the problems. Unfortunately, they cause big problems in Darwin and in other areas of the Territory.
I said before that I feel some become more violent. Because of that violence, even though we are speaking of the minority of young people, the impact they are having on our community is increasingly felt. The attitude demonstrated by these young people is increasingly hostile and increasingly arrogant. This is very disturbing. I have been told many times that when these people commit an offence they brag that they are underage – they are under 14 years, or 13 years, or 12 years – and the police cannot do anything about it. The surprising thing I hear is the moment these people turn 16 or 16 and they realise that if they are caught they have to go to court, all of a sudden the criminal activity stops. Unfortunately, some of them become indoctrinators for the younger kids.
There has always been a tolerated level of exuberance of youth. We have all been young and we have all yahooed around. We have all done things we should not have done but we tolerate it because sometimes it is a fine point from exuberance to committing a crime. All too often today the exuberance is labelled violence and the targets more and more indiscriminate. It is this change in behaviour which is raising levels of genuine fear in the community, and also the fact that many of these young kids somehow access alcohol, and alcohol and youth is a very dangerous mix.
I am pleased that the Chief Minister has announced how we are going to get to the nub of this issue. The limits placed on diversion are strongly welcomed. The idea of diversion was to ensure, where possible, young people do not get caught in the criminal justice system without having an opportunity to change their ways through alternative programs.
I remember mandatory sentencing under the CLP. I recall the article in the newspaper where a father gave a report to the newspaper; his young son got involved with some kids. They broke into Toy World, stole some toys and his son came home and admitted what he had done. The father approached the shop and was prepared to pay all the damage his son had done. Because the police were involved, his son was arrested and he had to be sent to gaol under the mandatory legislation. That kid probably never committed, and will never commit another offence, but because he was trapped in the mandatory sentencing of the CLP he had to go to gaol. We remember that there was a big hoo-hah at that time as the Commonwealth government was very unhappy with the CLP mandatory sentencing regime and they were threatening to intervene to wipe out the legislation. Under duress, the CLP agreed to introduce diversionary programs. They actually advocated the diversionary programs before mandatory sentencing so they would not have that legislation overturned by the then federal Liberal government.
Diversion programs work sometimes. Some kids go to diversion programs and afterwards they never cause any problem. For some other young people, this process leads to an increased contempt for the law as they become untouchable, they can do one, two, three, or 10 diversionary programs and they do not change. Have a look at the juvenile court list again. It is very interesting to go on the Internet to the Darwin Juvenile Court and you will see the same kids - and I have seen the same name appearing five, six, seven, 10 times, day after day on the court list. Sometimes they go out with bail constantly. I welcome any introduction of legislation to limit the number of times people can get bail when they continuously commit crime.
The measures announced today say to these young people that you are not untouchable, you are on notice. For those failing to reform after diversionary programs there is the criminal justice system, including incarceration, which is fair enough. Two chances and then you are in. Evidence shows that diversion works with those young people who fall foul of the law once and were most likely to return to mainstream. However, I am less convinced about those young people for whom breaking the law and antisocial behaviour has become a way of life. It is this group of young people that the Chief Minister has targeted by putting a limit on the opportunities they receive for diversion and he has my wholehearted support.
As I said before, we live in a society where every man has got rights but no one seems to have responsibilities and for that reason I am supportive of the intention to make parents more responsible for the actions of their children. I am a parent, I have two sons, and it is not easy to bring up children these days. There are many temptations out there and sometimes you have to govern them wearing a velvet glove on an iron fist. Sometimes they do not like it, sometimes we have to make tough decisions, but this is the way to bring up children. Often we have these people, the bleeding hearts, who say you cannot punish your children, but there are different ways of punishing them. I am not advocating hitting a child with a whip, but removing the television for a few days or the computer can be a form of punishment. They can then realise what is right from wrong.
On the other hand, I know very well that poverty and disadvantage is not an excuse. Not many of us have grown up in a rich family. Most of us probably came from working class families who were probably not well off. They were struggling and working very hard. My family was very poor when I was growing up. We did not have the luxuries that kids have today. We did not have even the quality of food that we eat today. That was not an excuse for me to go off the rails and it is not an excuse for anybody to go off the rails. Sometimes poverty and disadvantage make people stronger. Often, many of the kids who are today yahooing down the streets and causing all the problems are kids with very good families in Darwin, the Territory and Australia.
There are parents who want to continue to party, get drunk, get stoned and live a lifestyle with no responsibility for their children. These are the parents who abuse the police when they return their children at 2 am. These are the parents who, when the kids go away, do not check where the kids are, where they have been, and what they have done during the day or the night. They are increasingly selfish and uncaring.
The government has said enough is enough. It is your responsibility. You are the parent, and you have to take responsibility for your children and their behaviour. If you are not willing to fulfil these responsibilities, there will be consequences. Parents must be and should be held responsible. We recognise circumstances where people are not capable of fulfilling those roles without better preparation than they have had. I have people coming to my office telling me about their children running off, living a life that they do not approve of, children as young as 14 years old getting drunk or smoking or having sex. We can do the best in our life for our children, but sometimes we cannot succeed and we need outside help.
Our government is prepared to help these parents who go off the rails. We will be able to link them to effective parenting support programs. Essentially, the Chief Minister is saying if you make an honest attempt to get the lifestyle of your child under control the government will make an effort to help you through. If you thumb your nose at society, your neighbours, your friends and your community we will come down on you like a ton of bricks. The provision of voluntary contracts or a compulsory order means that the authorities will have an option of how best to deal with the family involved. In some cases, a corporate approach works; in other cases, the limits must be set with a punishable response for failure. The family is the core of our society; it will be supported strongly by our government. However, where families shrink from their own responsibilities and leave it to others to pick up the pieces, they will be made to bear the consequences of their actions.
The announcements regarding youth camps here and in Alice Springs are also welcomed. I have believed for some time that reintroducing youth camps was the way to go. However, the necessary preparation work has to be done. The Wildman River youth camp experience has already been touted as a model. I am aware there were significant issues with this model; in particular the failure to properly identify ways of ensuring that young people who went through their programs connected to a meaningful role once they returned to society.
I was very interested to hear the CLP touting the youth camps when it was the CLP that closed down the Wildman River youth camp. Members do not think that this new camp will be the revolving door that has happened in the past. Unlike previous experience, this camp will be tied to a youth hub and to services to ensure that what occurs at these camps is individually aimed at lifting that child out of the mire and setting them back on a useful lifestyle. I do not want to see a camp that will be a holiday camp. I do not want to see a camp that is airconditioned with three meals a day, a soft bed for the night, television blaring all day, and a gym. What I want to see is a camp that kids will go to that will not have the luxury of television. They will be able to undertake accelerated leadership programs because many of these kids skip school and do not learn to read and write. They will be able to learn a trade.
I cannot understand why we have to build a luxury camp out in the bush when we can teach these kids to build some of the essential infrastructure such as fences, roads, and toilets, and when they come out of this camp, first of all they will be tired, and second, they can start learning a trade. I do not want them to have television and a gym as a reward. Gyms should be out of the question; it costs too much anyway. These kids should learn to be involved in team activities, playing sports like basketball, football or soccer. All these sports can continue after coming out of this camp.
This announcement will mean more options for police and the courts, and great peace of mind for the public. It will also be a diversion from crime for these kids who went off the rails, made a mistake, and they will never do it again. It also shows the kids that if you stuff up twice, the third strike and your out. This announcement has my wholehearted support and I will be spreading this information through my electorate as soon as possible. I believe it will be well received by people of the Territory. It will be well received by the people in my electorate of Casuarina and, over time, we will see significant reduction in youth crime and antisocial behaviour as a result of these policies.
Madam Speaker, we have to make a stand, and we are prepared to do that. We are prepared to tell kids enough is enough, three strikes and you are out. We are also prepared to tell their parents that it is their responsibility; the community does not have to pay for their failures. If they cannot look after their kids, we will ensure that either the kids or parents are punished in one way or another. However, if they make an effort, our government is prepared to help them.
Mrs BRAHAM (Braitling): Madam Speaker, I am pleased with the minister’s statement today. I hope he follows through with what he is promising; that it actually happens because there is concern out there in the neighbourhood. We have to have a multipronged approach to handling children and these young teenagers who go off the rails. Therefore, I support many of the things the Chief Minister has said in his statement.
I would like for people to get away from the terminology ‘boot camp’. That is not what I have in mind at all and it conjures up an image of something that is punitive. Some of the concerns I have had are for juveniles who have not broken the law in any way. They are on that slippery slope and they are very likely to; they are running with the wrong lot. Quite often, if you can grab them, then perhaps you will save them.
There have been a couple of cases in Alice Springs where parents have asked: ‘Do you know of any program I can enrol my teenage son into? I cannot control him anymore. I need to break the cycle, break the gang he is with, and put him on the straight and narrow’. To be honest, we looked at many options. However, the final answer for those parents in the few cases that I had was they left town - they took their teenager away to set up home somewhere else so that they would get them away from that environment. That was probably a good thing, but a bit hard on the parents who had their careers and they had to leave those behind. It is important that there are a number of options for young teenagers who are on the slippery slope. To be honest, the diversionary programs I have come across in Alice Springs have not been a deterrent, and that is what we are talking about.
I have seen the requirements some of our juveniles who have broken into businesses have signed, you know, these are things that we agree to do. One might be to write a letter of apology to the business person, but the business person said that they had never seen it. One of them may be that they will go to school every day, but you often see them out on the streets, and you wonder who is following up. It is an enormous task if you are asking police and the diversionary unit to follow up on all these diversionary contracts that they have. I do not want to waste police resources doing that when there are probably more important things for them to do.
I was pleased to meet with Tony Kelly, the consultant in Alice Springs, who came to look at various ways we could address the problems in Alice Springs. I support the Chief Minister talking about a location at Hamilton Downs. Hamilton Downs has been there for some time. It is run by the Hamilton Downs Youth Camp Committee. It is owned by the Miller family and leased to the committee. I ask the Chief Minister if he has consulted with the owners of the property because part of their lease states that they need to approve whatever is going on there. I hope that that has been done. I would not like to raise the hopes of people in Alice Springs who are going to have something at Hamilton Downs on a short-term basis if there has not been the proper consultation with the owners of the property, and that is Andy Miller. It has been well used for a number of years with different groups.
I know there was a group from the Alice Springs High School who went out there last year. While they were out there it was a camp. They put on a musical production for the kids, so that at the end of camp there was something they came away with. We have seen good results from camps. We only have to look at what Barry Abbott does at Wallace Rockhole to know that he can look after young people with substance abuse problems and, at the end of the day, they can often walk away and be better citizens because of it.
Hamilton Downs seems to be the choice of government. It is already a purpose-built facility. It has many advantages in regards to location, and it is far enough out of town not to worry us. It has a proven record of catering for groups, and it has services such as power and water, telecommunications and accommodation. I believe it is an ideal place for it to be. However, when I discussed what would happen at Hamilton Downs with the consultant, as I said earlier, I do not see it as being a boot camp, nor do I see it as being a pastoral camp either. I believe that for any teenagers who go into such an establishment, before they go there has to be an assessment of their needs, and that the program is tailored to make them better when they leave, and then there is follow up back in the community. So it is not just a holiday camp, but something that is substantial and catering for that particular child. I would not like to see a combination of children who have offended and done something illegal with children who are just on the slippery slope about to offend. We need to keep those groups quite separate so there is no influence.
We need to address education. We need to look at these children, assess them and see where they are with literacy and numeracy. That could be one of the options whilst they are there; it could be an educational-type learning program, or that may be an option we make sure they have when they go back to town.
Kids always enjoy recreational activities, so it has to be the carrot and stick approach. Young teenagers also enjoy art and music so we can run a very good program catering for that. These days there is a real need for us to also make young people aware of the environment and it would be an opportunity for us to get them into understanding the environment, how they can care for it, upkeep and learn more about it.
The Minister for Business and Economic Development talked about not having television. Astrology is a wonderful thing in the Central Australia skies. It is absolutely …
Mr Wood: Astronomy.
Mrs BRAHAM: Astronomy. What did I say?
Mr Wood: Astrology.
Mrs BRAHAM: Well, we get both. There are beautiful clear skies out there and that is something I am sure they can do at night rather than watch television, as we have said.
We need skilled workers. We talked about the Pathways program in Alice Springs where young apprentices do both training and school work. Perhaps this is the time to introduce them to many of these skills that are needed. We should also provide them with a program on justice, on law and order. I am not quite sure what goes on in the curriculum in schools today, but we need to focus on law and order, what is right and what is wrong, what are the rules of the community that we live under and this would be a good opportunity.
Obviously you would conduct health screening. Most importantly, you need counselling and management at the entry to the program and you need it at the exit of the program. It is no good sending kids out to have a good time and then forgetting them when they come back into town. It is not an easy task to set up the kind of camp that I would like to see. The consultant is returning to Alice Springs this month and I hope to catch up with him again.
Perhaps we need to get a reputable non-government organisation to run it with oversight by government agencies as well, and staff could be employed on a needs basis. Operation Flinders, which works very well in South Australia, has many volunteers who move in and assist with the running of the programs. I can see that there may be volunteers who would be willing to go out and teach skills, to get involved with these young people out on these camps.
I am pretty hopeful about Hamilton Downs as a place to take these students. Many of the schools already do bush camps and students usually respond in a pretty positive manner. They take on tasks and responsibility in an environment like that which perhaps they do not when they are at home and they do it with a great deal of pride and enjoyment. It is important that we break this cycle and the interference of their peers which often is wrong. The type of camp I would like to see should be rewarding and stimulating so they can feel free from peer pressure.
The bottom line is that although it is going to cost the government a lot of money to implement these programs, in the long run, if you balance the savings to the government from what they may have inherited from the justice system, it probably balances out. So spend a little money up-front and you may save a lot of money in the future. We also need to review what is going on at these particular facilities, but it is worthwhile that the government has decided to take on a program such as this in Central Australia. It is one place where we feel that diversionary programs are no longer an option for many of our young people; they have not worked in many cases and the victims of these crimes see them as a soft option, and that families should take a lot more responsibility, and young teenagers should take responsibility for the way they behave.
There is nothing better than seeing a young teenager take a different path. There are many times I have heard it said to a young teenager: ‘You have your choice. You have skills. You have leadership. Go down this path and you will end up in gaol. Use the skills you have, the talents you have, and you will be a great contributor to our community’.
I like the term ‘youth hub’. As I said do not like the term ‘boot camp’. It brings up images of something we do not want to push. When you look at some of the other programs around Australia, they do not use that image of being a punitive-type establishment. A ‘youth hub’ presents something that is going to be worthwhile in the end.
We already have some good programs in Alice Springs, and out in the bush, which have worked. I can see no reason why we cannot utilise some of those as well. There are many other ways the government should be re-enforcing what young people should do. One is truancy. I have spoken about truancy in this House. In Port Augusta in South Australia, and Kalgoorlie in Western Australia, you see signs in windows saying that there should not be any school-aged children in this shop during school time; if you do see someone, ring this number. We do not have truancy officers in the Education department anymore and I believe they had a role to play. They had a place within the system and they were able to follow up when anyone was reported.
We have liaison officers who have a different role altogether. We need to get children who are truant in public places during school hours taken back to school and the parents notified. I have to admit as a teacher many years ago that I did knock on doors and ask why a child was not at school. I think now and again you need that. You need to be able to say this is where you should be, get a move on, and if we get kids to school we can do something with them in the long run.
The parent responsibility repayment for the cost of the damage has been called for by many people for a long time. As the member for Araluen stated, we already have rules regarding that but the courts are seen to be slow in implementing it, saying that in many cases the parents may not be able to refund or repay the cost of the damage. Parent responsibility cannot just be financial. It can be in other ways as well and we should investigate and ensure parents realise their responsibilities. Most parents want to do the right thing. It is usually when the parents are dysfunctional that the kids are dysfunctional. If we can get parents who are dysfunctional, give them the means to get their lives together and to lead a better life, then perhaps we have some chance of managing the children.
I noticed that one of our mayoral candidates, and I thought this was rather amusing, suggested that the council or government, I am not sure which one, buy the Todd Tavern and turn it into a community hub. I would hate to think what sort of cost it would be to buy a pub or to buy back a licence. It seems a silly idea because we have a youth centre just up the road from this particular establishment that seems under utilised. There needs to be much more cooperation amongst the youth groups within town to utilise the facilities that we already have. I also notice that the Gap Youth Centre has been closed due to lack of funding and support. That is unfortunate because the previous Chief Minister promised that particular youth centre $300 000. I will be asking the question tomorrow about why was it closed and where did the promised money go. Why was it not funded and why was a youth centre which has been catering for young children from a disadvantaged area for many years forced to close down? It is a question well worth asking to find out what is going on there.
I suppose it is now a case of us ensuring that the government fulfils their promises; that they do what they have promised in their statement. I will support them; I believe that the way they are going is the right way to go forward. People out there on the streets have been saying for too long that kids are treating everything as though they do not care. Why do the kids have that attitude? It is probably because no one cares about them.
An interesting program I saw when I was overseas was Hug a Hoodie - these kids walk around with hoods on their faces. Instead of treating them in the way that we do, let us tell the kids that they are good kids. Most kids are good kids; they start off as good kids. Somewhere along the way, they might get messed up. However, Hug a Hoodie is not a bad program, and perhaps that is what our kids need - a little love, a little respect and a little teaching to get them on the right path.
Madam Speaker, I thank the minister for his statement. I will be keeping an eye on it to ensure that he delivers.
Mr WOOD (Nelson): Madam Speaker, I also welcome the minister’s statement. Year after year we have debated issues of youth crime and youth exploits. I have spoken about hoons. Hoons do not get much of a mention here, but is something that will get a mention - I can guarantee, minister - in these sittings. That is also antisocial behaviour; we need to put more emphasis on it.
In relation to what the Chief Minister put forward, no one is going to go crook at an attempt to try to fix something that we know is a problem. It is important to state that it is a problem of a minority of young people.
I helped organise some Australia Day celebrations at Howard Reserve in the Howard Springs area, and there were great young people out there. Anyone who has been to school assembly nights at the end of the year will see great young people achieving. You will see young people volunteering in the scouts, in the Red Cross, and in St John Ambulance. We should also make note that there are young people out there doing the right thing in their community, not being antisocial, but being pro-social - if you want to put it that way. We should remember those people and encourage them so that they are showing an example to the young people we are having problems with.
My understanding of what the minister is saying is that this deals with repeat offenders and that, in itself, raises a question. What the minister is saying is that after two diversionary orders, that will be it; they will be subject to the particular legislation that the government is presenting to this House soon. This legislation being put forward by the minister refers to people between 10 and 18 years, but I hazard a guess that between the ages of 15 and 18 years that you know what is right or wrong. You know that if you smash a window of a shop then that is wrong. You know that if you pinch something from somebody’s car then that is wrong.
I believe there should automatically be some form of punishment. I am not talking about mandatory gaol, as was a policy of the previous government. I have always believed in mandatory punishment instead of mandatory sentencing. That is, not necessarily incarcerating people but saying that they have done something wrong and to recognise that there is a penalty for doing the wrong thing, and they have to do some community orders such as mowing the lawn at the local park, or cleaning up the mess if they break a window. Either they or their parents have to pay. Perhaps they would be the better person and, if it takes 10 years to pay, so be it. However, there has to be some responsibility for things that are obviously wrong. I imagine that whilst diversionary programs certainly help young people that should not divert us from the requirement that when someone does something wrong they should also have to own up for it and pay for it in some way or other.
Be that as it may, the system as it is exists, and through the diversionary programs, and after that you are into the system which the government is putting forward today. It is not only for people who are getting into trouble. As the member for Braitling said, truancy and those sorts of things are also included in this legislation. The minister says there will be an agreement with the parents. After that agreement, if that is not working, you can come up with an order which will be set out by the court to try to force parents to some extent to do something about their children. This may also apply to guardians, grandparents, aunts or uncles.
When the minister announced this, I had great concerns that this was going to be a program which said, basically, if the parents of the children that are playing up do not do anything about what is happening, we will fine them, we will force them to do something about their children. It is pleasing that the minister has included in this process some help for those parents.
That is important, because we are dealing with human issues here. They are not clear cut and not every case is the same. There are parents who might try their best. These children might come from a very good background but that is not a 100% guarantee their children are going to end up model citizens. Those children could get mixed up with the wrong crowd. They could get involved with drugs and alcohol when their parents have no idea that it is happening. You could have cases where, basically, the parents have disowned the child; they just cannot handle them so they kicked them out of the house. Or the children have left home of their own accord and there is no way they are going to go back into that house, all the forcing you might like and those children are not going to go back there. Each case needs to be taken on its merits.
I notice also that, in his statement, the Chief Minister says that this may apply to guardians, grandparents, aunts or uncles. I am partly in that case. I cannot say that I am a guardian, but I am one of those with three grandchildren at home. My daughter is at home but, in many cases, it is my wife who looks after those kids. They come home from school, she does much of the washing, she gets to prepare meals for them and my daughter is still working. I am interested to know what the situation is there. Officially, I may not be a guardian, but we have control over those children from the point of view that they live at our house. Would we fall into this category? Would I be required to have an agreement if one of my grandchildren started to get into trouble? I am not sure where that would leave us in that situation. It would be an interesting aspect of what has been put forward to see whether agreements and orders would apply to grandparents and aunts and uncles. In many Aboriginal communities, a family is an extended family, so who would be responsible for this particular court order or agreement?
I can give you another case. I know that the Leader of Government Business was out on a bus the other day. I also did the same thing. I spoke to one of the bus inspectors and asked him which bus was the best to take if I wanted to see a bit of antisocial behaviour? I hopped on the No 4 from Darwin at 7 pm on a Friday night to Casuarina. That is the long way around; it goes up Dick Ward Drive and through Nightcliff and Casuarina. The bus trip on the way was not too bad - there was only one drunk. He was non-Aboriginal. He staggered on and staggered off and did not do much harm to anyone. There seemed to be more problems at the bus station.
I was talking to the bus driver at Casuarina and said who I was and why I was travelling on the bus. This full-blood Aboriginal person, probably about 16 years old, walked straight up to the bus, straight onto the bus - we were not taking passengers at that stage - and had a threatening look on his face. I must admit that if I was not standing next to the bus driver I probably would have moved away because I was not sure what his intent was. From a practical perspective, if you have people like this who have probably come from out of town and they are causing a problem, how do you get to their parents? If their parents are living in outback communities, how will these agreements and orders work for them? I am pretty sure that this bloke did not come from Darwin; his family is somewhere else, and it could be in a very remote community. I will be interested to see the application of what has been put forward in a practical sense in some of these remote communities.
Say you have a young bloke who has left home from one of these remote communities to come into town. He has been given a couple of diversionary orders. He is old enough to leave home but he is still under 18 years and then he commits his third offence, and they say: ‘Right, we are going to sue your parents’. How is that going to work in the case of an isolated community? It is just a practical consideration that needs looking at.
There are some other things that the government is doing in relation to this. They are talking about youth hubs which are a sort of safe house. The questions I ask the minister are: where will the money come from to fund these safe houses? Where will they be established? If you said one in Darwin and Alice Springs, what about one in Palmerston, maybe one in Humpty Doo, maybe one in Katherine. What is the process behind this? Will children who want a safe house, who do not have a place to sleep for the night, be allowed to bunk down for the night there or not? Or is it a place you just stay for a couple of hours and then get shifted out? In other words, is it a refuge or is it just a place that you can go and talk with a few mates and then you move on? There needs to be more clarification of what these youth hubs will be.
The minister mentions there are two forms of sentencing options. There is case management, which is important, and making sure that agencies work together. You do not want the police doing one thing and somebody else doing another thing. You need to ensure that we use our resources as best we can. Of course you have the youth camps and I have spoken about youth camps ad infinitum in this House.
Years ago I went to Wildman River when it was operating. I was most impressed by what it did. Of course, it cost a lot of money and there is no doubt that finances came into the calculation of whether the place should have been closed down. Then they upgraded Don Dale and to some extent they said that the people who used Wildman were not that many and part of that was also because of the diversionary programs. Wildman, to me, still had a good purpose and yet we now seem to have gone the full circle. We had the government close it down and give you all the reasons why we should close it down. Now we have said let’s have some youth camps. You have to wonder if there were problems closing the youth camp at Wildman River in the first place, what makes the circumstances different now to opening a new youth camp. That is not saying I do not support the youth camps. I am just saying the government had an agreement to shut down Wildman River at that stage in history, and at this stage of history it says it is going to open something that is not much different to Wildman River. Why? The government needs to give us reasons as to why they have changed their mind.
I have not been to Hamilton Downs, but perhaps during the longer break I will try to get there for a look. There should be far more of these youth camps. If you are going to break up gangs you cannot put them all in the one place. Otherwise you are just taking a gang out and it is still a gang where it is. You need to break up those places so these young fellows are not associating with their mates. They have a chance to have time out from the pressures of urban society which is important. I have said many times that one of the great things about sending people out bush is that it gives time for kids to think. There will no be radios and no computer games, there might be a little television, but basically they will not have those distractions which soak up a lot of young people’s lives when really they need to work, to learn, to have some discipline, and to have some quiet time in their lives as well.
I agree with the member for Braitling about kids having a hug. I remember going to Wildman River and speaking to some of the young people there. They were talking about how they would love to get back to their girlfriend. These were 14-, 15-, and 16-year-old kids, but there was an instant feeling that these kids had no one to love them. Perhaps that is a reflection on society and perhaps that is a reason to some extent why these kids are where they are.
There was a program I picked up on BBC2 the other night. It was in relation to a single mother with three children who had awful troubles looking after the boy in the family. He would gain her attention by eating, and she did not realise this. He would climb up cupboards, go to the neighbours, and he would just eat. He would eat the family out of house and home. They brought in a psychologist who filmed what was going on. She told the mother that what he was really doing was trying to seek attention. So she changed her way to work with this young fellow. He was only four. He would help around the kitchen and she would encourage him to help with the cooking. She would help him do some things like play doh or plasticine. She took time out with him. Eventually, it came out that she had not given that child a hug in four years. He was a boy looking for love from his mother.
So you do wonder whether some of the problems we have later on in life relate to some of the parenting issues that need addressing. Many of our young people who become parents do not have the parenting skills that are needed. Therefore, a lot of emphasis about today’s discussion should be placed on putting money into programs that can help young people or others becoming mothers and fathers for the first time learn how to be good parents. Watching that show raised a very important issue. We, as politicians, sometimes have that problem because we are not home for very much time at all. You can tend to lose sight of some of these more important things with your friends and family.
The other area I will quickly speak about is that although we are talking here about youths up to the age of 18 I think we must look further than that. There are many people in gaol whom I feel you would not necessarily class as full-time criminals; they have offended and they are paying the price. They might have belted someone up; they might have done something silly. They may go back to gaol again, they may not go back to gaol, but sometimes there is a waste of resources. It would be better for those people to be on work camps. I look at programs run on cattle stations, maybe in national parks where they have time to work and time to learn, where there is some sort of teaching program where their literacy and numeracy skills can be increased.
When I was in America, I visited two prisons. The big emphasis in Ohio was trying to bring prisoners up to a much better literacy and numeracy standard so when they left the prison they had a fair chance of getting a job, there was no need to get into crime. The same applies to the people who are in gaol today. I imagine with 80% of our gaols occupied by indigenous people that their level of literacy and numeracy is quite low. Though we have teaching facilities in these gaols we need a combination of getting these prisoners out of the concrete gaol into the bush, in an area that is familiar to them, where they can do things that they do well such as riding horses. Bill Fordham ran a program at King River some years ago for young people. What did they like the most? They liked stock work and I believe we need to be working in those areas.
I thank the Chief Minister for his statement. It can be broader in the sense that we should not just look at youth on its own. What happens when a youth gets to 19 years and is still in one of these gangs around Casuarina? Do we say: ‘Sorry, this does not apply to you’? The government might say: ‘You are too old and your parents are not responsible for you anymore’. That would depend on whether that person is still living at home. If they are still living at home maybe some of the matters the government is raising about agreements and orders might come into play.
Overall, I wish the government luck; that the program they are putting forward will work. I have heard many programs put forward before. We have anti-gang legislation. I believe there has been legislation passed in the south many years ago regarding the responsibility of parents where a child damages property. I do not think that law is used very often because of some technical issues in its implementation.
We need to be looking at the situation now and, in two years time we need to see what the situation is, and come back to this parliament and say: ‘This is the difference this legislation has made’. I would rather see the legislation scrapped if it does not work instead of it just making us feel good. This legislation can work if the government puts sufficient funds into it, because you have to have sufficient funds to make it work if there are the right people involved. I am interested to know if we have enough qualified people to help run these programs. Who is going to run all the new programs and youth hubs you are establishing? I hope you have the finances; that is all important.
Let us see after, say, two years what the state of affairs is, and ask the minister to report to see if there has been any improvement in juvenile offending. Then we can see where we go from there.
Mr CONLAN (Greatorex): Madam Deputy Speaker, this is a statement that has been covered quite well from this side of the House, so I will not take up too much of the House’s time. This government does not have a great track record in this area.
Once I got through the feel-good first or second page, and started to get into the gist of what this was all about, at page 11, the minister talked about a youth justice clinician. The question I have for the Chief Minister is: what is a youth justice court clinician? I would like to know what that is. We are flat out getting FACS workers into the Northern Territory, so how is a youth justice court clinician going to apply to this youth justice issue?
On page 3 of this statement, he said:
Already tough stance on crime?
Well, it could not get much worse. As I say, the government does not have a very good track record in this area. You must be kidding, Chief Minister, if you think you are tough on crime? In the seven years that you have been in office, crime has gone through the roof largely due to this government’s soft-on-crime approach.
Why has it taken so long to address this issue by this Northern Territory government? That is a pretty good question I would like the Chief Minister to answer. Surely it was not as a result of a gentle stroll through his electorate of Wanguri and reacting to public concerns about this? If he was reacting to public concerns on this issue I am sure he would have acted a lot sooner. It has something to do, as someone mentioned before, with Labor party polling. This Labor party knows that they are on the nose when it comes to this issue. We see this 14-page statement on youth justice issues as a way of placating that feeling across the Northern Territory.
Another question: has the Territory government finally realised that in the Northern Territory we do have a problem with youth crime? Have they finally woken up that we have a problem with youth crime in the Northern Territory; that these gangs of kids are wagging school, patrolling the streets looking for someone to harass at best, someone to attack, injure, rape and murder at worst? This is happening in the streets, make no mistake. They finally realised what the rest of the Territory has been saying for at least seven years while this government has been in office. Have they finally realised it? That the streets are full of violent young offenders and, as the member for Nelson said, violent adult offenders? It does not just stop at 18 years of age.
Nevertheless, if we are to believe that this government is serious about bringing antisocial behaviour and antisocial criminal behaviour under control through these measures outlined in this statement by the Chief Minister today, then go for it. Please do something. Show a commitment to the rest of the Northern Territory. Demonstrate that you are actually interested, and what a serious concern this is for families, for tourists, for business owners and the rest of the Northern Territory community. It is not hard. Last year, the member for Johnston said on radio in his guise as Police minister – he has since been sacked from that job for failing to execute his duties properly – that he did not think there was a problem with crime in Alice Springs. He categorically denied that there was a problem with crime on the streets in Alice Springs – this was only 12 months ago. In fact, talkback callers would ring him up and say: ‘Listen, I can’t walk down the mall, I do not feel safe’. He said: ‘I don’t believe you. You are telling me fibs’. Call after call he just batted away and completely dismissed their concerns.
One year on, where are we? One year on from that radio interview with the member for Johnston, a little under one year, in fact, where are we? We have seen a major protest in Alice Springs, with maybe 500 or 600 people …
A member: A thousand.
Mr CONLAN: Well, it felt like it, surely - 500 or 600 people outside their regional parliamentary sittings this past year in Alice Springs. We have seen two exposs on national television. One on Lateline, which prompted the federal government to start taking over areas that this government has completely failed on, plus another one on the Today Tonight program or something like that. So we have seen two exposs on national television; a damning report, the Little Children are Sacred report that this government failed to introduce, and then all of a sudden the federal government felt that they had to do something urgently. So they stormed in, they came into the Northern Territory. It is interesting that Kevin 07 has not decided to roll back anything on that at this stage, so clearly he feels that this federal intervention is necessary.
We have seen long-term residents forced to take to the streets in an attempt to curb street violence; we see ever increasing crime statistics, the latest one for Alice Springs is a 36% increase in crime in the town; we see general disrespect, humbugging and foul language. It is a massive sliding scale of failure by this government to address these issues. The will to improve our lifestyle and to show leadership has deserted the Northern Territory government.
We have seen what happens when this government wants to act, we have seen the results, and it is amazing what can be achieved in a very short space of time. Last year, as a result of that protest, as a result of those exposs on television, and as a result of letters in the newspaper and talkback callers, and just general unrest in the community, we have seen what happens. We have seen the mobilised troops, you might say; Operation City Safe was introduced last year; police establishment figures finally brought to establishment. Some would say that it is still not enough. We have seen the dry town legislation, and other measures introduced to address this problem.
Unlike the Top End, in Central Australia we have seasons. We have a winter time. It is no secret: anyone who lives in Central Australia will tell you that, come winter time, crime does drop. It is a simple fact that crime drops when the winter months hit.
A member: It is cold.
Mr CONLAN: Yes, it is cold, that is right. People hang around the fires and they stay inside. Come the warmer months, people start to wander the streets. It is no secret. Again, this government had the will to act. They did not take it upon their own – it was not their own initiative - they did it as a result of the public outcry about this government’s failure to address these situations. Just recently, we have seen what can happen with such public outcry with the member for Nelson and his campaign to save the Litchfield Shire. It is amazing. It cost the member for Barkly his job but we see what happens when this government is prompted by public outcry.
Madam Deputy Speaker, they do not have a good track record, and they are not very good at taking their own initiative. We were told that alcohol restrictions would solve the problem. We were told that the dry town legislation would solve the problem. The ill-conceived measures by the member for Johnston as the Minister for Alcohol Policy, and let us not get into the Minister for Alcohol Policy - this new initiative by him to introduce scanning machines at takeaway outlets would solve the problem, that anti-gang legislation would solve the problem, that these and an absolute raft of so-called tough new measures would address the problem of youth violence, antisocial and criminal behaviour throughout the Northern Territory.
This government does not have a great track record in addressing these issues. They have had seven years to address these issues, and now we see something else in a glossy little report titled Ministerial Statement, Youth Justice Issues. It is another attempt to hoodwink the Northern Territory. The gist of what is in this statement is welcomed, and it does look good on paper, without much detail, but it does look good. I am interested to see the legislation when it comes out during the week. However, while it looks good on paper and the gist of it is welcomed, the track record is not good, and Territorians can expect no change from an already soft-on-crime bunch of political placebos.
Mr BURKE (Brennan): Madam Deputy Speaker, congratulations on your well deserved appointment.
Members: Hear, hear!
Mr BURKE: As has become a bit of a tradition for me the first time I stand up for the year, I again acknowledge the Larrakia as the traditional owners of the land on which we meet. An important point, I believe, as we celebrate the cultural diversity of the Northern Territory at the opening with the Chinese Lions and a smoking ceremony. I am glad to see that the federal parliament is picking up on the foresight of this parliament with its smoking ceremony and other arrangements and celebrations.
We have heard a great deal from speakers already, and it is difficult when you come in late in the speaking order not to rehash what people have already said, only in slightly different language, so I will do my best to avoid that.
One of the key components of the mechanisms detailed in the statement is reaching out to young people and finding ways to legitimately address their antisocial behaviour. It is not a simple ‘lock people up’ approach. I believe that would be a wrong approach. There is a place for diversion; there is a place for alternate ways of addressing crime, not just youth crime. It is a shame, however, that unless you are calling to lock everyone up and throw away the key, you are suddenly attacked for being soft on crime. A feeble argument, but that is what we have this House for: a difference of view, feeble arguments and, hopefully, some not so feeble.
Addressing crime properly is not just about locking everyone up for the smallest offence and for the first offence. Maybe people here have forgotten a bit about what it is like to be a teenager or growing up. There is a certain level of rebelliousness and some kids go off the rails. Some kids do not have the support that they could, and should deserve, from home, so it is not really surprising that some kids get into trouble. However, they are not without hope and there are ways of bringing them back into productive lifestyles other than a term of incarceration somewhere.
I believe I would be correct in saying I have the support of many police in saying this. Sure there are people for whom diversion is not appropriate, but there are still plenty of young people for whom it is appropriate.
I give my congratulations and public support to the Northern Territory Police who do a fantastic job in Palmerston. Crime is one of those things that you will never completely get rid of and, frankly, one rape, one assault, is one too many, but we are never going to get to this Utopia of a completely crime-free society. And let us not forget the white collar crime and given the level of skill many teenagers have with that, computer crime is no less antisocial and can have severe effects.
I pay tribute to the number of different community organisations within Palmerston and elsewhere for the work they do in assisting young people. The Palmerston Regional Safe Communities Committee within Palmerston City Council is one. These groups are frontline associations whose people deal with youth homelessness, youth running away from desolate homes, wanting to try to create something for themselves, not knowing how to do it, getting into trouble.
I congratulate the Palmerston YMCA for the drop-in centre they thankfully continue to run. It was in doubt due to the federal government removal of some $200 000 in funding from the Palmerston YMCA. The Palmerston YMCA made it very clear that they would be unable to continue operating their drop-in centre without that funding, a drop-in centre which has run for some 18 years if not longer. When I found out about that I tried to get media attention and I tried to let as many people I could know that I was against the removal of the funding. I said that it was short-sighted and it did not help the prevention of crime one iota, because everyone acknowledges the great work that the Palmerston YMCA does. You can imagine my surprise when I failed to get any support whatsoever from the then member for Solomon who, as a member of the federal government, refused to make any application on behalf of the YMCA, and the good Senator who refused to lift a finger to assist the YMCA. They could not even pick up the phone and tell the YMCA that the funding had been lost. The YMCA found out by searching through the departmental website.
Who else is missing from this equation?
Mr Vatskalis: The member for Blain?
Mr BURKE: The member for Blain, the current Leader of the Opposition, who is so full of ‘I am here to fight crime; I am here to try to help’. Where was he? Did he come out and decry the cutting of funding from the YMCA? No, not a word, not a sausage. It was all fine as far as he was concerned. He hardly ever goes down - in fact, I am not aware that he has ever gone down to the YMCA.
Mrs Miller: That is a pretty sad statement.
Mr BURKE: It is sad that he has not, I agree member for Katherine, thank you very much. Very sad. He has no interest. All he wants to do is score cheap political points, bashing the youth of Palmerston and elsewhere by focusing on those elements that are involved in antisocial behaviour. He does not want to do a blind thing for those organisations which are attempting to prevent youth getting involved in antisocial behaviour. I know the police are very thankful for the role that the Palmerston YMCA drop-in centre plays; it gives young people a place to go.
It is with some incredulity, some sense of doubt, when I listen to the Leader of the Opposition talk about crime and his determination to do something about it. He wants the media; he wants to appear like he cares; he wants to appear like he has some solution. Unfortunately, he does not. All he is interested in is the media headlines, and that is where his interest ends. Perhaps he can go to the Palmerston YMCA on a Friday night, as I have, to talk to the kids. There are 60, 70, 80-odd kids who use that drop-in centre. Maybe he can explain to them why he is only interested in bashing them in a verbal sense and getting on their case, and wanting to direct them: do not pass go, do not collect $200, go directly to gaol. If he were in government he would do absolutely nothing to fund these services.
I congratulate and thank the Northern Territory government that we have for stepping in, once again, and providing the funding so that the YMCA can continue to operate. I know that the children and young people who attend the YMCA are grateful, and I am pretty sure that the police are quite happy that it continues to operate as well.
If the Leader of the Opposition wants to get serious, maybe he can explain to people why he failed to support the YMCA and the great work it does, and why he continues to fail to support the other organisations and the work they do, because it is not just about police. Police have a role to fill and they can certainly target antisocial behaviour. However, they need the ancillary services as well, the community support groups, and the community organisations. In Palmerston, they certainly need the YMCA drop-in centre which operates so effectively. If the opposition want to get serious on crime perhaps they ought to get serious about the prevention and giving young people and children positive alternatives and positive role models.
I congratulate, once again, not just the Palmerston YMCA but the other community groups that give our young people a chance when they have other chances removed from them. I thank the House for its attention.
Mrs MILLER (Katherine): Madam Deputy Speaker, it was nice of him to thank the House for its attention but it was quite a little theatrical performance. I have always thought that the parliament is a revered place where people present their case and debate. However, I have never seen such dramatics since being elected; it is better than going to the theatre. It really is quite theatrical. I certainly am not part of it. Unfortunately, I am not quite sure how to put on all that grand stuff. I think you might need a degree in law or something to be able to do that. I just like to get the facts across …
Mr Burke: Oh, very droll!
Mrs MILLER: I just like to do the facts ...
Mr Burke: Practice what you preach, Fay.
Mrs MILLER: I thought what you preached was quite good, actually. I was wondering if you were going to give a few copies out to the YMCA. You will probably print them out a few copies of that, seeing you were caning the Leader of the Opposition.
Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, I read the ministerial statement on youth justice issues and, without a doubt, every one of us here would be extremely concerned about the problems we are having with youth right across the Northern Territory. I welcome anything that would make an improvement to that.
What I have a little challenge with, and get a bit annoyed about, is the fact that some of what the minister has talked about have been in various places throughout the Territory over a long period of time and have been dismissed as failures. Now, all of a sudden, the Chief Minister is saying we have to put this in, we have to take a stand on it, we have to be strong, and we are just not going to tolerate it any longer. That is fine, because I am sick of it too, as is everyone else in this House. We want to see some changes made.
I would like to know how you are going to implement these changes. We already have so many different things working in our communities across the Northern Territory to address youth issues, and they do not seem to have made much difference. There are many people working very hard looking at different programs to address youth issues. Some of the programs are working.
I have talked about Fred Murphy before. He has addressed problems with young indigenous men and he has had a really big turn around, especially to age 18. He has done that with leadership roles. He has used leadership and set examples for these young boys to aspire to. That is why Fred has made such a big change. Fred, with some other helpers, is running the Clontarf Football Academy in Katherine at Katherine High School. I was talking to Fred when I was there last Friday, and I have not had a chance to look at the academy yet, but he is very excited about it. He is enthusiastic about everything that he can do to keep kids on the straight and narrow. So there are some things that are working in communities.
The member for Nelson said, and I believe this is really important, that many of the issues we have with juvenile crime these days stem from children who have had a poor upbringing, or they are missing something very important from their upbringing. I know this is terribly old-fashioned of me, but I believe in hugs too. When I worked in a primary school in Port Pirie, South Australia, one of my roles was to work with children who had remedial problems. I had a group of six, all little boys, aged from 5 to 8 years, for literacy every day. That would probably be 20 years ago now, when it was still acceptable and not seen as being something dirty to actually give kids a hug in school. Those children used to come into the classroom and the first thing they did was run over for a big hug. It was a big hug and a squeeze and then we got on with the lesson. I had great success with those children. I must say that I got as much out of it as what those children did. I, like the member for Nelson, do believe there are not enough hugs given. There is a funny, old saying that you need 13 hugs a day to survive. I must be surviving very badly at the moment, and I think a few of us are not surviving very well, but there is a saying that you need 13 hugs a day to survive.
A majority of good parents across the Northern Territory do the right thing by their children and work hard at being good parents, ensuring that their children have every opportunity. As previous speakers have said, what we are dealing with is a minority of parents who do not have the skill to provide a good family environment, they just do not know how, or they are hooked on drugs or alcohol. There is some extenuating factor that does not, unfortunately, allow them to bring their children up in the way that is acceptable and for those children to go on to contribute to society. We are dealing with a minority of parents. This same thing happens with all of the issues that we seem to have across the Territory: with substance abuse, it is a minority; drunken behaviour, a minority of people again. The big challenge is to come up with an answer to deal with those people.
I believe we send mixed messages to young people. They are allowed to leave home – some of them have left home at 13 and 14 years - and it seems to me that some of them have a very valid reason for leaving home due to the environment they are in. Some of them, and I know this for a fact, have not had a very good reason at all. They have left home and the parents have not been able to do a darn thing about it. The children have had more authority than the parents. They are catered for by Family and Community Services and told that they have rights.
On the one hand, we have kids who are told that they have rights and their rights need to be respected, and on the other hand we are saying to parents that you have to be tough, you are going to be responsible for your children and you are going to have to pay if they do something really bad. I do not disagree with that. I believe parents should be responsible for ensuring that – not so much they pay, but they make their children pay. I do not care how long it takes, but the kids can have a payment arrangement and the kids have to pay, but the parents could put that into place.
However, we are actually saying to them if you do not really like home you can leave and it is okay, we will look after you and we will find some way to protect you. We send mixed messages to kids. Some of these kids think they can have it both ways: we can leave home if we like and if we do not like it, we can go back home, or when we get into strife, mum or dad will get contacted by the police and we will go home and I will just leave again next week or whenever I feel like it. Unfortunately, there is a mixed message there.
I am interested to see what the Chief Minister is going to do when he talks about his youth hub and outreach workers. Where are they going to come from? I trust the Chief Minister, in his winding up, will tell us where these outreach workers are going to be. How are they going to be assessed, and how are they going to be trained? Where are the youth hubs going to be set up? Are they going to be something different to what we already have in our communities? In Katherine, we have the YMCA - our YMCA is going very well, member for Brennan - so what happens to those? Where is the hub going to come from? Where is it going to be set up? Are we going to make police responsible for bringing these kids there on top of what else they have to do?
If you are going to give these roles to police, and the minister says, yes, he is going to give police the tools they need to get the job done, you are going to need a lot more of them. I do not want to hear that sad story that you have, that you have 200 more police in the Police Force. Look, if it takes another 200, there needs to be another 200, because it is obviously not enough. The problems that we have - I will use Katherine as an example of this. We became a dry town three weeks ago and, in that time, I have watched so many things happen in the main street that the police we have could not possibly take control of what is happening; there are not enough of them. I have watched people blatantly exploit the dry town law in the Woolworths car park. I have watched them fight and yell, I have watched physical violence happen, and the police are already busy doing other things somewhere else in the town. There are not enough police, and you are expecting them to do more.
I am very interested to hear what tools the Chief Minister is going to give the police to get this job done to make our streets safer for all Territorians. We all agree that we want safer streets. My colleague, the member for Araluen, referred to the interview with John Lawrence on the Stateline broadcast on 8 February. John Lawrence, from the Criminal Lawyers Association, said this bill, which is going to be introduced tomorrow, resembled very similar provisions brought into New South Wales over 10 years ago. After they had been in for 10 years they were reviewed and the review came to this conclusion:
That committee recommended that the law be abolished. By all means introduce legislation that is going to make a difference to juvenile crime in the Northern Territory. Look at what has not worked elsewhere and look at what they have so that when you do it, you do it right the first time. I encourage the Chief Minister to review this regularly to ensure he gives the police all the resources they need to enforce this youth justice legislation. I look forward to hearing how he is going to provide the youth hubs as well as hub workers to ensure this really works.
Mr KIELY (Natural Resources, Environment and Heritage): Madam Deputy Speaker, I support the Chief Minister’s statement. Like the Chief Minister, I moved to the Territory for one reason and that was the lifestyle. I am pleased to say that the Territory has rewarded me and my family in many ways. It is important that we mark the spot here. Being a family man in the northern suburbs, I am keenly aware of the issues and problems that occur there. The Territory has rewarded me very well. I have a house in Anula, a wife and a young family of 12- and 13-year-olds. We participate in many sports. We get the kids off to different youth activities. Many of their friends come around and I get involved in the local youth endeavours. We get to see it all. We get to talk to the kids, find out what is going on. That sort of lifestyle informs you about the issues. I consider where I live in Anula, and Darwin, to be the best place to live, work and raise a family.
All Territorians deserve to have a home in a place which is a safe environment where they are not worried about their kids going out; a place where kids grow up and leave home; or senior Territorians feel safe in their homes and feel free to get out and have a walk in the afternoon or evenings and not be fearful of what is going on in our streets. I am afraid that it has reached the stage where do we hear senior Territorians saying they are scared to go out; we do hear kids saying that they are worried to go to Casuarina because of gangsters.
I believe American television programs have a lot to do with what we are dealing with at this time. You see a lot of this antisocial behaviour emulating what is essentially American culture. That is a really sad thing because it goes back to children not being able to get out and socialise with their peers, not getting out playing sports, not getting out and learning a healthy lifestyle - all those are qualities which we say we value so much here in the Territory.
Of course, it is because their parents are not encouraging them to get out, are not driving them to local sports events, or are not giving them push bikes or showing them where to get involved in these groups. Because of these things, they start developing antisocial behaviours. You really have to question why parents are not becoming involved with their children. Why are they not helping them to develop in such way that they value the social interaction and have respect for what goes on in their neighbourhood and those people around them? The parents’ role in all this is part of this comprehensive plan to tackle youth crime.
The opposition is keen to say this problem has been going on, and for seven years we have had a chance to address it and we have not done anything. I put it to you today that we are looking at it and we are looking at generational issues. We are looking at antisocial behaviours that go across the generations. From that perspective we have parents who have not learned parenting skills, who have nothing to model to show their kids and to bring them up correctly. We look back at the past 20 years or 30 years and what do we have? We have this dug-in CLP government which has been going for years and years which neglected to address any of this. It is all right to say we have this issue, but I put to you that this is a generational issue that was born in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s in the time when we should have been putting money into helping our families, by people obtaining parenting skills so that they were able to bring up their kids and instil the values we like. Unfortunately, it is not the case and now we have this situation which has been building up which we have to address.
I was raised in Melbourne. The youth issues going on in Melbourne in the days when I grew up make the issues we are dealing with here pale into insignificance. They were pretty rugged times. I believe we are seeing a building-up of these social issues. To think that the Territory is alone in this is to paint a skewed picture of what is, after all, a societal problem across the Territory, across Australia and, to a large extent, across other communities of like type in America, London, Liverpool - all across the globe. I accept the criticism of the opposition and the community asking what is going on. However, do not for one minute think that what is going on is something that is only happening in Alice Springs, Tennant Creek, Katherine or Darwin. It is not. We have a global problem which we are trying to come to terms with.
I am happy to see that we are going with the Balunu Foundation and the Brahminy Foundation. These people are the first ones to say these are not boot camps. This is not about the Leader of the Opposition’s tough love approach. When they say it is about healing, they are right. I see this healing not in some great mystical sense; it is a healing of people, learning and knowing how to get along with each other and build that respect in individuals so that when they come out they will respect one another, themselves and property, and we will see a better society for it. That is what we are about. We are not about boot camps. If we want a boot camp we will bung them into prison. That does not do anything really significant for these youths. We have seen that. What we have to do is look at changing and modelling them into good citizens - getting respect back into them. Full points to the Balunu and Brahminy Foundations for the way they are going about it and for the work that they do. I am pleased to see that as a way that we are going forward.
The opposition is saying: ‘You have stolen our policy’. Whose policy is it? It is the community’s policy; it does not belong to one political party or the other. We have all agreed there is a problem out there. When I get around my own suburb, every now and then I see a broken shop window which has had a rock chucked through it. This costs the shop owner money. It is not an attempted break-in. It is a plain, ordinary straight-up act of sheer vandalism because they are bored and show no respect for property.
When I look at the graffiti that pops up on the bus stations, or on the walls of shops, I am not talking about some grand artist’s vision. I am not talking about a mural. I am talking about some pretty tacky texta colour or spray can painted initials. The more creative vandals manage to pick up a tag. That is the fashion; that is the American way, so the kids want a tag. The most marvellous thing about graffiti tags – I do not expect any of the antisocial juveniles or criminal elements will be reading Hansard to pick this up, so I feel free to give this tip – is it is like putting a signature on a wall. It is getting out there and just signing the wall and saying: ‘I am the one who did this.’ The police know these tags, they see them around, and bang, they have you. It is not really the sharpest tool in the tool kit when you put a tag on that is special to you because all you are doing is saying: ‘Here I am, come and get me’, and believe me, they do go and get them.
While I am talking about what is going on in my area, I will go back to what the opposition was talking about in regard to drinking and antisocial behaviour in the streets of Katherine and all the alcohol-related initiatives that we have brought in. This statement is dealing with youth justice issues. The alcohol and drinking that you are referring to, unless you are talking about it in the sense of parents who are not looking after their kids, is the subject of another debate. But, you are right in that respect. If you have a home with parents who have a severe alcohol problem and are neglecting the children, the chances are that these children will be running amok, and that also is part of the strategy we are looking at.
As you can see, it is quite an holistic approach; it is not just a matter of lifting these kids off the street, tucking them away for a month or two and hoping that the problem dissipates only to have it arise a bit later on. It is a really well thought out strategy that is before us. We do need it, because I am reluctant to see my kids go off to Casuarina to the cinema and come home on the bus. Like any parent, I do not want them hanging around that interchange.
So we really have to get in there and sort it out so that kids who are 12 and 13 years old can catch the bus and come home at a reasonable hour, and they are not afraid to do so. There are all sorts of different ways that this can be done as far as building design and everything that goes with it, but there are other factors and we are addressing issues such as the transport officers we have on the bus services for security and the CCTV which is helping police. Hopefully, we are also making anyone who is thinking about playing up think twice because they will come to the attention of the police.
I have praise for the police at Casuarina. They are the local constabulary that I deal with when someone comes into my office and tells me there has been a break-in - and many times, around my area, it is doors left unlocked and people come in, grab whatever it is and take off. I am not too sure of the crime that is, illegal entry or something, I suppose. They grab the goods and take off, or they get into the fridges out the back or steal property from around the house that has not been secured. I have had people come into my office and talk to me about that. I am straight onto the e-mail to the police officer in charge and I advise that this is going on in my area. If I hear stories of any other sort of antisocial or illegal behaviour, I tell the police. I do not have the expectation that they are going to drop everything and tear around there in a heartbeat – well, most of the time, I cannot say all of the time. I do not have the exact figures but I would say that, most of the time, the police have been in contact with these victims of crime and are working with them. I send this information in because it lets the police get an accurate picture and builds up their intelligence database about what is going in the neighbourhood, and it lets the police know that the people are concerned about crime because it is important that the police know what is going on in the suburb and where it is happening.
It is important for local members, when people come in, not to sit there and say: ‘This is all the government’s fault. There should be more police or there should be more of that. It is their fault’. What does that do? How does that solve an issue? It does not go anywhere near it. It might give you a quick political run, but as far as helping the poor survivor of the crime, the victim, it does nothing. It does not do anything to help identify the perpetrator. As local members we need to contact our police and let them know what is going on. If you know of kids who are running amok, advise the police. I certainly do.
I also listen to my kids. We talk about doing things with families. I put a call out to families: if you do not want your kids involved in antisocial behaviour, because sometimes good kids get caught up in this for no particular reason, talk to them, help them learn to read and write, read to them at night, have an interaction with them. Do not just sit there and give them a PlayStation. Do not just watch the television with them. Go and watch their sport if they are involved. If you cannot afford a sport or you cannot get to it because you might be a single parent or something, try to make time to get involved at their school. Get involved with your kids. That is the message.
If we really want all this antisocial behaviour to stop, if we want the criminal activity amongst our youth to decrease, the only way we are ever going to do it is to really get involved with our kids. We can have all these measures in place, which is always after the event and they are commendable, and this does need addressing. The really commendable thing I would like to see our community do is get involved with their kids. That is the main thing. That is the best message we can give to all of our families who are concerned about crime. Get involved with your kids. Know what your kids are doing. Play with your kids. Talk to your kids. Understand their issues. I will guarantee that we will see a decrease in crime better than that achieved by any amount of money that we throw at it could ever do.
Mr BONSON (Sport and Recreation): Madam Speaker, I support the Chief Minister’s statement on youth justice issues. I agree with the Chief Minister when he says that there are children and families in the Northern Territory who do not seem to respect the responsibility of parenthood. As someone born and raised in the Territory, I can say with absolute confidence these problems are not a recent phenomenon nor are they unique to the Territory. Every society in the world - North America, Asia, Europe, South America or the southern states - faces issues to do with youth crime. What formulates the issues of youth crime? In most cases there are some prime indicators: poverty, lack of education, poor housing or no housing, alcohol and other drugs, broken homes, abuse, and dysfunction.
I have heard contributions from both sides of the House and I have a genuine belief that both sides of the House would like to address many of these law and order issues relating to our youth. But, I think the clear difference between the two is that the Chief Minister is offering a Youth Justice Strategy which has a plan. Whether you agree with it or not, that is what he has put on the table. I happen to agree with it. I happen to agree that in many different policies this government has introduced over the last six years, we are addressing many of these issues. The issues that we have in the Northern Territory are the same as anywhere in the world. The youth who are committing these crimes come from situations of poverty, lack of education, poor housing or no housing, or they are affected by alcohol or other drugs.
Since 2001, we have seen this government take proactive steps in relation to alcohol and drugs. We have created 200 new police in our time, we are enforcing the laws in terms of alcohol restrictions. The Minister for Alcohol Policy outlined the dynamics in his attack on issues to do with alcohol. As a born and bred Territorian, the environment in which youth grow up today is much different to the environment that I grew up in. In the environment I grew up in, the issues were related to alcohol and marijuana. Right now, whether you are white, black, green or purple, you live in Darwin or bush, there are other drugs affecting these young people. There are designer drugs, speed-based drugs, etcetera, that we all know are in our community, not only in Darwin and Alice Springs, but in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, in Asia, in North America and Europe, This is a blight on all people in the modern world.
Antisocial and criminal behaviour by adolescents on the streets of Darwin occurred when I was growing up, there is no doubt about that, but there is definitely a change in behaviour. I believe when you look at the criminology, at the circumstances in the environment of what these kids are facing, many of those issues are related to increased poverty, increased lack of education, poor housing or no housing, and increased alcohol and drug abuse.
We have shown over the last six years a concerned and considered effort to attack these issues. I absolutely support the intent outlined in the Chief Minister’s statement. We need a comprehensive plan to tackle youth crime. Simple, one-dimensional approaches have never worked and they certainly will not today. Territorians should not have to put up with unacceptable and antisocial behaviour, but it is also important to keep things in perspective. The problems are neither new nor unique to the Territory. What we do have in the Territory are elements of antisocial and criminal behaviour that are different to those being experienced elsewhere.
In our circumstance, alcohol plays a significant role in antisocial and criminal behaviour. The habits of Territorians and their drinking behaviours are significantly higher than other Australians. Until we can manage a significant reduction in our alcohol consumption, we are going to have to continue working on strategies to curb antisocial and criminal behaviour right across our community. If you cast your mind back to the October sittings you would recall that the Alcohol Policy Minister delivered a statement about the government’s plan for alcohol reform in the Territory. The facts outlined by my colleague in October are relevant to the government’s justice initiatives, whether youth issues or antisocial behaviour. I will quickly re-cap on some of the points the Minister for Alcohol Policy made in October.
On average, adult Territorians drink 17.3 litres of pure alcohol a year, compared with 10 litres elsewhere in the country. In the Katherine region, the most recent statistics show alcohol consumption to be twice the national average. In the Top End, we are drinking at the Territory average. The good news is that the Barkly has the lowest alcohol consumption in the Territory per capita, but the bad news is the average adult in the Barkly region works their way through 14.7 litres of pure alcohol per year compared with the national average of 10 litres. This statistic in itself only serves to highlight the extent of our battle with the bottle. The minister outlined in October the damage alcohol is inflicting on Territorians’ health, but perhaps even more importantly, he also highlighted the dramatic reduction in crime, disturbances, police call outs and hospital admissions in those places where alcohol consumption has fallen as a result of alcohol management plans. That particular debate was characterised as one of the most constructive in the Assembly in recent years, and one in which there was genuine agreement from all sides supporting government plans to tackle alcohol abuse.
Various administrations have tried to deal with these problems over the years. The CLP had 27 years to sort things out. You have only to look at the statistics on property crime in 2001, when we assumed government, to realise that the former government had not dealt with the problem. In fact, I remember a former Chief Minister saying he was going to monster and stomp perpetrators of antisocial behaviour. History shows the only significant legacy of that particular campaign was the rhetoric. It requires more than a cute turn of phrase to address these issues. What is required is a considered and comprehensive strategy, based on an understanding of the causes of the problems and an integrated strategy involving government and non-government agencies to address these problems.
Simplistic, one-dimensional approaches are not going to get us anywhere. While there are problems with particular elements that are peculiar to the Territory, we should not ignore the lessons that have been learned elsewhere. That is an important point. Often we operate in isolation. Often we operate as if we are inventing the wheel. These factors affect all human beings right across the planet and in very similar circumstances. We should be using this knowledge from around the world to develop our strategies to deal with this issue. The Minister for Alcohol Policy is an academic researcher. He has a deep interest in this field. It shows the type of qualifications we have to address these problems. We are putting this man’s skills to use.
In speaking to non-government agencies in my capacity as Minister for Young Territorians, the issue of youth camps has been raised and it was a concept that won support. The same people also agreed that there was a small group of young people who had absolutely no respect for the criminal justice system. These are the young people the Chief Minister is specifically referring to. Their behaviour is affecting the lives of too many fellow Territorians. It is important that we identify and deal with young people engaging in at-risk behaviour early. This government’s Youth Justice Strategy will do that. It is also important that we are tough with those who continue to break the law. Territorians have a right to expect that, and this will happen under the Youth Justice Strategy.
The causes of antisocial and criminal problems facing the Territory are complex and, in many cases, deeply ingrained. As the Alcohol Policy minister has observed, we must continue to work to address the Territory’s historic culture of alcohol usage, but that is a long-term task. Even so, we must keep investigating options that can help in keeping people out of the cycle of negativity and grog that contributes so much to our antisocial behaviour problems.
As not just the Sports minister, but as a local Territorian, I believe that sport has a role to play. I know there is still a lack of data about the benefits of sport and recreation in keeping young people out of strife. However, the anecdotal evidence appears to confirm that sport and recreation has a role to play, particularly in relation to indigenous people. Sport has played a defining role in developing a sense of identity amongst young Aboriginal people. In my own family over the generations, sport has helped us in our interaction with what you might call mainstream. That is because in those times, when social rules were not equal, the one place Aboriginal people knew the rules were the same for everyone was on the sporting paddock. In my time as a player, coach and administrator, I have seen what sport has been able to do to young people’s sense of self-esteem.
I recall one young Aboriginal man whom I first met when I was working as a lawyer. He came to me and asked for a run in the football side I was coaching at the time. This young fellow had a history of low-level crime activity, but he applied himself to the game and committed himself to the club and became a valued member of the team. He went on to develop qualities of loyalty, honour, integrity and honesty. He subsequently took up art and has been highly successful. He is now seen as a role model by younger Aboriginal people. I cannot say it was all down to sport, but I have no doubt that sport played a role in his turnaround as a person. That is why I am confident that well-targeted sport and recreational programs, particularly in bush communities, can play a role in developing that vital sense of self-esteem and hope in young people.
Let us be honest, boredom is a major contributing factor in much of the trouble that young people find themselves in today. I can only imagine how crushing that sense of boredom must be at times among young people in isolated communities in the bush. If we can engage young people in worthwhile activity, it must help. We are delivering programs in the bush, but we could do a lot more work in this area. The Territory government provides more than $2.9m a year to fund sport and recreation grants to remote communities. In addition, the Australian Sports Commission commits just over $522 000 per year to support the employment of seven indigenous sports officers across the Territory. I am pleased that last year’s Closing the Gap initiative committed an additional $4.5m to sport and recreation programs for remote indigenous communities. Much of the focus of our sport and recreation grants program has been in Central Australia.
Madam Speaker, I will touch on our grants under the Department of Sport and Recreation and the local government bodies’ programs this financial year to show, essentially, the type of initiative we are supporting. I believe they are the type of program that can make a difference to the outlook of indigenous youth:
I believe sport and recreation has a role to play in developing community spirit in the face of challenges young people experience in remote Aboriginal communities in the Territory, with their problems of poverty, unemployment, poor health and at times apathy. This challenge is one I want to address in my time as Sports minister. I believe that the link between sport and positive outcomes among Aboriginal people, particularly young people, is one that needs greater research effort.
Empirical evidence would obviously assist services in providing (inaudible) sport and recreational programs (inaudible) health and social outcomes in the bush. I know some funding bodies and services providers have designed their own particular mechanisms to monitor their programs, although this is not hard data.
I will be working to ensure Territorians are given every opportunity to engage in sport and recreation activities no matter where they live. The Territory government currently contributes the second highest investment per capita in Australia to sport and recreation. While we continue working to bring elite sports to the Territory, I want to keep a particular focus on delivering grassroots programs.
One of those areas is women in sport. I believe that generally, across the Territory and across the nation, we do not do enough for women’s sport. I believe that there is a great potential there to harvest a benefit. What we do know is that women in sport are often volunteers, umpires, referees; they take young children to different events. We need to not only support them in terms of participation, but acknowledge all the work they do behind the scenes. This is because I believe not only in the benefit of sport and recreation activities for the individual but also the social aspect.
This is quite a serious issue and it has been used historically as a political football. I am proud of being part of the government that recognises that this is an issue in our community and is attempting to tackle this problem. I know the Chief Minister has a plan. I know that Cabinet and my colleagues in the Labor party understand that there needs to be punishment in dealing with these youth issues. However, the youth are the future of the Northern Territory and we need to invest the time to ensure that we prevent the law and order issues that some youths get into. We also have to minimise the dangerous effects of alcohol and other drugs on these youth which often links to the problems they cause.
We also have to get tough on those children who are doing the wrong thing. We have to find ways to ensure that the punishment fits the crime so people understand that certain behaviour is just not right. The family responsibility issue is a big one. I walk around the streets of my electorate and there is no doubt the community of Darwin has changed. There was more a sense of community in the past. That is a fact. People were responsible for their children, and they took pride in their family values whatever their cultural or religious background. There now seems to appear to be a certain group of parents who have no responsibility for their children and that is a shame. We have to target those parents who do the wrong thing. In reality, like everyone in this House, we are all committed to addressing the negative behaviour of young people and we will continue to do that.
We also need to invest in all young people and, as Minister for Young Territorians, I will guarantee this House that I will endeavour with all my ability to ensure that the youth of today in the Territory will have a voice and that that voice will be heard by government and the policies we develop will benefit the youth of the Territory and will reflect their views.
Ms McCARTHY (Arnhem): Madam Speaker, I support the Chief Minister’s ministerial statement on youth justice issues. It is quite clear from the package that the Chief Minister has drawn to the attention of this House, that this government is clearly very concerned about the welfare of children right across the Northern Territory.
I would like to specially focus on my electorate of Arnhem. As we saw towards the middle of last year with the intervention that the member for Greatorex pointed to in his response today, that certainly the focus was highlighted nationally. When we talk about the responsibilities of parents, of children, or any guardians of children, it is more than just a responsibility about whether that child is from the bush or is from a town or city. It is a responsibility that comes back to us, to each of us as individuals, as members of society, and what kind of society we create with the response that we have to one another in relationships that we have with each other and how we react to one another.
It has also been very clear, certainly in the media, over the last few months in regards to what has been going on in the northern suburbs of Darwin and in areas around Alice Springs. The behaviour of youth on the streets has caused alarm to residents and also caused alarm to their own friends who are unsure of whether to join them in these activities. I think it comes back to the question of who is responsible for these children.
There are situations where you have a single parent trying to raise four children. That parent has suffered severe domestic abuse largely related to alcohol and other issues. They are unemployed so there is not much money coming into the household. That violence has an impact on the parent and the children. We are seeing more of the effect and impact of that violence as we travel around the Northern Territory.
When we see these kids we have to ask ourselves: ‘What is happening? Why is there such disrespect? Why is there such anger? Why is there such carelessness in kids who are roaming the streets who do not seem to worry too much about their future?’ When you talk to these kids, and I have spent a lot of time with some of these children, much of it comes back to a sense of not having confidence in themselves, not feeling loved, not feeling cared for, that they do not have a place to call a home. These are very simple parts of life.
It is nothing that governments can create. It is not an invention that can be made in a scientific laboratory. It is quite human and very basic. It is about the feelings and respect that we have for each other. These children tell me about their experiences in their young lives, some of them as young as 13 and 14 years.
Ms CARNEY: A point of order, Madam Speaker! I draw your attention to the state of the House.
Madam SPEAKER: Ring the bells. We now have a quorum. Member for Arnhem, you may continue.
Ms McCARTHY: Thank you, Madam Speaker. I will try to recollect where I was.
In talking to these children, they tell me the stories about their lives and the fact that they do not have parents who are there full-time or who worry about where they are. They might have grandparents, or an uncle or auntie. But what happens when a child does not have that parental guidance? It falls on those nearby - whether it is teachers, counsellors, or extended family members - to take an active part, an active interest in that child.
As was heard from other members in this House, that active interest is also participation in sports and recreational activities. For a parent or guardian or grandmother to be able to take part in that child’s activities is all about learning the basic principles of caring for one another, of sharing, of looking out for each other. It is basic principles that we see with families in the Arnhem communities.
We heard the Opposition Leader talk about the emphasis that is placed on families within the Chinese community. That emphasis on families should be everywhere. It is actually in most communities. It is in the Greek community, the Italian community, and it is very much in the Aboriginal community. In fact, sometimes there is too much family in the Aboriginal community. Sometimes you are trying to visit all the family members and you just not sure what you are doing: if you go to this one, you are not pleasing them; and if you do not go to this one, they think you are forgetting about them. You can go from one extreme to the other.
The member for Millner said that when he was growing up here, Darwin was a much smaller community where everyone did look out for each other. That sense of community is what we should not lose sight of no matter how big the Northern Territory becomes. That sense of community should not be lost.
We talked about the future. What kind of future do we want? We want a future where the children of today will be the ones who will be looking after us when we are older. We want to ensure that they grow to be adults that do care for others.
I will give you an example of what happens when things go wrong for a child. I will not reveal the identity of the community because I do not want to reveal the identity of this particular child. There was an incident with a school and a school teacher with a child who was about 13 years old. The teacher and teacher’s family were very rocked by what happened to this particular child. The future of that 13-year-old child was in question since the offence the child committed was quite serious. We all had to take a deep breath and think: ‘Whatever decision is made now within this small community, and within the teacher’s family and within this child’s life, is going to have a profound impact on this child and on the community’.
It took another couple of years of talking and constant vigilance of the child’s development to make sure that the child was able to talk about why they did what they did; to feel that they were in an environment where they could try to heal from the issues that caused them to commit their crime, and also working with the community so that the community did not feel like everyone was pointing their fingers at them and saying: ‘You’re a really bad community. You should never have allowed this to happen.’ There was a lot of blame going around. That sense of healing was very important for those three areas: for the child and the child’s family, for the community, and for the family of that teacher as well.
Regarding the healing program provided by the organisation called Balunu, I certainly commend our government and, in particular, the Chief Minister on the emphasis that has been given to Bobby and David Cole, not as a solution by itself, but as one part of the solution of trying to deal with these young children so they look at themselves, have a sense of identity about who they are, and have discipline in their lives which is an important part of growing up, and to have a place where they feel comfortable enough to talk about these issues. That is the environment that Balunu is creating for some of these children who are either recommended to go there or whose family members are asking for them to go. I do not want to put too much on Balunu because it can sound like it is going to be the ‘fix it’ organisation. However, it is not, because we have seen too many times in the past that many organisations that are doing well get lumped with too much and they cannot do it.
I congratulate the Balunu Committee. I remember when you first came into my office in 2005 - I think it was around November. You came to lobby me and to sell your ideas about what you were on about. I thought it was fantastic. I just thought: ‘Wow, that is huge! You are talking about a healing program largely for young men - certainly for young teenagers up until adulthood - and about things that meant that young men could talk’. It is not an easy thing, especially for young Aboriginal men, to talk about these problems and these issues of why they offend, why they re-offend, and why they do not have family support that they respect at home. These were pretty serious issues to tackle. I just looked at David and Robbie and said: ‘What you are doing is fantastic. You have a long road ahead of you, but I wish you well.’ We need to see more programs like this, in particular with our young men in our communities. It is a credit to the Chief Minister and to the ministers in Cabinet that they have seen the value of Balunu. I wish them well over the coming months and years. However, I add a note of warning not to try to take on too many kids in your desire to want to make a difference.
That comes back to that whole healing process. Tomorrow is going to be an important day when we look at the Stolen Generations’ apology in the federal parliament. I reflect on the first – certainly the only - federal court case that took place here in the Northern Territory with Lorna Cubillo and the late Peter Gunner. Lorna always said that, as a mother, she did not know how to be a mother. She did not know how to raise her children. She did not know how to care for them because of her own experiences of having been taken away. That has, somewhere along the line – and it is just not Lorna - had an impact on any parent who has not had a role model. They do not know how to be a parent or a good parent. I suggest to the Chief Minister that it is not always about parents not being good parents; it can also be about a parent not having enough support around them to be the best parent they can be.
I also look at my communities in regards to the intervention and the quarantine programs that are going on in some places. We always have to be vigilant, particularly in this environment, with the intervention and aspects of it that are affecting family life. We have to ensure there is that balance for the parent, family members, or the guardians to be able to lean on someone else - be it social workers, counsellors or guidance counsellors in schools, or the police who have their own units that can work to support people. It has to be broader than that. It also has to be about the community in general taking an active interest in one another, knowing a family, knowing whose kid is whose, saying: ‘Yes, I know that young boy; I know who his nanna is’, and taking that active interest.
It is very simple stuff; there are no new secrets here. A very simple human process: take an active interest.
We need to have that balance in these communities so that parents who are struggling, who are single parents, who have issues of domestic violence or issues of unemployment and not enough money coming in, are supported, that there is not a sense of everything being taken away from them, that they have the support to help their children as well. Whilst we might want action immediately on these issues, the long-term process is about supporting the whole family, and the family as a whole. We cannot lose sight of that in whatever laws we may bring in.
I would also like to point out some of the highlights of our government in terms of youth. Jocelyn Uibo in Numbulwar is an amazing young woman who is coming through the system with the support of the Northern Territory government, being a part of Al Gore’s climate change forum, being on the Youth Round Table forum, being able to talk about these youth issues that are important to them so that they can advise government, and they can advise councils and say, ‘Well, this is what we as young people would like, this is what we need’. The problem is many young people feel they are not heard. So that is an important forum.
Our version of The Big Day Out is another way our government is reaching out to the youth of the Northern Territory. It is not the only means but it is another avenue where we are trying to tap into the needs of youth.
The final thing is the push to have a Children’s Commissioner, Madam Speaker, which I believe speaks volumes about our government and our government’s intent in wanting to make a difference in the lives of all children across the Northern Territory. I commend the Chief Minister’s statement to the House.
Mr HENDERSON (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, I thank all members for their contribution to this important debate for the Northern Territory, given some of the issues we have had to confront over the recent past in regards to antisocial and criminal behaviour by small groups of young people who commit, disproportionately, a huge amount of trauma in our community.
I pick up on the sentiments and the comments of the member for Arnhem first, inasmuch as when we are having this debate it is important for us as leaders in the community to acknowledge that the vast majority of our young people in the Northern Territory are absolutely fantastic. They are growing up in the best place to grow up in the world. They are striving to achieve what they can be, and they are going through all the growing pains that everybody goes through as they move through the stages of childhood to adulthood. By far, the vast majority of our young people are fabulous people and the same goes for our parents. The vast majority of parents or carers do the very best they can in the most difficult job, which is to raise a family. It is not until you are at a stage of your life when you have the greatest privilege you can know, which is to have kids of your own, that you realise what a tough job it is. It is not a cakewalk. Sometimes, with the public debate, we can reinforce broader perceptions that our young people are not great people, and the vast majority are.
I thank the members on this side of the House for their considered and sensible contributions, all drawn from their own experiences, their own backgrounds and their own electorates.
I thank the Independent members for their contribution, particularly the member for Braitling for her supportive comments in relation to the development of a youth camp in the Alice Springs region. Implementation is well under way and scheduled for phased implementation throughout the year. I thank the Hamilton Downs people and owners for working in partnership with government to get it up and running as soon as possible.
I thank the member for Nelson. It is important to note that this is not about revisiting policies of the past. This is about a comprehensive reform agenda for the future. We recognise that both kids and parents require support, not punishment. We are not setting people up to fail. That is what my colleague, the Justice minister, reinforced at yesterday’s press conference. This is not about setting up parents to fail and punishing parents for not disciplining and controlling their kids. This is about giving support to parents who are genuinely struggling to ensure adequate care and to take responsibility for their kids. There will be further announcements about how we propose to do this with a whole-of-government approach and an inter-agency approach with weekly meetings around case management of families who require that support. At the end of the day, for a small minority, there does need to be more punitive measures and sanctions in regards to court issued orders and sanctions for failure to comply. I do not believe that we will need to use that on many occasions.
Unfortunately, the opposition could only offer limited support and it appeared at times they either had not read the statement or understood the statement, and with public policy in this area, a one-shot-in-the-locker approach seems to be where they are at.
People do not want words; they want action. This is what this reform package is going to do. I believe that it will make a difference. I am not nave enough to believe that there will never be another crime committed by a young person in the Northern Territory again. However, I also call a spade a spade and we will not tolerate this type of behaviour. We will strengthen the community’s capacity to bring these kids under control with this package of reforms that we will be introducing this week.
In December 2006, the opposition criticised the anti-gang laws that I brought in as Police minister. I do not have the numbers in front of me but police have used those laws extensively across the Northern Territory to interfere, interrupt and deal with gang-related activity whether it occurs in places like Wadeye or Casuarina or within our criminal elements. The opposition criticised those measures, but did not have any policy agenda at all to disrupt gangs across the Northern Territory. I have asked for the laws to be reviewed to ensure they are working on the ground.
One part of the review is non-negotiable following disturbances in Wadeye at Christmas. I have already announced that the penalty for violent disorder will be doubled to a maximum of two years in prison. The feedback that I get on the ground when I visit Wadeye is that people are sick and tired of having their lives disrupted, displaced and, in some instances, property destroyed by a group that is out of control and causing so much harm. They were very strong on that. They wanted significant penalties. That is what we are going to be doing by introducing a doubling of those penalties for that type of behaviour. There is no silver bullet; you need to keep working on new initiatives.
The Leader of the Opposition does not understand the measures we took to protect private bus drivers and taxi drivers. These people are hard-working Territorians who are earning an honest living and dealing with the public as they convey passengers throughout the Northern Territory. From time to time we have reports, too frequently, of people throwing rocks at buses and taxis, and assaults on taxi drivers and bus drivers who are working independently. They are isolated and it is just not on. We introduced changes that would see better protection for our bus drivers and taxi drivers across the Northern Territory. The Leader of the Opposition did not understand the issue, did not read the legislation, and was critical of the measures.
I will just go through them. Drivers of commercial passenger vehicles such as buses and taxis provide, as I said, a very important community service. Section 188(1) of the Criminal Code provides the offence of common assault; that carries a maximum sentence of imprisonment for one year. Section 188(2) lists 11 circumstances of aggravation. Assaulting a member of the public service acting in the execution of his duty is one of the circumstances of aggravation. Section 188(2)(f), not all bus drivers providing public transport in Darwin are employed by the Darwin Bus Service. Darwin Buslink, which is privately owned, also employs drivers so we have legislation that provides for aggravated provisions for public servants. The Leader of the Opposition does not understand that about 50% of all bus routes are actually contracted out to a private sector company and those drivers were not covered by that aggravated provision. Neither were taxi drivers - who are obviously not employed by the public service. They deserve the same protection.
They also deserve an Opposition Leader who at least understands the legislation that he is criticising – instead of being critical of the measures the government is taking to try to improve the protection of those people. It is obvious that the Opposition Leader has not taken the time to read the legislation or understand the issue. I have received a bit of negative comment from the community that I represent. Quite a few of them are taxi drivers who were very happy at the signal that the government sent. They thought it was long overdue and they could not believe that the Opposition Leader would criticise the government for doing so.
I repeat my commitment as Chief Minister that criminal and antisocial behaviour when it is perpetuated once, but particularly when there is an ongoing cycle of that type of behaviour by young people in our community, will not to be tolerated. The revolving door on juvenile diversion will be closed. Parents will be better supported but, at the end of the day, if they refuse to attempt to control the behaviour of their children there will be sanctions in place. We will be introducing youth camps in Central Australia and the Top End to provide alternative options for rehabilitating young people who are getting involved in antisocial behaviour and crime. That is our commitment as a government. We are going to follow through on it in a comprehensive package of reforms to try to make a significant dent into what is a very real problem that concerns all Territorians.
Madam Speaker, I agree with the comments made by the member for Arnhem. Parents are not necessarily bad parents because they cannot or will not control their kids. They might not necessarily know how to be a parent. The reforms we will put in place will provide those supports. However, at the end of the day, there will also be significant sanctions for parents who absolutely refuse point blank to attempt to control the activity of their kids because the whole of the community pays a price. That is not going to continue. I thank members for their support of the statement.
Motion agreed to; statement noted.
Adjournment
Ms LAWRIE (Leader of Government Business): Madam Speaker, I move that the Assembly do now adjourn.
Mrs MILLER (Katherine): Madam Speaker, the Australia Day ceremony in Katherine this year began with the raising of the flags at the Civic Centre at 9 am. The National Anthem was sung beautifully by the Kantarbillay Choir under the guidance of Jan Murphy. Everyone then moved inside to the air-conditioned comfort of the Civic Centre gallery where the rest of the function was carried out.
Mayor Anne Shepherd gave a welcome speech and conducted a citizenship ceremony where seven people took the pledge to become a citizen of Australia. Our newest Katherine citizens are Nicola Goldbach; Jennifer Lindsay; Sinead Linton; and the Spafford family – Peter, fondly known as PJ; Hilda, fondly known as Judy; and their children, Patricia and Douglas. The Spafford family looked resplendent in their yellow T-shirts with Southern Cross stars and Australia printed down the front. Following their enthusiastic pledge, they waved green and gold flags printed with Aussie, Aussie, Aussie. It was great to see and it caused some amusement.
This year, we were very pleased to have Australia Day Ambassador, Susie Elelman from Perth attend and participate in the ceremony. Susie gave us a wonderful insight into her family and the challenges her parents and siblings faced before their migration to Australia, and of settling into a strange, new country - one we all take for granted.
During the Australia Day ceremony in Katherine, it has become a tradition to present the Katherine Times Senior and Junior Sportsperson of the Year Awards. This year, Vince and Jill Fardone of the Katherine Times gave the Senior Sportsperson’s Award to Stephen Wilson. The runner-up was Greg Schmidt. The Junior Sportsperson was 9-year-old Hayley Glass, and the runner-up was John Bretten.
Senior Sportsperson, Stephen Wilson, moved to Katherine with his wife, Sharni, and two children in January 2000. He started riding motor bikes when he was 14 years old and started racing them at 30 years of age. Between 2001 and 2003, he took up BMX riding in Katherine with his son, Jacob. During this time, he competed in the 2002 NT titles, placing third in the Masters Class.
In 2003, Stephen participated in the Kampfari and placed third in the Masters Class and 13th overall. Stephen rides mountain bikes every Wednesday night with a group of riders and, on Saturday morning, he rides road bikes. He has also participated in many triathlons, either teaming up with others or on his own. Stephen has, unfortunately, had a track record for sustaining injuries while riding. He has broken ribs on three separate occasions and has broken his leg, but this has not deterred him from continuing to pursue his passion.
Senior Sportsperson runner-up, 46-year-old Greg Schmidt lists his favourite sports as swimming, bike riding, yoga and tennis. He recently qualified for the World Masters Championships in 50 m and 100 m freestyle, and has also taken up butterfly.
Junior Sportsperson, Hayley Glass is only nine years of age and belongs to, I believe, a third generation Territory family. I am going to get some more information on Hayley because, whilst she is only nine years old, she has packed a lot into those nine years. I will put that in another adjournment at a later time.
Junior Sportsperson runner-up, 14-year-old John Bretten has travelled to New South Wales, South Australia and Queensland where he gained a bronze with the Katherine Judo Club in 2007. John played in Katherine Junior Rugby League’s Under 14 competition, and also played Rugby Union earlier in the year.
Katherine’s Citizen of the Year was awarded to Jenny Duggan, a very worthy recipient. Jenny has lived in Katherine for 30 years. It is hard to know where to start naming the voluntary work that this very energetic mother of five is involved in. To give you some idea of Jenny’s community involvement, she was unable to come to the award ceremony because she was busy volunteering at the St Vincent de Paul shop. Jenny and her husband, Marty Duggan, own and operate Astral Contracting.
For many years now, there have not been too many mornings that you would not see Jenny and her friend, Di Jennison, walking with their dogs somewhere in Katherine with a collection of plastic bags, picking up every bit of rubbish they see. These two women have played a significant role in keeping our footpaths clean all over Katherine and they do a fantastic job. Jenny also participates every year in the Clean Up Australia day and whenever there is a call to help tidy up our river corridor. For several years, Jenny has lobbied to have the railway heritage bridge repainted, and it would be appropriate if that dream was realised this year while she is Citizen of the Year.
Some of the activities that Jenny is involved in include St Joseph’s Catholic Church, St Joseph’s Catholic School, St Vincent de Paul, Katherine Junior Rugby, Katherine Golden Oldies Rugby, and off-road motorbikes, in addition to sponsoring local sports over many years and fundraising for numerous activities. Jenny is a quiet achiever who does not like the limelight but her invaluable contribution to the Katherine community over many years is very much appreciated.
Students who received Australia Day Awards through their schools were Shakita Lindner, MacFarlane Primary School; Karan Symes, Katherine South Primary School; Phillip Morrow, Katherine High School; and Rory Palmer, Michael Lindsay, Katherine Noyce, Rachel Robins, Tara Guempel-Crothers, Tiannah Bernard, Amy Harding, Caleb Patrick, Maxwell Gillett, Kristian Anzac, Teegan O’Keefe, Cleven Woods and Kira Jolly.
This year, the Australia Day Speech was given by long time local resident, Kerryn Taylor. Kerryn’s very interesting speech was on what it means to be an Australian citizen, and was very relevant to every one of us. I am going to include her words in this adjournment. I quote:
2) Australian society values equality of opportunity for individuals regardless of their race, religion or ethnic background; and
That was the end of Kerryn’s speech.
Following the ceremony, Mayor Anne Shepherd invited all to a light morning tea in the Council chamber. The Australia Day birthday cake was cut by the Mayor, the Australia Day Ambassador and me. As she has done for several years, Bronwyn Haggar decorated the cake magnificently. This year she had themed the decorations for the anniversary of the Scout movement complete with pitched tents and a flying fox joining Australia and Tasmania. Bronwyn’s cake decorating talent always creates a lot of interest and it seems such a shame to cut the cake.
The 2008 Australia Day ceremony in Katherine went very well and was well supported.
Mr VATSKALIS (Casuarina): Madam Deputy Speaker, unfortunately, the Territory recently lost a businessman whose contribution to the Northern Territory tourism industry should not be forgotten. John Newland shaped the face of tourism in the Territory and will be remembered for tourism campaigns such as ‘Part of the story of the Northern Territory’, ‘See Alice While She’s Hot’, and the Top End’s ‘Green Season’, and who could forget the ‘You will never, never know if you never, never go’.
John Newland’s love affair with tourism started in 1963 when he came to Alice Springs to assist his brother, Robert, to build the Alice Flag Motor Inn on Undoolya Road, which still operates today.
John, like many visitors to Alice Springs, wanted to make ‘the Alice’ his home and secured employment with E J Connellan which took him to many outlying communities and tourist attractions. John later became Operations Manager for Cornnellan Airways, later renamed Connair and, in 1972, became Manager of the NT Tourist Bureau in Parsons Street in Alice Springs.
After Cyclone Tracy in 1974, the head office of the NTTB was relocated to Alice Springs. John was asked to be Director of Tourism and was given the unenviable task of rebuilding not only tourism in the Top End, but in the Northern Territory. Without John’s dedication and commitment in continually pushing federal, state and territory governments for better infrastructure, tourists today would not enjoy driving on our Stuart Highway, then called ‘the South Road’, or the sealed roads from Alice to the Rock and the Arnhem Highway to Kakadu.
John was also instrumental in getting the new Ghan from Adelaide to Alice Springs and then immediately started working on extending the Ghan’s route to Darwin. John had some terrific allies in the former Lord Mayor of Darwin, the late Alec Fong Lim, Keith Smith, AO, former Chairman of Australian National Railways, and Keith Castle, CEO of CATA tours. Presentations were put to the private and public sectors around the country to enlist their support for the continuation of the railway to Darwin.
Without visionaries such as John Newland, Territorians and visitors would not enjoy the infrastructure facilities that we have today at Ayers Rock and Kakadu.
Other iconic events that John was instrumental in developing were the Camel Cup, the Beer Can Regatta, the Finke Desert Race, Halley’s Comet and the Alice Prize.
Madam Deputy Speaker, I pay tribute to the contribution that John Newland made to our tourism industry. I extend my sympathies to his wife, Janet, children Jenny, Tim, Michael, Steven, Liz, Richard and Chris.
Mr WOOD (Nelson): Madam Deputy Speaker, I would just like to say something about a person who has been very much in the spotlight today. I have known this person since I was elected to parliament. In fact, he entered parliament the same time as I did. He is a deep thinker, an honest, passionate and hard-working man. He is committed to trying to make a difference in the bush, especially for his people.
He and I have had our differences. I have been working for the last six or seven months trying to stop what I believe was the wrong approach to what he was trying to do and, of course, he thought exactly the opposite. He is a man the Territory needs. It would be a great shame for him to sit on the backbench for the rest of his time in this House. I hope the government will reconsider him for a ministerial position.
That man is Elliot McAdam. He is a good man. Unfortunately, as I am learning in politics, that means one has to take a stand even against your friends. I hope that regardless of that …
Dr Burns: You called for his resignation. Do not be a hypocrite.
Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order!
Mr WOOD: You would not know. You would not know.
Dr Burns: I heard you and I read it in the newspaper, so do not be a hypocrite.
Mrs Braham: Let him say some nice things about Elliot. Elliot is a good man.
Dr Burns: Oh, let him salve his own conscience, but that is what he said.
Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order!
Mr WOOD: I find it strange that the member for Sanderson is so bitter about something he knows very little about.
Mr KIELY: A point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker! I was not bitter about anything.
Mr WOOD: Sorry, my apologies. I meant the member for Johnston.
I hope that regardless of our differences we will remain as friends. I still believe there is much that I need to do in relation to local government reform. I will continue to ask the questions, investigate and debate because I also want what is good for the Territory. You will probably not agree with me, but I hope that the noise on the outside does not always reflect the feelings on the inside.
I say to the member for Johnston that asking a person to resign, whether I said it or someone else said it, does not change the fact that I respect the person in question. I was saying - and the minister is representing the government and the government’s policy - that I felt that the government’s policy was terrible, and I still do. Asking the minister to resign is something that we all call for at times. It is not hypocritical. I am sorry, member for Johnston, if you do not understand that; then it is your problem.
I would just like to raise another issue. This involves a young family in the rural area. Mum and dad have a five month old baby. Mum has cervical cancer and hopes to receive treatment interstate. She gets an airfare paid by the government, but I understand she has to find the money up-front. She receives $10 per day to help with accommodation when she is interstate. Her husband also has to pay for an airfare because he needs to travel with her, but he has to apply for a reimbursement which may or may not happen. He had to give up his job to help. Do not forget: this is quite a young family who has had a loss of income.
Why they asked me to bring this to the government today was that they are concerned that there seems to be a lack of understanding in the government about the financial pressures people in these circumstances have to face. They are simply asking the government to look at ways to relieve this pressure. They are also concerned that there is still no oncology unit because they feel that if we did, the stress that relates to travelling interstate would be lessened if they were able to receive this treatment in Darwin.
The government needs to look at situations like this with a sympathetic approach. It needs to see if it can assist families in this situation, especially young families, where they do not get any other financial help and even more especially if one has to give up their job. Another issue they felt that needs looking at is a help line for people with cervical cancer. Maybe the government could also look at that.
I raise this issue in light of what these people have told me, with the hope that the government will look at making some changes which would prevent people in these situations enduring so much stress caused by a financial loss due to the illness. Also, you have the health worries on top of that, and that is something we certainly need to look at.
I would like to talk about Australia Day. We had a very successful Australia Day, both from the Litchfield Shire Council’s point of view and also the Family Fun Day which was held at the Howard Springs Reserve. I thank a number of people and sponsors who helped out on that day. Some people who did a lot of hard work were Bernadette, Di, Phil, Tom and Trish, as well as the Howard Springs Volunteer Fire Brigade members who supplied the soft drink, cooked the meat, and generally helped out all round. Kotch and Noel, who are members of the fire brigade, helped out with the games. Lisa George and Geoff Akers helped out with the Southern Districts Cricket Club on the day as well. Shorelands supplied all the meat, and Devondale supplied milk for the day. Mitre 10, Fin Bins, Reidy’s Lures, Top End Fishing, All Earth, Saddle World, Tommo’s Pies and Coolalinga Car Parts all donated goods or cash for the day.
There were many games including boule, and we tried speed scrabble for the first time this year. It took a little while to get people to be game enough to try it. You were limited to the time you could actually play your letters on the board. If you did not have them down in time, too bad, it went over to the next person. As it got towards the end, it became a bit like a chess game where there were many spectators hanging around watching the people, especially the ones who had reached the finals. It was different and a lot of people enjoyed it.
We had Aussie corn hole and the cricket match. I do not know how many kids we had out on the cricket field, but there were a lot of them. They all had a hit and a bowl and they all enjoyed themselves. We had the pie and hot Coke eating competition with the pies courtesy of Tommo’s. It might sound fairly easy but, when it comes to the crunch, it is not as easy as you think.
All in all, it was a great day that, hopefully, will be bigger and better next year. I thank all the people who helped out on the day and I appreciate the time they had given up on Australia Day when probably they hoped they could do something else, such as sit down and watch the cricket. It certainly was good.
On just a different note, we decorated all the power poles on Whitewood Road with Australian flags. They lasted about six hours and seemed to disappear during the night. We put another batch up early in the morning and they all went as well. It was a little disappointing on Australia Day. I can imagine, at some other time, it may not be a big issue. The street looked nice; people appreciated the colour. The idea was just to advertise that we were going to have some games nearby. Hopefully, we might be able to get some help from Power and Water next time and put them up high so people cannot reach them. I thank the people who helped me put those flags up. All in all, it was a great day on Australia Day.
I stand by my comments that I made regarding Elliot McAdam. I am disappointed in the comments made by the member for Johnston. He may think I am hypocritical, but I do not think he understands the relationship I have with Elliot. I have spoken to Elliot. I am hopeful that he will come back into the Cabinet because I believe he is good value. Calling for the resignation of a minister does not necessarily mean I dislike the person personally. I was dealing with a political matter that I felt was very important and it needed strong opposition to get the government to change. That is simply what it was all about. Because I call for something does not necessarily mean the government has to do what I say, but it is a tool a lot of people use in arguing their point where they feel the government is going down the wrong path. I respect Elliot. We will probably continue to have our disagreements, because I believe there are still many local government issues which need addressing. If this House says that you disagree with someone and therefore become some sort of enemy because you have a difference of opinion, then I would say pity this House. My job …
Dr Burns: Personal things said about Elliot.
Mr WOOD: My job - I beg your pardon?
Dr Burns: I said there have been a lot of personal things said about the man …
Mr WOOD: You would not know what was said.
Dr Burns: … as part of the campaign you waged.
Mr WOOD: The member for Johnston …
Dr Burns: You need to take some responsibility for that.
Madam Acting DEPUTY SPEAKER: Member for Johnston!
Mr WOOD: The member for Johnston has made a statement. If you would like to say that outside, I would be interested.
I have been to many public meetings and I have defended the integrity of the minister. Saying he should resign does not make him a bad person. It is to do with the government’s policy on this issue that I am dealing with. I have always stood up for Elliot. I believe he is a good man. I am disappointed in the member for Johnston for saying something that I think is reproachable. I will leave it at that.
Dr Burns: I did not say you had said them. I said things were said.
Madam Acting DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! Member for Johnston!
Mr WOOD: Inferred.
Mrs BRAHAM (Braitling): Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, I remind everyone that politics is a tough game.
Dr Burns: It is.
Mrs BRAHAM: It is. What you say in here, when you walk out the door, should be forgotten. We are all just people and we should all be able to walk out that door and be friends and colleagues. Do not take things too personally because you will get hurt far too much. I have been around a long time and, as you would know, I have been hurt on many occasions, but I believe we must remember we are all here for Territorians. We might have our arguments on the political scene, but let us not delve into personal attacks upon people. There is a little too much of that here.
That aside, tonight I want to speak of two characters who have recently passed away. I say characters because they were Territorians for a long time, perhaps not well known to people, but they contributed an enormous amount to the development of the Territory and I believe that is important.
The first person I want to speak about briefly is Thomas Ian McKnight, known to us all as Tim, who was 77 when he passed away. Tim seems to have been in Alice Springs forever. He was from the surveying fraternity. I did not realise that surveyors are a tight, close knit group and that they support each other as a profession. I saw a different side of what happened with Tim. It was heartening to see so many people remember someone who has been so long in the Territory by attending his funeral.
Tim was educated in New Zealand and it was there that he learned the technicalities of surveying. By the time he came to the Territory in 1971, not only had he worked throughout New Zealand, but also Nigeria, the Bahamas and Borneo. Being so well travelled, he could have lived anywhere in the world he would have liked because he had such a talent but he chose to spend his life in Central Australia. The people he worked with were really touched by this man.
He worked as a licensed surveyor with the Northern Territory Administration, which became the Northern Territory Department of Lands in 1978 with self-government. The nature of survey work in those early days was land boundaries, mapping control and engineering works in a developing outback region of Australia. Surveying in the Territory involved a tremendous amount of field work, but the surveyors and chain men really enjoyed the lifestyle and Tim became one of the characters in the industry.
They had a huge task at that time. Conditions were harsh with extremes of searing heat and icy cold. Mostly, it was hot, dry and arid, but now and again it could be unexpectedly stormy, windy, thundery and wet. All the trips involved camping, often for weeks at a time, and they certainly did not enjoy the luxuries of camping that we have today. A typical surveying bush trip involved between three to six or even more blokes. I am reading from some of the notes given to me by Roland Maddocks, the Senior Surveyor of the Lands Information Division of the NT Department of Planning and Infrastructure.
He said:
and I presume he is talking about Terry Gadsby there:
Tim accommodated our harsh environment, in summer and in winter. Tim has done surveys anywhere and everywhere in the Territory. It is a bit like the song I’ve been everywhere - Tennant Creek, Borroloola, across the Barkly, Harts Range, across the Plenty to Tarlton Downs, Argadargada, Tobermorey, Finke, Areyonga, and so on. There is a huge list of places that he had been involved with.
He was also involved with the Alice Springs to Darwin line; the beef roads across the Plenty and through Angus Downs and Henbury. He was on-site for the establishment of the tourist resorts at Kings Canyon and Yulara. You will find field books for Larapinta Drive, Lasseter Highway, the Petermann road - mention anything like that and you will get a story about Tim. It is incredible that there are people who have had such a huge history of involvement in the development of the Territory. This man as a surveyor has done so much and we do not even realise it.
Many people came to his funeral from all over Australia. They paid tribute to two particular people as well because as Tim resigned, retired and became not so well, he had wonderful support from Tony Markham and then in later years from Terry Gadsby. We all know that Tim appreciated what his colleagues did for him as he grew older. He even worked on Project Jindalee, the over-the-horizon radar, and laid down the Tropic of Capricorn monument on the Stuart Highway. This is a lot of history that I hope we do not lose. I hope Roland does something with these words that he put together about Tim.
All the surveyors regarded Tim as their mate. He always regarded them as Aussies because he was always a Kiwi at heart but he still called Australia his home. Tim’s family came from New Zealand for the funeral. I know Terry Gadsby is still doing a huge amount of work to settle his affairs. When you hear of people like Tim McKnight who has contributed to the Territory as a surveyor, you realise that the history of this place is never ending. I admire him for what he has done and I thank those people who came to his funeral.
I also want to make brief mention of William Brailsford, or Bill as we knew him. He lived in my electorate and also worked for my husband at one stage in his contracting business. As Bill got older and his wife had passed away, often the newsagent ladies would say things to us like: ‘You had better do something about Bill’, or ‘Perhaps somebody ought to get in touch with his son’. As they said, Bill’s driving became a little unsatisfactory as he grew older and eventually he ended up, I think, in the front of a baker’s shop, so we knew it was time for Bill to stop driving. I was pleased when he came to Darwin to live with his son, Roger. The last few years that Bill was in Darwin were important because he had family to support him. Living on his own in Alice Springs, his neighbours, everyone, seemed to be worried about him but he had a great network. Roger has given me these notes, and I will just mention a few of them.
William Brailsford was born in Nottingham in rather humble circumstances in June, 1920 to a former soldier. In his adult life the Army became a dominant theme. Soon after his 16th birthday, with his father close to death as a result of a wound received in World War I, he joined the Army Reserve. In June 1937, he joined the Royal Leicester Regiment and he continued serving with these Regiments for some time. In September 1938, he had been assigned to the regiment’s 2nd Battalion and found himself on a ship to Palestine.
In 1942, he arrived in Ceylon, which is now Sri Lanka, and then to India. He marched into Burma when the Japanese were advancing and he found himself amongst troops from many nations. Here he came to respect people from other countries as well. On returning to India from Burma in late 1943, he joined the Corps of Military Police and stayed with them until he managed home leave in April 1944. This was the first time he had been home for six years. He left Palestine in June 1946, some 10 days after his 26th birthday - I keep thinking he must have been so much older because he did so much in that time - and he returned to England. He left the military in October of the same year.
At the end of 1946, he entered training at Nottingham Central Fire Station and he stayed as a fireman for some years. He married Joan in 1948 and, in 1951, Roger was born.
By 1965, with 19 years service as a fireman, Bill had decided to follow his two brothers to Australia. He eventually came to Alice Springs in 1984. He was a part-time worker in my husband’s contracting firm. It was sad that Joan passed away and he was left on his own, but he was such a character and knew everyone so well that, in a way, he did not feel lonely, even though we always thought when Roger moved to Darwin that perhaps that is where Bill should be.
Roger says Bill’s driving career ended in a minor, but spectacular accident in the Coles car park at Alice Springs. Bill found himself seeking entry to the local pie shop while behind the wheel of a borrowed Nissan! Life as a single pensioner had become difficult and he agreed to move to Darwin.
Bill Brailsford had a life of extraordinary contrasts. He began life in a town that echoed to the standards, customs and language of the Victorian era. He used the armed forces to escape a life of industrial drudgery and he faced danger so many times in places that even today are challenging. Not content with the quiet life, he became a fire fighter, and when it became clear that life in Australia could offer more, he made a life-changing choice at 45, an age where many men would be contemplating a quiet retirement.
Despite his ways and his love of many things, he always strove to do his best. His Army discharge papers describe his conduct as ‘exemplary, a trier, most honest and sober, a stolid and reliable individual who at all times rendered highly satisfactory service’. While true, he did have a softer side.
He is survived by his sister, Dorothy; his brothers, Albert and John; his son, Roger; his grandsons, Adrian and Simon; and his great-granddaughters, Kiara-Jane, Amber Rose and Rhiannon. I pass on my sincere sympathies to all the family.
Ms CARNEY (Araluen): Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, tonight I pay tribute to a man very well known in Alice Springs who passed away in December last year. I am sure he is probably known to all members of the Assembly. Certainly, he was well known to many members of parliament over a long period of time. I talk, of course, about Bert Cramer.
Many people in Alice Springs would know Bert as that old bloke who drove around town in a ute of dubious roadworthiness who collected cans, annoyed public servants, politicians – usually at about 4 pm on a Friday – and a guy who would talk to anyone who would listen - I was one of them – about the impact of craters, religion and anything else those two subjects and many others would lead to. It is fitting to recognise Bert Cramer in the parliament of the Northern Territory. I will, throughout my contribution, be quoting parts of the eulogy read by his son, Rod, at his funeral which, unfortunately, I was unable to attend.
Bert was an interesting man. He was an artist, a poet, an inventor, an author and an entertainer. He was also a lateral thinker long before that particular term became common. Bert Roland Cramer was born in Tanunda, South Australia on 15 April 1928. He was the first of three sons to Willem and Adela. Bert left school at 14 and worked for several years for the South Australian Brush Company, first in the Adelaide factory and then harvesting and processing Darwin grass at Port Lincoln.
By this time, Army surplus was available and he and his brother, Colin, obtained .303 rifles and weekends were often spent on foot or pushbike expeditions into the bush hunting rabbits, foxes, brumbies and roos, and prospecting for gold. He became a crack shot with open sights. At about that time, he started recording his experiences with a Box Brownie but, unfortunately, many of the photos he took were damaged in the 1988 flood in Alice Springs. Bert taught himself to play the mouth organ sitting alongside a wind-up gramophone, endlessly playing country ballads at approximately 78 revs per minute.
A stint at RM Williams learning saddlery, boot and whip making further prepared Bert for the attraction of the real outback to head north. In February 1949, Bert found a job as a stock camp cook, equipped with rubber-tyred wagon hauled by two camels on Welbourne Hill Station which was 50 km east of Marla on the edge of Sturt’s Stony Desert.
Eleven months later, 21 and unemployed, Bert found himself at the Oodnadatta rail siding intending to return to Adelaide for Christmas, but he decided to have a quick look at what was further north. While on the train, he was offered a job in Alice Springs with the government bore maintenance gang which looked after the bores on the stock routes in the bottom third of the Northern Territory.
One trip found the bore gang a year later passing through Hermannsburg and Bert was shown around the mission by Pastor Albrecht. Bert could not help notice the number of single women working there - school teachers, nurses and so on. Bert commenced work at the stock camp at Hermannsburg in 1951 at the start of the pneumonia inoculation program. These were still frontier days in the cattle camps, long before fridges, radios, four-wheel drives, helicopters and road trains.
Luckily for us, Bert by that time had purchased a 35 mm camera which could fit in his shirt pocket. He started keeping a comprehensive colour slide record of his experiences in the outback - and how fascinating those slides must be. Hermannsburg at the time had plenty of scrubbers and brumbies and very few yards or fences. Saddle tack was falling to bits and stock horses without saddle sores were scarce so much of the time was spent breaking in horses and training the stockmen in horse hygiene and saddlery. Sale cattle were walked to Alice Springs for trucking on the steam train from the old Smith Street yards.
The Hermannsburg community purchased a Caterpillar D4 tractor and scoop, and Bert was tasked to clean out soakages in the Finke and Ellery waterways and to train an Aboriginal man, very well known, Herman Malbunka, then aged 19. Bert was happy to train Herman and he also taught him to read and write by the campfire of the tractor camps.
Romance was alive and well, and Bert found time to court a young school teacher, Mona Kennedy. At Christmas 1952, Bert and Mona announced their engagement and they were married at Light Pass on 28 January 1954. Marriage did not put an end to bush work camps. Mona accompanied Bert, and together they travelled to Gilbert Springs building troughs, or dam yard building or wherever. Their life took them to many places in and around Central Australia.
Soon Bert had other demands on him. They were family demands. With the birth of Rodney, and then Lance 15 months later, they needed a cot, so Bert decided to build one. He built one that had a fly screen that was fully collapsible. As the children grew, they also needed a pram and a high chair, so Bert built them as well and all, I am told, are still serviceable. Many people can still see the pram holding the wash basket at Mona’s clothes line.
The end of 1956 saw Bert and his young family leave Hermannsburg. They spent six months in South Australia and then, in July 1957, they started life in Alice Springs on the Emily Gap property, now Ragonesi Road. Times were tough: a bare block, the first years of drought, no water, electricity, phone, house, bitumen road or secure tenure. Initially, Bert shot roos for skins at night, pegging them by day and cleaning out and equipping an old well, originally dug by the Kilgariffs, another well known pioneering family in the Territory, to obtain water.
Bert did a short stint working on the night cart until he got the sack, branded as a trouble maker for asking for soap and overalls. Bert did the occasional saddle repair, fixed pumps and windmills and other pieces of equipment. There is no doubt that Bert was an enterprising fellow, and he became the agent for Villiers Engineers, Bodaco and Mona Pumps and Denkovit. A shortage of plumbers in town led them to melt down cases of roofing nails to recover the lead from around the heads and sold them to the plumbers. Bert was an enterprising man.
In 1958, he did a fencing job at the warehouse of Stuarts and Lloyds on Ghan Road opposite Sutton Motors. This led to full-time employment in the warehouse. A regular customer there was Jack Maskall, who offered Bert a job in his welding shop on Healy Crescent under the athel pines. In 1959, Bert took on a job as kitchen gardener for Connellan Airways at the pilot mess and Araluen Homestead.
In 1960, he saw the arrival of their daughter, Judy. It was a trying time for Rod and Lance, their mother was away and they could not see the point of Bert’s toasted lettuce sandwiches. No wonder that was worthy of a mention in the eulogy, Madam Acting Deputy Speaker.
After two years gardening, he took up the offer of employment in his welding workshop on a casual basis. This was an opportunity not lost on Bert, who soaked up as much as he could of the metal trade from the highly skilled Jack Maskall, and this gave him the skills and opportunity to start constructing bigger projects.
When new asbestos water pipes freighted into Alice Springs had a substantial number of breakages, he salvaged all the broken pipes and built the lathe to machine new ends on them for joining and installed them as mains on his farm, once again, evidence of his entrepreneurial nature. Bert mounted a large pump on the power take-off of the Land Rover, and monopolised the emptying and cleaning of five inground private swimming pools in town at that time. His penchant for pumps and pipes saw him annually employed collecting dirty diesel fuel and sump oil, storing, mixing and spraying it on the sand greens of the old golf course.
In 1963, Bert tendered for the contract to install the fence strainer posts at the Old Telegraph Station Reserve. Showing his calculations to his friend Jack, Jack had one comment, which was ‘double it’, which Bert did and he still won the contract. This was the beginning of a decade-and-a-half contracting relationship with the Northern Territory Reserves Board and the Chairman, Colonel Lionel Rose. The colonel took quite a liking to Bert and his workmanship, and no more tender documents were thereafter required. After the complete fencing of the Telegraph Station, Bert went on to design and construct a sophisticated pumping station, drawing from five bores in the bed of the Todd River, to supply to the Telegraph Station. Bert installed water supplies at Stanley Chasm and Simpson’s Gap and he installed the first toilet blocks at Stanley Chasm and Ormiston Gorge.
The income from these contracts trickled back into the farm. Bert bought the sad remains of a bee keeping enterprise. Finding the hives riddled with wax moth, Bert proceeded to boil, clean and repair the lot and started a honey business. The dairy was gradually forming, goats and cows were hand milked, bottled in whatever they could get their hands on, and delivered around Alice Springs. Eventually registered studs, the goats and cows were part of the ‘milk and honey farming’ until 1987, when after 30 years, the block was sold and Temple Bar was purchased.
The dairy herd needed fodder, so Bert built a fifth of an acre water-powered pivot sprinkler he had invented in his stock camp swag a decade earlier that ran on a mere 15 psi of water pressure. To harvest the lucerne crops, he imported an old binder and, on two daring occasions, grew wheat crops on rainfall. He also experimented with onions, cotton, dates, pasture, beans and other products. A secondhand Caterpillar D4 bulldozer, purchased in 1965, enabled other contracting jobs and bigger water harvesting projects on the farm. The cleaning of the rodeo ground at Blatherskite Park, the first stage of Jindalee (Mt Everard) and Pioneer Park were all done with this machine. It helped excavate the two-up pit at the Casino. Bert could almost make the bulldozer sing.
The dairy was prefabricated and erected in 1966, and a two stand milking machine was installed. The milking machine, an electric welder and a nine frame honey extractor were perhaps the only new large pieces of equipment they ever bought. Mostly, if they needed it, Bert built it. A boring plant, cement mixer, drill press, power hacksaw and air compressor were all supplied from his own ingenuity and the town dump, with access to Jack Maskall’s workshop and advice when needed.
However, not all of Bert’s inventions were successful. In the 1970s, Bert needed a rock saw to repair the sandstone fence in front of today’s Centralian Advocate premises. Bert looked at his metallic chainsaw, bought a masonry wheel and went to the workshop. A day or so later, he emerged with a hand-held, belt driven rock saw. The specifications on the masonry wheel advised the maximum speed was something a lot less than the RPMs of the chainsaw motor. Revving it out on the test run, the masonry wheel disintegrated and disappeared, the only trace of it being a ‘Zorro-like’ slice up the leg of his baggy trousers and scratches on son Lance’s knee and nose, as he was holding the rev counter.
Bert Cramer was a well known member of the Alice Springs community. Apart from his ingenuity and entrepreneurial nature, he was, for many years, the secretary of the Alice Springs Farmers Association and a Sunday school teacher. The foundation stone of the church had been collected by Bert while a stockman at Hermannsburg. He fully intended to use the stone for his headstone, but he donated it to the church instead.
There is no doubt that Bert Cramer will be considered one of Australia’s battlers, but he was a tenacious battler. The only time he ever gave up was at his room at the Old Timers on 19 December 2007. Bert is survived by his brother, Colin, wife Mona, children Rod, Lance and Judy, five grandchildren, and one great granddaughter.
As Bert observed in hospital: ‘You could say I have had an interesting life. I have done the best I can’. Indeed, Bert Cramer did lead a very interesting life, and he did more than his best. At times in the Territory’s history, when there were not the modern conveniences of today, the Territory depended on people’s pioneering spirit.
In the parliament of the Northern Territory, many members of parliament have talked about the pioneering spirit of our fellow Territorians. So many of them now are older and they are passing on. Bert Cramer was one such character, and the people of Alice Springs can be very proud of a man like this, always an interesting fellow to talk to.
His son, Rod, plays a very active role in the community in Alice Springs. I do not know Rod all that well, however I do have a sneaking suspicion that he shares his father’s ingenuity and entrepreneurial nature.
On behalf of all members of the Northern Territory Legislative Assembly, I pass on my condolences to Bert’s family and thank them for supporting Bert throughout his interesting life and, most importantly of all, thanking Bert for his tenacity, his ingenuity, his passion for things that not everyone else shared. This is the pioneering spirit of the Territory and the Territory, without a shadow of a doubt, has been enriched as a result of Bert Cramer’s experiences in the Territory and the fascinating life he has led.
Dr BURNS (Johnston): Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, on Australia Day this year, Robert Aubrey Bradshaw was awarded the Northern Territory Public Service Medal for outstanding public service to the development of Public Sector Administration in the Northern Territory.
Robert first arrived in the Territory as a newly graduated lawyer in 1976. He took up a position with the Department of Law, as it was then, perhaps not realising that this fateful decision would have such a big impact on his life.
Over the 30 years that followed that initial migration north, Robert has served the Northern Territory Public Service, and the Departments of Law and Justice in particular, with dedication, diligence and distinction. Despite such a long involvement with one department, albeit in as many guises, Robert has thus far - and I am sure there are many more years to come – had what I can only imagine to have been a most interesting and varied career.
Robert has held positions ranging from Registrar-General, Registrar of Land and Business Agents and Public Trustee to the Commissioner of Consumer Affairs and more recently, Director of Legal Policy.
Robert’s contribution in the area of law reform must also be noted. As a member of the Policy Division of the Department of Justice, Robert has worked on many and varied projects at both Territory and national levels, advising governments of the day on the development of legislation and legal policy generally. Most recently, Robert has managed to regain the record for the longest piece of Justice legislation with his work on the development of the Legal Profession Act.
Renowned for his enthusiasm for his job and his ability to work seven days a week at all hours of the day and night, Robert has provided me and my predecessors as Attorney-General with exemplary advice and service; he has been a source of advice and guidance to colleagues, other members of the public service and the public generally. He has also been a mentor and an example to young upcoming lawyers.
There is no doubt that Robert Bradshaw is a deserving and appropriate recipient of such an award as the Public Service Medal. I am sure that all members of the House join me in congratulating Robert Bradshaw and thank him for his service and urge him to continue his good work for the Territory.
Tonight I would like to acknowledge some schools in my electorate and particularly those students who graduated last year from schools in my electorate and started middle school.
I request that the names of the students from each school be incorporated in the Parliamentary Record.
Leave granted.
From Wagaman Primary School, congratulations to:
Anthony Alley Joshua Barnes
Ange Bachu Carloss Camposo
Dein Cantrill Jayme Cigobia
Dallas Collinson Shianne Craufurd
Jerome De Costa Khloey Djawas
Somenah Dooley Niressa Fenis
Emily Fletcher Vernon Francisco
Kallan Gill Brandon Hansen
Cain Hendy Riley Hendy
Taylah Hendy Jackson Hrotek
Emma Jackson Jesse Jones
Dhiraj Lal Tommy Le
Teikauea Maniju Lorena McIntyre
Hannah Motter Bianca Mowat
Trevor Nickels Joel O’Brien
Manoli Panatos Stergos Panatos
Jess Rees Donica Sarikon
Joseph Shereston Rui Sihombing
Cain Simpson Michael Skopellos
Karlee Truscott Tiani Van der Velde
Julienne Vargas Nathalia Wauchope
Marni Wishart
From Jingili Primary School, congratulations to:
Asher Bradbury Shayenne Carne
Stephanie Franklin Bradley Golik
Chantel Holloway John Hoskins
Max Kenna Leroy Larson
Nicholas Long Tre Manning-Watson
Lucas McAndrew Luke McIntosh
Theo McMahon Ryan McMurray
Alexis Merritt Shannen Pugh
Bryden Racines Emma Ramsey
Kailin Rosas Lance Schmidt
Ewan Sutardy Renae Williams
Rowan Williams Paige Wilson
Jacqueline Withers
From Moil Primary School, congratulations to:
Jessica Agung Shane Atkins
Mareysol Beltran Jedda Bennett-Kellam
Aidan Bird Jordan Briston
Eloise Bruekers Madison Campbell
William Carroll Warren Collins
Shane Creeper Beau Cubillo
Carlo Dela Pena Nick Deverill
Jethro Dickens Ethan Dilettoso
Maria Ergas Anthony Esam
Kieren Fiorenza Ryan Fountain
Stacey Gould Samuel Handley
Adam Hodor Elysia Jongue
Dylan Jones Vaanathy Kandiah
Lee Kenny Daniel Lai
Felicity Lay Livia Lay
Manap Lay Sau-Ching Leung
Christina Lopes Benjamin Lu
Ian Manolis Douglas Mansell
Phoebe Mansfield Tara Maxwell
Riley May Tara McIntyre
Cameron McKenzie Stephanie Mison
Keanu Moylan Jo Newberry
Sam Newberry Rebbeca Noakes
Tegan O’Connor
Sassikumar Packiakumar
Matthew Petterson Teyarra Pickering
Tolanda Pickering Annie Pidgeon
Alyssa Pidgeon Michael Pilling
Elycia Pittman Steven Polychrone
Mathew Rehrmann Nicholas Simmonds
Kostandin Smalios Chloe Smith
Jett Sukcharoen Vivian Tchia
Adrienne Turner Luke Urban
Emanuel Vieira Bianca Walsh
Denise Wheeler Kylie Wheeler
Jarryn Zyka
Dr BURNS: Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, the 2008 school year has begun and all classes are now well into Term 1. School council AGMs are coming up. It is a fantastic opportunity for parents to get involved in decision-making and management of their children’s school.
Fundraising events will start again and I hope to attend the Jingili Twilight International Markets to be held at the school in March this year. It is always great to see school councils forming committees for fundraising and coming up with such a wide variety of ideas for making extra funds to help the schools out. Jingili is also planning a trip to Canberra this year in August so it will be lots of action as far as fundraising goes to ensure that that trip is a success.
At the end of last year, I was happy to supply sponsorship for the Jingili Year 5 camping events at Batchelor. Breanna Haase from Year 4/5 Heysen sent me a wonderful e-mail seeking support, and following the great success of the camping trip, sent me photos to check out just what a great time they had. Breanna reported that the camp was really fun with many activities including archery, snorkelling, bike riding, canoeing, kayaking, rock climbing, high ropes, low ropes and swimming. I take this opportunity to thank Breanna for her letter and her photos.
At the end of last year, I presented prizes at the Greek School end-of-year awards to Mihalis Halkitis and Faneromeni Koulouritis for high achievement. Well done Mihalis and Faneromeni.
On Australia Day, the Student Citizen Awards for 2008 were announced. I offer my heartiest congratulations to Decideria Alves and Sheradene Solien-Senge of Alawa Primary School; Kym Baird of Casuarina Senior College; Ewan Sutardy and Jessica Harpur of Jingili Primary; Emma Jackson and Hannah Motter of Wagaman Primary; and Vaanathy Kandiah of Moil Primary School. These students are chosen for this award based on their outstanding citizenship qualities within their school and the community.
Last Friday, I had the opportunity to attend the presentation of Certificates of Merit from the Northern Territory Board of Studies and subject awards sponsored by various organisations throughout the Territory. The Northern Territory Board of Studies promotes excellence in school learning and recognises student achievement in the senior secondary years. The following students from Casuarina Senior College, another school within my electorate, are to be congratulated on their achievements and the college should be rightly acknowledged for its excellence in teaching.
Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, I seek to include this list of names in the Parliamentary Record:
Leave granted.
Kelly Beneforti Carmen Chau
Joshua Clayfield Helen Dockrell
Nadia D’Souza Daniel Ellen-Barwell
Shelley Keast Jayde Kellie
Hivaraj Klessa Georgia Leach
Erin Lim Bonnie McGregor
Joshua Miles Brooke Ottley
Stevie Shehan Chrysovalantis Sideris
Raphaela Thynne Ciella WIlliams
Dr BURNS: Kelly Beneforti was also awarded the Rotary Club of Darwin Ian McGregor Year 12 English Award, the Lord Florey Students Prize, and also headed the list of the Top Twenty 2007 Final Year Students. She was also named the Most Outstanding Stage 2 NTCE Student for 2007. Well done, Kelly!
Helen Dockrell, also among the Top Twenty Final Year Students, won the Dennis Thompson Estate and the Australian Veterinary Association (NT Division) Science Award, as well as the Royal Australian Chemical Institute and Northern Territory Environmental Laboratories Chemistry Award.
Eliza Bott and Stevie Shehan were presented with the International Association of Hydrogeologists (NT) Geography Awards, and Sita Rodgers was awarded the International Association of Hydrogeologists (NT) Geology Award.
Carmen Chau was presented with the Lord Florey Students Prize, as well as placing third in the Top Twenty Final Year Students.
Thomas Cowie was presented with the Northern Territory School Music Award, and Michael Jones, Debra Fox, Paul Lyons and Brendin Lacco were presented with the NT Board of Studies Vocational Education and Training School awards. Michael was awarded for Building and Construction; Debra for Community Services, Health and Education, Paul for Engineering, and Brendin for Business, Clerical and Information Technology.
Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, once again I ask that this list of other Top Twenty 2007 Final Year Students from Casuarina Senior College be incorporated into the Parliamentary Record.
Leave granted.
Danmei Lin Raphaela Thynne
Venu D’Souza Bonnie McGregor
John Kandiah Ciella Williams
Daniel Ellen-Barwell Hannah Williams
Susan Glencross Grace Ness
Jennifer Wilson Joshua Miles
Stevie Shehan Leonard Quong
Dr BURNS: Last, but not least, while talking about the fantastic young kids in my electorate, I would like to make special mention of an up-and-coming baseball player, Michael Garton of Jingili, who represented the Northern Territory at the National Youth Baseball Championships held in Kempsey, New South Wales last month. Michael and his team won silver medals, but Michael is only 10 years of age and was only one of two that age in the competition who were given approval to play at that level based on outstanding skills for age. What a fantastic achievement. I will be keeping an eye on Michael and wish him all the best in his baseball career.
I attended the Australia Day Citizenship Ceremony held at the Darwin Entertainment Centre on 26 January. I congratulate all of our newest Australian citizens. In particular, I welcome in my electorate, Mr Ajout Ajout of Alawa, my good friend Peter Jones’ wife, Tita Jones of Jingili, and Mrs Celia Lee, Mr Salim Mohamed, and Mrs Laura Smithers of Moil. Darwin is such a culturally diverse place to live in and I hope our newest citizens will be even happier living here at the top of Australia as Australian citizens.
Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, I am very proud to be the local member for the Johnston electorate. There is a lot going on there, many fantastic people, and I look forward to speaking in future adjournments on their achievements.
Motion agreed to; the Assembly adjourned.
DISTINGUISHED VISITORS
Madam SPEAKER: Honourable members, I advise of the presence of many distinguished guests in the Speaker’s Gallery. In particular, I advise of the presence of His Honour the Administrator, Mr Tom Pauling QC, and Mrs Tessa Pauling. On behalf of all honourable members, I extend to you a very warm welcome.
Members: Hear, hear!
Madam SPEAKER: Also in the Speaker’s Gallery are representatives of local government: the Right Worshipful the Lord Mayor, Mr Garry Lambert, the Lord Mayor of Darwin; and His Worship the Mayor of Palmerston, Mr Robert Macleod. On behalf of all honourable members, I extend to you a very warm welcome.
Representing our religious communities are the Very Reverend Jeremy Greaves, representing the Bishop of the Anglican Diocese of the Northern Territory; the Reverend Wendell Flentje, the Moderator of the Northern Synod of the Uniting Church of Australia; and the Venerable Medhankara Thero (Bhante), the Spiritual Adviser for the International Buddhist Centre. On behalf of all honourable members, I extend to you a very warm welcome.
Representing our Defence Forces are Air Commodore Ian Meyn, Commander Northern Command and Mrs Sharon Meyn; and Brigadier Michael Krause, Commander 1st Brigade and Mrs Jacqui Krause. On behalf of all honourable members, I extend to you a very warm welcome.
We are pleased to have representatives of foreign regions: Mr Harbangan Napitupulu, Consul for the Republic of Indonesia and Mrs Murtiani Siregar Napitupulu; Mr Harry Maschke, Honorary Consul for Germany and Mrs Janice Murdoch; Mr Keith Aitken, Honorary Consul for Poland and Mrs Lea Aitken; and Mr Hugh Bradley, Honorary Consul for Sweden and Finland, and Mrs Sue Bradley AM. On behalf of all honourable members, I extend to you a very warm welcome.
I also acknowledge the presence in the gallery of members of the Larrakia Nation, and the Chinese community and the Chung Wah Society. On behalf of members, I thank the Larrakia Nation for the smoking ceremony, and the Chung Wah Society for the blessing of the Chamber.
Members: Hear, hear!
Madam SPEAKER: There are many more people, but I particularly recognise the young people who have joined us today from schools across Darwin: students from Year 6 at Leanyer Primary School, accompanied by Mrs Lindy Maddock and Ms Fiora Breuer; Year 5/6 from St Mary’s Primary School accompanied by Mr Terry Cullen; Year 7 Dripstone Middle School accompanied by Ms Jessica Goegan; Nightcliff Middle School students - and may I say a particular warm welcome as the member for Nightcliff - accompanied by Ms Lyn Hollow, the principal; Year 4 to 6 students from Wulagi Primary School accompanied by Ms Tania Kolomitsev; Year 10/11 Marrara Christian College students accompanied by Mr Stuart Taylor; and Year 5/6 students from Anula Primary School accompanied by Ms Judy Evans. On behalf of all honourable members, I extend to you a very warm welcome.
Members: Hear, hear!
Madam SPEAKER: It is wonderful to see full galleries for the opening of our parliament. It reminds honourable members that we are all elected to represent each of you here and I hope you are interested in what our members are doing. I invite you to come to any session of our parliament. Question Time is always an interesting time and we have tours of Parliament House as well. Once again, welcome to Parliament House.
TABLED PAPER
Resignation of Deputy Speaker and Chairman of Committees – Member for Goyder
Resignation of Deputy Speaker and Chairman of Committees – Member for Goyder
Madam SPEAKER: Honourable members, I have received a letter from the Deputy Speaker, Mr Ted Warren, the member for Goyder, noting that he has resigned from the position of Deputy Speaker and Chairman of Committees.
CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES
AND DEPUTY SPEAKER
Appointment of Member for Port Darwin
Madam SPEAKER: Honourable members, following the resignation of the member for Goyder, there is now a vacancy.
Mr HENDERSON (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, I propose to the Assembly for its Chairman of Committees and Deputy Speaker the member for Port Darwin. I move that the member for Port Darwin be appointed Chairman of Committees and Deputy Speaker of this Assembly.
Madam SPEAKER: The Chief Minister has nominated the member for Port Darwin. Is there someone to second that?
Ms SCRYMGOUR (Arafura): Madam Speaker, I second the motion.
Madam SPEAKER: Member for Port Darwin, do you accept that nomination?
Ms SACILOTTO (Port Darwin): Madam Speaker, I accept the nomination.
Madam SPEAKER: Are there any further nominations? There being no further nominations you are duly elected member for Port Darwin.
Members: Hear, hear!
Ms SACILOTTO (Port Darwin): Honourable members, I express my sincere thanks and appreciation for the high honour you have conferred upon me. Thank you.
Madam SPEAKER: Congratulations on behalf of all honourable members. We look forward to working with you in our parliament.
COMMITTEE MEMBERSHIP
Changes to Membership
Changes to Membership
Madam SPEAKER: Honourable members, I advise that I have received letters from the Leader of Government Business and the Opposition Whip proposing changes to membership of Assembly committees as follows:
Substance Abuse Committee: the member for Port Darwin be discharged and the member for Arnhem be appointed;
House Committee: the member for Stuart be discharged and the member for Arnhem be appointed;
Standing Orders Committee: the member for Daly be discharged and the member for Goyder be appointed;
Sport and Youth Committee: the members for Port Darwin, Sanderson, Millner and Blain be discharged and the members for Daly, Stuart, Arnhem and Greatorex be appointed;
Environment Committee: the member for Millner be discharged and the member for Stuart be appointed;
Legal and Constitutional Affairs Committee: the member for Sanderson be discharged and the member for Stuart be appointed; and
Subordinate Legislation and Publications Committee: the member for Stuart be discharged and the member for Port Darwin be appointed.
Honourable members, I table the letter.
I also received from the Opposition Whip changes to the membership of those committees:
Sport and Youth Committee: the member for Blain be discharged and the member for Greatorex be appointed.
Ms LAWRIE (Leader of Government Business): Madam Speaker, I move that the Assembly agree to the changes to the membership of Assembly committees as contained in the letters tabled.
Motion agreed to.
GOVERNMENT ADMINISTRATIVE ARRANGEMENTS
Mr HENDERSON (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, I table the Administrative Arrangements Order of Government dated 30 November 2007, Northern Territory Gazette No S36:
PAUL RAYMOND HENDERSON
- Chief Minister
Police, Fire and Emergency Services
Major Projects and Trade
Climate Change
Territory-Federal Relations and Statehood
Multicultural Affairs
MARION ROSE SCRYMGOUR
- Employment, Education and Training
Family and Community Services
Child Protection
Indigenous Policy
Arts and Museums
Women’s Policy
DELIA PHOEBE LAWRIE
- Treasurer
Planning and Lands
Infrastructure and Transport
Public Employment
CHRISTOPHER BRUCE BURNS
- Health
Justice and Attorney-General
Racing, Gaming and Licensing
Alcohol Policy
KONSTANTINE VATSKALIS
- Business and Economic Development
Tourism
Asian Relations
Regional Development
Defence Support
Essential Services
ELLIOT ARTHUR McADAM
- Local Government
Housing
Central Australia
Corporate and Information Services
Communications
CHRISTOPHER WILLIAM NATT
- Primary Industry and Fisheries
Mines and Energy
LEONARD FRANCIS KIELY
- Natural Resources, Environment
and Heritage
Parks and Wildlife
MATTHEW THOMAS BONSON
- Sport and Recreation
Senior Territorians
Young Territorians
Assisting the Chief Minister on
Multicultural Affairs
RESIGNATION OF MINISTERIAL PORTFOLIOS
Member for Barkly
Member for Barkly
Mr HENDERSON (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, I also advise that the member for Barkly has resigned his ministerial portfolios this morning. I will be assuming his portfolio responsibilities until a new minister is elected and portfolios allocated.
WARRANT
Deputy Chairman of Committees
Deputy Chairman of Committees
Madam SPEAKER: Honourable members, pursuant to the provisions of Standing Order 12, I hereby revoke all previous warrants nominating members to act as Deputy Chairmen of Committees and nominate the following members to act as Deputy Chairmen of Committees: Ms Alison Anderson, Mr James Burke, Mr Karl Hampton, Mr Rob Knight, Ms Malarndirri McCarthy, Mr Ted Warren and Mr Gerry Wood, when requested so to do by the Speaker.
Given under my hand this 12th day of February 2008.
MESSAGE FROM ADMINISTRATOR
Message No 25
Message No 25
Madam SPEAKER: Honourable members, I have received from his Honour the Administrator Message No 25 notifying assent to bills passed in the November 2007 sittings of the Assembly.
RESPONSES TO PETITIONS
The CLERK: Madam Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 100A, I inform honourable members that responses to petition No 67 and petition No 69 have been received and circulated to honourable members. The text of the responses will be placed on the Legislative Assembly website and a copy of the response will be provided to the member who tabled the petition for distribution to petitioners.
- Petition No 67
Request for Permanent Veterinarian in Maningrida
Date Presented: 27 November 2007
Presented by: Mr McAdam
Referred to: Minister for Primary Industry and Fisheries
Date response due: 8 May 2008
Date response received: 14 January 2008
Date response presented: 12 February 2008
Response
- In response I can recognise the benefits of the dog health programs in Indigenous communities to improve the health and welfare of dogs. I appreciate the petitioners’ concern for welfare and wellbeing of the children in the community of Maningrida and note the request to establish and maintain a permanent veterinarian in Maningrida. However, I am advised that dog health programs do not produce a direct improvement in the health of children. Veterinary services for dog health programs can be obtained by visiting private veterinarians. Alternatively, the community might provide assistance for a veterinarian to establish a veterinary practice at Maningrida. I suggest that contact is made with a non-government organisation which coordinates dog health programs. The contact details are:
Julia Hardaker, Executive Officer
Animal Management in Rural and Remote Indigenous Communities
PO Box 1591, Nightcliff NT 0814
Telephone: 8941 8813,
E-mail: info@amrric.org,
Website: www.amrric.org
- Petition No 69
Increase in Standard Taxi Licence and Multi-Purpose Taxi Fee
Date Presented: 29 November 2007
Presented by: Mr Mills
Referred to: Minister for Infrastructure and Planning
Date response due: 10 June 2008
Date response received: 10 January 2008
Date response presented: 12 February 2008
Response
- Following discussions with the Taxi Council of the Northern Territory and taxi operators, the 15% increase will apply to all taxi licences and will be introduced in 5% increments over three years. The increments will not commence before March 2008.
A 1.8% taxi fare increase commenced on 19 December 2007, ensuring that the licence fee increase does not reduce the incomes of taxi drivers and operators.
Lastly, the Multi-Purpose Taxi Lift Incentive Scheme has also commenced. This will ensure that Territorians with disabilities have improved access to taxis by providing an additional financial incentive to taxi drivers who service such people.
MINISTERIAL REPORTS
Chinese New Year
Chinese New Year
Mr HENDERSON (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, it is fitting that we join with our Chinese community to celebrate Chinese New Year in 2008, the Year of the Rat, and Gong Xi Fa Cai to everybody in the Chamber.
We are privileged to live in a society enriched by vibrant and diverse multicultural communities. In the Northern Territory, multicultural communities have made a very substantial contribution to our social, economic and cultural development. Our cultural diversity was on striking display this morning with the smoking ceremony performed on behalf of the Larrakia Nation, and the Chinese New Year blessing ceremony supported by the Chung Wah lion dancers. I am sure all honourable members will join with me in expressing appreciation to both groups. It is the only parliament in Australia which celebrates the opening of the parliamentary New Year, but I also acknowledge that in the federal parliament this morning we had a similar indigenous welcoming.
Members on both sides of the Assembly will be familiar with the long association of the Chinese with the Territory. The first Chinese migrants came here in the late 1800s, many with dreams of striking it rich on our goldfields. By 1881, the Chinese outnumbered Europeans by six to one. Indeed, for much of its early history, Darwin was a Chinese town. Since those pioneering days, the Chinese community has contributed significantly to the Territory.
Today, family names like Chin, Lay, Mu, Lee, Quong, Lowe, Fong Lim, Jape, Ah Kit, and many more, are well known in our community. Chinese businessmen and women run thriving enterprises and our local Australian Chinese community, together with the Territory government, maintains strong links of culture, friendship and trade with China. China is now a major player in the world economy and an engine of economic growth.
While the Territory and Australia as a whole seek a broad based relationship with China, trade and investment linkages will be a particular focus for the foreseeable future. My government will continue to be proactive in supporting trade in resources and services with China. We will continue to build on the initial successes of the China Minerals Investment Strategy.
Tourism is another area where our links with China will only strengthen in the years to come. The Territory government will continue to develop these important commercial relationships with China. The contribution of the Chinese community locally will always be important to our success. Organisations such as the Chung Wah Society, the Timor-Chinese Association and the Hakka Association bring a community focus to Chinese culture and tradition. The Chinese community in the Territory is known for its generosity and commitment to family and hard work. It has been an honour for me and many of my government colleagues and other members of this Assembly to join with the Chinese community in celebrating New Year.
On 7 February, it was my privilege as Chief Minister to host a reception in Parliament House to usher in the New Year. I was delighted to see the community turn out in such large numbers to join the celebration. Those present were enthralled by the enchanting music and traditional dancing. Congratulations to all the dancers, Mrs Leah Jongue for her renditions on the Chinese harp, Meimi Louie for her keyboard music, and the Chinese Language and Culture Centre of Darwin.
Last Saturday, I was delighted to attend a Chinese New Year celebration hosted by the NT Timor-Chinese Association. The music, food, dancing and the community involvement was superb. The event saw the baptism of the new kitchen at the community hall. Congratulations to the Association President, Rui Mu, and all those involved in the event.
I also look forward to attending the Chung Wah Association’s Chinese New Year Banquet at the SKYCITY Casino. I thank the President, Adam Lowe, for his kind invitation.
The government is committed to continuing support for the Territory’s multicultural communities. I am uplifted and inspired by their contribution to the Territory. I am certain that Chinese Territorians will continue to play a key role in the future of the Northern Territory. We will work together for continuing harmony and prosperity, and a secure future for our children.
For the next two weeks or so, the Chinese New Year will be celebrated with lion dances and blessing ceremonies. I thank and congratulate all those involved. I am sure all honourable members will join me in extending best wishes to our Australian Chinese Community for a prosperous and rewarding 2008. Gong Xi Fa Cai.
Mr MILLS (Opposition Leader): Madam Speaker, the opposition concurs with the sentiments that have been expressed by the Chief Minister. I, and other members from this side, have attended a number of those functions. The strength that we gain as a culture from our understanding of the Chinese culture is the strength of family. That is encouragement to us all to value those things which are most important. In order to progress and to develop, we need to develop a greater understanding and respect for the Chinese culture.
As the lions came into the Chamber, I reflected on the important role the Chinese community has had in the history of the Northern Territory. At the turn of the last century there were 10 Chinese for every Caucasian. They had a significant impact on the development of the Northern Territory and are woven into the culture of that which is Territorian.
With the emerging economic presence of China in the world market, we are strategically located to capitalise on that changing dynamic within the region. It is critical that we develop a better understanding of that dynamic and that change so that we can respond to it in a proactive way. I encourage the government to continue down the path that is already outlined. You have the support of the opposition. I am aware, as are members here and members in the business sector, that there is a changing dynamic within our region and we must be well positioned.
I note the grassroots activities of Queensland and Western Australia, in particular, in getting close to those markets in a more proactive way than I believe we are, and taking advantage of the opportunities that we do have, particularly when we reference the unique history that the Territory has in its earlier stages of development.
We support the statement and we look forward to further developments in this area.
Mrs BRAHAM (Braitling): Madam Speaker, I agree that it is most important to continue our links with China, not just from a business point of view but also from a cultural point of view. Admittedly, we did not have such an influence in the Centre as you have had in the Top End even though there were some Chinese who ventured down in the early days of Central Australia and those of you who come from Central Australia will recall the Fan family. It must have been a terrific expedition to do that in the harsh climate in which they ventured.
Coming from Bendigo, the Chinese community has been part of my life for many years and, like the Territory, Bendigo has embraced the Chinese community and every year we have this wonderful celebration of the Chinese New Year.
I know that your emphasis on dealing with China and the influence of the people in this city will greatly enhance the opportunities for the Northern Territory. I say to everyone here that we should be embracing all cultures, no matter where they are from, as this population has certainly benefited from many people who have come to the Territory. Most of us have come from somewhere else. We come to contribute, and let us hope that we all work together in harmony from now on.
Cyclone Helen
Mr HENDERSON (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, today I report on the impact of tropical Cyclone Helen and the lessons learnt. After tracking west as a depression, Tropical Cyclone Helen intensified in the Joseph Bonaparte Gulf and, in line with Bureau of Meteorology predictions, reversed course.
The unusual track of this system reduced the normal warning time issued by the bureau. Helen crossed the Top End coast at Channel Point as a Category 2 system at 10 pm on Friday, 4 January 2008. Maximum wind speeds at Channel Point were estimated to be 130 km/h to 140 km/h. Darwin recorded a maximum gust of 102 km/h, which equates to a Category 1 system. This was not a particularly severe cyclone, yet it is estimated that 700 trees were blown over, about 15 500 residences were left without power, and a small number of houses damaged. Fortunately, the weather system was fast moving and, although some rivers rose quickly, no flooding of townships occurred.
I am pleased to begin this report by stating that, overall, the cyclone plan for the region worked well. That is not to say that everything worked perfectly. Preparing a city the size of Darwin for a cyclone is a major undertaking and, inevitably, there are things that we can be doing better. Whilst we have learnt much, it is nevertheless clear that we have a sound basis on which to improve our responses to cyclones.
The overriding issue which caused the most public concern has been the power outages caused by fallen trees. This raises a number of issues. As I reported, around 15 500 residences from Darwin to Batchelor were without power on the Saturday morning after the cyclone. Notably, by Sunday afternoon, about 90% had their power restored. Of the remainder, about 560 properties were restored over the next few days. The delays, in most cases, were caused by access difficulties due to flooded and washed-out roads.
We have a beautiful environment here in the Top End but, obviously, there is a balance to be struck between having enticing shady gardens and public spaces and clearing trees that might threaten power lines. Clearly, government will need to consider whether the current balance is correct; whether Power and Water requires greater powers to extend their tree clearing operations, and whether other measures to improve the robustness of the power supply should be contemplated. As part of this, individual homeowners need to consider how well they have prepared: do they have trees that pose a threat to their own or a neighbour’s house which they need to lop or remove? Business also needs to consider their continuity plans in the event of an emergency and ensure that their risk is minimised.
The most important point I raise here is the magnificent effort put in by employees, contractors, volunteers, and Power and Water workers who worked hard to quickly clear the roads and reconnect the power. This was a large task done under difficult conditions and I am very proud of their results. Effective coordination of the efforts of many agencies responding to an emergency is, obviously, a fundamental principle. Cyclone Helen emphasised the importance of close relationships and mutual understanding between agencies. To improve this coordination, we will step up our Emergency Operation Centre training activities. We will also work with councils to improve recovery planning and coordination should Darwin be struck more severely by another cyclone.
Providing clear advice to the public is always an important issue in an emergency. As a result of Cyclone Helen, the official advice provided to the public by the media has been reviewed. News scripts are being issued to media outlets to improve advice to the public. There will be a further review after the cyclone season. This review will also look at improving the understanding of compliance with these messages. Unfortunately, during Cyclone Helen, a number of businesses remained open too long and some people remained outside too late. In different circumstances, this could clearly place lives at risk unnecessarily, and government is working with appropriate agencies to improve this outlook.
I finish this report by emphasising that one of the most important lessons learned from Cyclone Helen is that all cyclones are dangerous and their potential to cause damage should not be underestimated. Cyclones can be difficult to predict. Had Helen intensified unexpectedly overnight and come closer to Darwin, the damage from fallen trees alone would have been substantially greater. Consequently, we must all heed the warnings. Safety is a partnership between government and the community and everybody must play their part. We need to clear up our own back yards, identify where we will shelter, and look to our own safety and that of our families by ensuring we have a cyclone plan and our 72 hour kit. We should close our businesses at an appropriate time. These are individual responsibilities which we should take seriously as not doing so puts our own lives and the lives of others at risk.
Madam Speaker, I conclude by taking the opportunity, on behalf of government and everybody in this House, to thank the hundreds of people who were involved in preparing and responding to Cyclone Helen. This involved Territorians from all walks of life doing many different jobs. I cannot name every group, however, I am sure all in this House appreciate the efforts of everyone involved in preparing and responding to Cyclone Helen. You have our sincere thanks.
Members: Hear, hear!
Mr MILLS (Opposition Leader): Madam Speaker, I thank the Chief Minister for his report because, after an assessment of the response of this community and the agencies that have the responsibility of responding to an incident such as Cyclone Helen, we stand encouraged at the capacity, particularly of Power and Water, to respond in difficult circumstances. It also provided a test for the relationship between the Territory government and councils. It is good to see that we have the Lord Mayor of Darwin and the Mayor of Palmerston here, because it does bring an influence to bear upon that relationship and who bears the full responsibility of cleanups. Cyclone Helen has given us an opportunity to check our systems.
It also raises the question of, and I would like it responded to if you are able to, Chief Minister, the stories from Mandorah. There have been a number of reports, of which the local member probably already knows, that it took a long time for the concerns of Mandorah to be addressed. There have been members from that community contacting me saying they wanted some clarification as to why their power was out for two days. It has a different effect on those who are in a rural environment as to urban.
It is an opportunity to test the communication plans. I am very pleased that you mentioned that. Those communication plans, where there are many different lines of communication, must be coordinated. A number of concerns were raised that there was a discrepancy in the messages that were being delivered. This is a great opportunity to revisit those and I am pleased you are doing so.
The cyclone season has not finished yet. We were very fortunate that school was not in when we had the visit of Cyclone Helen, which means that we now need to assess our response capacity as it relates to the communication to schools. We have had some problems in the past. Cyclone season is not over. I ask and urge the government to attend to that as a higher priority before we have another cyclone, before the end of the Wet Season.
Mr WOOD (Nelson): Madam Speaker, I welcome the report from the Chief Minister. There are a couple of issues the Chief Minister raised that need to be considered. The Chief Minister spoke about power lines and trees. It is one of those difficult areas, and the more we can put power lines underground, the better. However, while that may not be economical or appropriate in some circumstances, perhaps we need an education campaign, as we used to have, where the government put out books on species of plants that were appropriate to grow, especially in urban areas, and the distance trees needed to be planted from power lines.
In the rural area, people have planted mahoganies on the fence thinking: ‘That will be nice. I do not want to use up too much of my block with trees’, but half the mahogany goes over the road and over the power lines and that causes major problems. People get a bit cranky when their trees get lopped, so an education campaign about the species of trees we should plant, and the distance from power lines these trees should be planted, would be a good idea.
I thank the lady on the switchboard at Power and Water. There were many people who had power out for a long time in the rural area who would keep ringing me up. I am not sure of the lady’s name, there were probably several of them, but they did a fantastic job. They are at the coalface of complaints, and it takes a lot of skill and diplomacy to handle those complaints. I thank those people who do that job.
I thank the Power and Water people, especially the rural maintenance people. They have had a lot of work. The rural area is a difficult area because you have to travel long distances to find out where the problems are, and they did a fantastic job as well.
The Chief Minister mentioned Darwin and the Opposition Leader has mentioned Mandorah. The Chief Minister said that the cyclone crossed at Channel Point. I know that my relations who live near Channel Point could not get home simply because there were so many trees over the roads. It is an isolated area and we should remember that the isolated areas are just as important as …
Madam SPEAKER: Member for Nelson, your time has expired.
Mr WOOD: Thank you, Madam Speaker.
Mr HENDERSON (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, I thank the Leader of the Opposition and the member for Nelson for their contribution. The major lesson learned from this is that we can always do better in improving our systems, our planning, our training and our communication. Those lessons have been learned, and contingencies and amendments to plans will be put in place.
I congratulate and thank, given that the Lord Mayor of Darwin and the Mayor of Palmerston are here this morning, the respective councils and their crews who worked really hard to clear the roads and get the roads open. It was a fantastic effort. It really shows the spirit of this community that everyone can come together and work so hard.
I am advised that a hotline was put in for the people at Mandorah. Power and Water with 15 500 customers without power worked as hard as they could to get supplies back to normal. Many people in the rural area have their own generators and maybe that is something people should look at in their own personal plans. I thank everybody for their contribution.
February Sporting Frenzy
Mr BONSON (Sport and Recreation): Madam Speaker, I am pleased to deliver my first report to the Assembly as Sports minister.
I have to say, for someone born and bred in the Territory, being the Sports minister is a dream job. That is because sport is such an integral part of the Territory’s unique way of life. I am particularly proud to be Sports minister in a government committed to developing both grassroots Territory sport, and also giving Territorians the opportunity to watch the best of national and international events.
Since becoming Sports minister in November, I, together with thousands of other Territorians, have had the chance to see some truly exciting sporting events, and there is more to come.
In mid-January, Darwin hosted the stand-out Rugby League tournament, the Hottest 7’s in the World. The government is proud to support the Hottest 7’s competition. In December last year we announced a further $300 000 over the next three years to ensure the event’s future. Fiji won this year’s competition, making it their third win in a row. The finals saw a magnificent display of running rugby by the Fijian side. They won quite easily.
One of the features of this year’s Hottest 7’s was the introduction of the women’s competition, adding to the family appeal of the event. As Sports minister, I am keen to promote women’s sport.
Another real bonus from the Hottest 7’s competition came thanks to the other rugby code, Rugby League. The North Queensland Cowboys fielded a team in the competition. Their party included Queensland, State of Origin, and Australian Halfback, Jonathan Thurston. I met with representatives of the Cowboys, including Jonathan Thurston while they were visiting, and they have committed to promoting opportunities for their club for talented young Territory Rugby League players.
Last Wednesday, I had the pleasure of being part of the sell-out crowd at Marrara Indoor Stadium which saw a fantastic National Basketball League match between the Territory’s adopted side, the Perth Wildcats, and the West Sydney Razorbacks. The Wildcats won the match despite being 10 points down at half time. Apart from the game itself, the spectators were also treated to the full NBL hype, which has helped to get the crowd fully involved. It was a great family night. We are currently two years into a second three year agreement with NBL. Given the great support the Territory public is showing to these games over the years, the government remains committed to bringing more NBL matches to Darwin. Congratulations to the Wildcats on their community activities. They held clinics for juniors, visited hospitals and remote communities. They did a fantastic job.
This week, the Imparja Cup for Indigenous Cricket started in Alice Springs. The Imparja Cup competition features 25 teams from across Australia. The Territory government has committed an additional $10 000 for the purpose of this event which will allow the best indigenous cricketers in the country to come together for this competition. I am very much looking forward to travelling to Alice Springs on Saturday to watch the final of this match.
Before the final of the Imparja Cup, Territorians will also get the chance to see the pre-season AFL NAB Cup match between the Western Bulldogs and the North Melbourne Kangaroos in Darwin this Friday. Football Park Marrara is the Bulldogs’ home away from home, and there will be strong local support for the Bulldogs when they run out on Friday night. Local fans will get the chance to see the likes of Jason Akermanis, Brad Johnson, Nathan Eagleton and Adam Cooney in the Bulldogs side in this first round NAB Cup match. It does not get any better.
Apart from the prospect of seeing the opening round of the AFL pre-season competition, local football fans are also gearing up for the finals of the AFL NT. With just one minor round match to go before this year’s final series it is shaping up to be one of the tightest in years. Three teams - Southern Districts, Saint Mary’s and the Tiwi Bombers - are locked on equal points on top of the ladder. The Palmerston Magpies and Waratahs have both shown that they can beat all the top three.
Madam Speaker, this government recognises the value of sports to Territorians, and we will continue to support grassroots level sports to give as many Territorians as possible the chance to become involved. However, we also want to support the elite level of sporting competition which has proven so popular with Territorians over recent years.
Mr CONLON (Greatorex): Madam Speaker, I thank the minister for his report. I congratulate him on the portfolio. It is a lot of fun being the shadow spokesperson for sports, so I can only imagine it is great fun being the Sports minister. He has a big job; I know that because sport plays such a vital role in the Northern Territory in the development of young people and, in particular, young indigenous men in Central Australia with the Clontarf Foundation.
It is a big year, as the minister mentioned. The NAB Cup is this weekend in Darwin and the NAB Regional Challenge is in Alice Springs on 29 February. That is going to be a big turn-out as it is always is - in fact, you get almost a third of the town going depending on who is playing. If it is a game between Collingwood and Essendon we usually get around 12 000 people at Traeger Park. It should be a great event on 29 February in Alice Springs. The Imparja Cup is under way and the final is on this weekend. The Alice Springs Masters Games are later this year. So it is a very big year.
I urge the minister to address the situation - I noticed a media release he put out earlier in the week - about Imparja Television effectively cutting free-to-air AFL by dropping Channel 10 programs. This effectively reduces free-to-air televising of AFL games to Alice Springs by half - which is all the Saturday games. I know the minister is a keen footy player and footy fan, and I hope that he, the Minister for Communications and the Minister for Central Australia will address this situation. I have written to the AFL and the federal Minister for Communications asking what they are going to do with still no sign of Warren Snowdon on the issue. I am sure the Northern Territory government will follow that up.
The minister also met earlier this year with some sporting bodies in soccer and athletics in regard to facilities in Alice Springs - a soccer/athletics super stadium if you like for the lack a better word at this stage of negotiations. I am interested to have a brief on that to see how those developments are going.
Congratulations to the minister. I look forward to a big year in sport and recreation.
Mr WOOD (Nelson): Madam Speaker, I congratulate the minister for receiving this job. I will be following his movements in the job keenly. He is a Hawthorn supporter and if, in his term as Sports minister, he does not get at least one game in the Territory with Hawthorn playing, I will ask him to resign! I think he has an enjoyable job and the minister has a sporting background.
There has been much said about the importance of sport, especially in relation to helping young people develop, to keep out of trouble, to improve their self-esteem, and you do have an important job from that point of view. It is not just about whether the Bulldogs turn up here next weekend or whether we have a major sporting event. There are big social advantages in encouraging youths and older people - and we should not forget that older people are in sport. I can still trundle around Marrara at 9 am as an umpire. We should encourage more people to do that and keep active and to be involved in sport.
One area we need to look at is the facilities at many of our remote communities and in some of our smaller towns. Those facilities need to be improved so they are up to standards so that people who are using those facilities can come up to a standard which will enable them, hopefully, to represent the Northern Territory and perhaps represent Australia.
I congratulate the minister, I wish him all the best. I hope he will stick to his traditions - he knows that brown and gold is the team!
Mr BONSON (Sport and Recreation): Madam Speaker, the member for Greatorex raised issues regarding Imparja Television. My office has been speaking with Imparja Television and we will be working with them to ensure that people in Alice Springs have every opportunity to watch their football.
Yes, I have met representatives from a large number of sporting bodies in Alice Springs, Darwin, and right across the Territory. There are a number of issues that arise when you meet people face-to-face - they are based on elite level sports and grassroots level and facilities, etcetera.
I know the member for Nelson has a deep understanding of sport in the Territory, both at the elite and grassroots level. I give both those members and every member in this House the undertaking that I will work with them as closely as I can at the grassroots and the elite level. Please feel free to contact my office regarding grievances. Facilities are a big issue. As a government, we have to manage where we put our money. I am very interested in promoting grassroots level sports, elite level participation from teams internationally and in the national context. However, I am also very interested in youth and getting benefits from sports.
There is one group of people I believe we can do a far better job for when all sports are working together. That is women in sport. It is an untapped resource. As we know, they do the volunteering, the work behind the scenes, sometimes they cater, and sometimes they bring players. I am looking forward to working with women.
I give an undertaking to every member in this House that I will work with them in Sport and Recreation and my other portfolios to get the best benefit for the people of the Territory.
Reports noted pursuant to standing orders.
PLANNING AMENDMENT (DEVELOPMENT APPLICATIONS) BILL
(Serial 130)
(Serial 130)
Continued from 28 November 2007.
Mr MILLS (Opposition Leader): Madam Speaker, I say at the outset that the opposition welcomes this amendment. There will be no opposition and we are pleased to see a move down the right track. It must be pointed out, however, that the act as it applied before this amendment imposed some serious restrictions on the processes of common sense of ordinary folk solving their problems. It is probably best typified by a gentleman who, when spoken to, had to go through a convoluted process involving a pink sign when he was merely putting up a bit of shade cloth in his back yard.
It did not take too long to impose those kinds of measures and regimes to the Planning Act, but it has taken a full 12 months to remove the shackles and the obstructions from the process. Therefore, we do welcome the change; we think it is a step in the right direction. It is a win for common sense, it is freeing up the system and allowing local decisions of a smaller nature to be resolved in a better and more sensible manner. It is for that reason that the CLP in opposition gives it our full support. We note that it has taken some time, but good on them.
Mr WOOD (Nelson): Madam Deputy Speaker, congratulations on your appointment.
I also support the legislation, but I have some concerns. I can either raise them at the committee stage or raise them now. That is in relation to section 5(3), which states:
- Except as otherwise provided by a law of the Territory, a lessee of land owned by the Corporation is not exempt from the liabilities and requirements mentioned in subsections (1) and (2).
Subsections (1) and (2) of the existing act state:
- The Corporation, as the owner or controller of the land in the Precinct
- (a) is not liable for any rates, levy or fees arising from section 15, 16 or 17; and
- (b) is exempt from other requirements (for example, licensing or registration requirements) imposed by the by-laws.
Minister, in your second reading, you said two things: ‘The Act provides for the precinct to be excised from the municipality of Darwin and for owners of land within the precinct to pay rates to the corporation’, and then you say that the bill clarifies that unless …
Ms LAWRIE: A point of order, Madam Speaker! I have a concern. I believe the member for Nelson might be referring to the wrong legislation.
Mr WOOD: The Darwin Waterfront.
Ms LAWRIE: No.
Mr WOOD: I thought …
Ms LAWRIE: No, sorry, my apologies, member for Nelson, the Whips have been in communication, so we should have ensured you were in the loop there.
Mr WOOD: I know. That is my fault.
Ms LAWRIE: No, the Clerk read reference to the planning legislation, which I understand you have been briefed on. I was anticipating your contribution to debate because you have a keen interest in issues of planning.
Mr WOOD: All right. Actually, it is my fault, minister. I thank you for reminding me and I will go on to the other one.
In relation to – and I will make sure I have the right one – Planning Amendment (Development Applications) Bill 2007 (Serial 130).
Ms Lawrie: That is the one.
Mr WOOD: Thank you. I have a number of concerns in relation to this bill. We did have a briefing yesterday, for which I thank the minister.
However, under section 47A ‘Development application not requiring public notice’, it said that there were certain matters that were to be specified by the regulations. I know we were told yesterday what was in those regulations, but I would have thought, because this particular amendment is dealing with a change to the planning, that the regulations should have been here at this stage of the debate because we can talk about the regulations. If we do not know what is in them it is debating something that we are not sure of.
From that debate, one of these sections, 47A(1)(b), is related to things such as a women’s refuge, or a child’s safe house, or something like that, and 47A(1)(c), which related to development that would not have a significant impact on existing and future amenity of the area in which the development was carried out, related to waivers, especially where, for instance, sheds or buildings may not be a problem if they are closer to the boundary than normally allowed.
I understand that and, if we can produce planning that reduces the red tape, then that is good. I am not criticising that except to say that the regulations should have been given to us today, and said this is what those regulations refer to.
My concern is, when you get to section 7 and 7(5), which is the very last clause, it states:
- A meeting of the Development Consent Authority must not be open to the public if evidence is to be taken in relation to a development application to which section …
which I have been talking about
… 47A applies.
Already existing in the Planning Act, under section 102(3), it says that if the Chairman directs under subsection (2) that a meeting is closed to the public, the meeting is closed to the public. I would prefer that subsection (5) is not put in there, and my understanding from the briefing is that that was more a drafting insert rather than a government insert, because the principle that has been put forward here is that the public, when dealing with issues in 47A, should not be allowed to attend.
If you took the three items that are written there, one is the consolidation of land. It is not controversial in the sense that it is not secret. I know the chances of the public getting to attend that meeting is probably about nil, but why take it out? Why refuse them the ability to turn up? It is the principle of removing the public ability to attend the meeting of the DCA in relation to consolidation of lands that seems to be overkill.
In relation to section 47A(1)(b), where it could be a women’s refuge and it is something which you do not particularly want advertised in the wider world, that might be okay, but under your existing act, the Chairman would immediately say: ‘Sorry, this is closed to the public.’ Then, when you get to section 47A(1)(c), which is about whether your shed should be 1 m or 2 m from the side fence, it is not something that is too secretive, one would have to say surely you do not need to tell the public that they cannot attend the meeting where that might be discussed. I would think that from a practical point of view your chances of the public turning up for a meeting in relation to this where you have already contacted the owners would probably be nearly zilch.
However, the principle is then do not apply something that nibbles away at a small piece of freedom, a small piece of open and transparency in government when it is not necessary. Leave that up to the discretion of the Chairman of the Development Consent Authority. He obviously will know if something really needs to be dealt with in private and, as we have said, I agree that section 47A(1)(b) would be one of those cases. Then to install a clause which I believe is an overkill, which is clause 7(5), it is the last clause in the act, I ask that the government consider removing that section. It is simply unnecessary and I believe it sends out a signal that one is tightening the ability of the public to have a say, no matter how minor it would be, in what we regard as a public process.
I support the bill as it is. However, I believe that reference should be removed. I do also say that with an understanding that this appears to be put in by the Parliamentary Counsel rather than the government itself.
Mrs BRAHAM (Braitling): Madam Speaker, to reinforce what the member for Nelson was saying, this was a concern raised yesterday at the briefing. I am not sure of the officers concerned; I thought in part they agreed. It was the wording of what is being inserted after 102(4) – ‘A meeting of the Development Consent Authority must not be open …’. I suggest that the word ‘must’ should have been changed to ‘may’ not be open. That still allows the Chairman the discretion to close it in certain circumstances, for instance, if it is a crisis centre or it is some shelter that you do not want the public to know that is occurring. Surely using the word ‘must’ makes it much more pedantic. We felt that the word ‘may’ would have covered all the avenues. It still gives the Chairman the discretion in circumstances, but it does not prohibit anyone from attending in cases which are not controversial. There may be times when it is not a controversial application for a particular shelter and perhaps the general public should be allowed to come and have a say.
For instance, we had great concern with a house in Alice Springs which was being rezoned to allow for what the residents thought was going to be a permanent home for aged people in a very private, upmarket area. However, when they looked into it, it was not so. It was purely a day care-type arrangement for aged care people. It was resolved because it was made open and they were told exactly what it was all about.
If you constantly use the word ‘must’ in your legislation, you are prohibiting anyone from being able to know exactly what it is going to be. It is not an open process. I understand that there are times when the Chairman may say, ‘we do not want this to be published’. Fine, I can understand that, but let us not have it so that we judge all cases like that. Let us say to the Chairman that he can have that discretion to do so. That was the point we raised most of all at the briefing.
Ms LAWRIE (Planning and Lands): Madam Speaker, it is a joy to start the new parliamentary year with consensus across the Chamber. I thank the opposition for their support.
Indeed, it may have taken us a while to get here but I have been heavily engaged with industry and homeowners in understanding the impact of the planning system. These changes are intended to reduce the regulatory burden on developments where there are few, if any, impacts on adjoining land.
In the instances of developments such as refuges for women and children escaping domestic violence, the intention is to ensure that their location is not widely broadcast to the community. The bill proposes to exempt the following development applications from public exhibition. One, consolidation of land: the consolidation of one or more lots into a single title is most often a requirement of a development permit where it is proposed to build across existing lot boundaries. The condition to consolidate also serves to highlight the consolidation will also be a requirement under the Building Act to satisfy fire separation requirements. In such circumstances, public participation really serves no sensible purpose because the determination has already been made. The process merely delays what should be a simple assessment process of the technical requirements of the applicable related legislation.
In terms of setbacks and single dwellings, when the application is to vary either side or rear boundary setbacks to a single dwelling, there is no potential effect on the amenity other than to an adjoining property. There is no basis, therefore, for broadly advertising the proposal. The amendment proposes only that owners and occupiers of adjoining properties be notified, offering the standard 14 days to lodge any objection. Should they do so, they will have the opportunity to be heard by the Development Consent Authority - an important provision. This process will largely replicate the current process, until the introduction of the new planning scheme, that is undertaken under the building regulations other than in Alice Springs and Tennant Creek where such variations have been dealt with under the form of town plans. In other words, what this amendment does is no more than mirror a system through the planning scheme that has delivered satisfactory outcomes for many years.
To the variations for industrial developments, where an industrial development is proposed in an industrial zone, it does not abut land in another zone, and that development seeks a variation, it is similarly proposed that the application not be advertised. Typically, such variations are to building height, car parking requirements or the like. There is little purpose to require advertising when experience demonstrates that rarely, if ever, there is an adverse submission from any other party. After all, it can be expected that an industrial use will occupy an industrial lot, and that amenity considerations of adjoining holdings will be less than would be expected elsewhere. The existing process only serves to delay and frustrate what should be a straightforward assessment of the development and a commonsense determination of the application.
In terms of women’s refuges and the like, for many years the planning regulations have been exempt from broad advertising proposals. It is proposed that this practice continue in the interests of preserving the anonymity of the address. This does not preclude targeted consultation with the immediate neighbourhood at the discretion of the Development Consent Authority.
The Independent members have raised an important matter in relation to whether there is a provision inserted to require the Development Consent Authority to have closed meetings in relation to these issues. The members have quite rightly raised a concern. As we know, the Development Consent Authority Chair has the discretion to close a meeting when required to do so. I propose that the Assembly go into committee, and as the sponsoring minister, I would move to delete clause 102(5) to ensure that discretion of the Development Consent Authority chair remains.
Motion agreed to; bill read a second time.
In committee:
Bill, by leave, taken as a whole:
Ms LAWRIE: Madam Chair, in relation to Clause 4 of the bill I move that proposed section 102(5) be omitted.
Mr WOOD: Madam Chair, I thank the government for taking on this amendment. This is not about politics; it is simply a good, commonsense approach to something that was overkill, an oversight. I thank the government because there was an important philosophical concern I had with the Development Consent Authority which, where possible, it should kept as open as possible. I thank the minister for bringing forward this amendment.
Mrs BRAHAM: Madam Chair, I also thank government for listening to us and taking on board our recommendations. We feel as though we go to these briefings and we raise points and go away thinking ‘Nothing will happen’. I congratulate and thank the officers who are in attendance for listening to us, and bringing it to government’s attention. As the member for Nelson said, it is a commonsense approach. We look forward to a new era of cooperation between Independents and the government.
Amendment agreed to.
Clause 4, as amended, agreed to.
Remainder of bill, by leave, taken as a whole and agreed to.
Bill reported with amendment; report adopted.
Ms LAWRIE (Planning and Lands): Madam Speaker, I move that the bill be now read a third time.
Motion agreed to; bill read a third time.
MINISTERIAL STATEMENT
Youth Justice Strategy
Youth Justice Strategy
Mr HENDERSON (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, when I arrived in the Territory 24 years ago, I did not really know what to expect. I was looking for a bit of adventure, a bit of fun. I was also looking for opportunity, for a chance to strike out a new path in what was a new world for me as a migrant to our great north. As for so many others, the Northern Territory has given me far more than I expected, and far more than I could have hoped for back then. I found a place, the Northern Territory, which ranks as the best place in the world to live and to work and, above all, the best place to raise a family. That is what the vast majority of Territory families seek – a safe and decent place to bring up their kids, a safe and decent place for our senior Territorians to live in their retirement, and a safe and decent environment for our businesses to operate in.
However, the antisocial behaviour and criminal activities of a small number of young people is affecting our whole community. To be brutally honest about it, there are a small number of parents of these kids who appear not to give a damn. These kids and these parents are denying the right of all of us to the quiet enjoyment of our day-to-day lives and the protection of our lifestyles. They are thumbing their noses at the vast majority of Territorians.
When moving around my electorate and talking to people in the street, it is clear that these kids, and their parents, are making life a misery through disgraceful acts of antisocial behaviour, abuse and crime, from petty thieving to serious assault. Every act of vandalism, every act of thieving, and every rock thrown is aimed at the heart of the lifestyle we all want to enjoy.
The Territory is not alone in experiencing these issues. There are many other towns and cities in Australia which continue to experience far more extreme situations such as we are seeing in the popular media. This is exactly what we want to avoid and what our strategies are designed to overcome.
Today I will advise the House about my government’s initiatives to tackle youth crime, and the ways we will move to reinforce those rights to protect our families in their right to enjoy a safe and decent place to live.
Much has been said publicly about the activities of a small number of young people who continually thumb their noses at the law. Today, I am pleased to speak about my government’s integrated strategy for addressing this issue.
Northern Territory police already perform an excellent job in tackling youth crime. However, notwithstanding police efforts, there is a small core of young offenders who engage in unlawful behaviour and this must stop. The measures I will outline will strengthen my government’s already tough stance on crime, especially youth crime. Whilst we will be even tougher on young repeat offenders, we will also strengthen our initiatives to stop people turning to crime. If we are to make a real difference in countering such behaviour over the longer term it is necessary to tackle the causes of youth antisocial behaviour and family dysfunction.
I am aware of the difficulties that young people face in the transition through adolescence to adulthood. These difficulties are sometimes exacerbated by a lack of appropriate parental guidance and support, family violence, or a family member’s substance abuse. In many cases, families of children with challenging behaviours are unable to access or are unaware of services which support young people.
My government’s Youth Justice Strategy will assist vulnerable young people by identifying at-risk behaviour early and providing assistance, support and, as a last resort, enforcement of the responsibilities of young people and their families. The strategy will address issues surrounding those young people who are on the fringes of unlawful behaviour and to prevent such young people from drifting into the small number of youth and young adults who are involved in serious crime. The strategy imposes tough treatments on the small minority of young people who are, unfortunately, involved in serious or escalating offences.
I will turn first to consider the legislative aspects of the strategy. As I announced last month, amendments to the Youth Justice Act will provide that diversion programs will no longer be an option for serial juvenile offenders. The Youth Justice Act has been in operation since 1 August 2006. It provides a sentencing plan for young people. Legal intervention where young people have broken the law is an important aspect in my government’s response to youth crime. Legal interventions currently include diversion and prosecution in the Youth Justice Court.
Under the principles set out in the act, young people are held accountable for their actions, and they must also be dealt with in a way that will maximise their opportunity to reintegrate into society and develop in socially responsible ways. Whilst warnings, youth justice conferences and diversion programs which are prescribed under the Youth Justice Act are often appropriate for young offenders and can be very successful, they are not the only answer.
Juvenile diversion programs play an important role in getting many young offenders back on track and away from crime. However, there is a small group of serial offenders who treat juvenile diversion as something of a joke, and who continue to re-offend. For this reason, the Youth Justice Act will be amended so that diversion programs will no longer be an option for young offenders who have already been sent to a juvenile diversion program twice. In these circumstances, serial offenders will be dealt with by the Youth Justice Court and will face incarceration.
Another key aspect of the legislative elements of this package is new legislation to be introduced in this sitting of parliament to provide for family responsibility agreements and family responsibility orders in circumstances where the child of a parent is engaging in antisocial behaviour. The scheme provides for a two step approach to engaging the parents of children who are repeatedly absent from school, or in public places late at night, or who participate in antisocial or criminal behaviour. Under the scheme, authorised officers from the Department of Employment, Education and Training, Justice, Police and Health and Community Services will be able to refer cases of children who are repeatedly truant, or in public places late at night, or demonstrating antisocial or criminal behaviour to a specialist service body which will enter into a family responsibility agreement with identified parents or carers on behalf of the agency.
Family responsibility agreements will be a written contractual arrangement. They will provide that the parent will, in exchange for agreeing to certain requirements, receive assistance from a dedicated officer to access government and non-government support services. Agreements will be entered into on a voluntary basis and will run for up to 12 months. Agreements may be entered into with the parents of children who have not yet turned 18 years of age. The sort of things an agreement could provide for include: that the parent attend parenting guidance counselling, parenting support group or other relevant personal development course or rehabilitation program; that the parent agree to ensure that the child attends school; that the parent ensures that the child is home by a certain time; or ensures that the child avoids contact with a particular person or place.
In exchange for agreeing to meet such conditions, the parent will have access to a dedicated officer who will assist the parent to access existing government support and service provider programs. The officer will provide the parents with any reasonable assistance necessary to help the parent comply with the agreement. If after substantial efforts to engage with the parents on a voluntary basis have not succeeded, and a parent refuses to either enter into an agreement or comply with an agreement, an agency may seek a family responsibility order from the court through the Chief Executive Officer of the agency.
Orders will only be sought if the Chief Executive Officer considers it to be in the best interest of the child and where an improvement in parenting skills is considered likely to improve the youth’s family situation and consequently prevent a repeat of the child’s behaviour. The agency will have to demonstrate to the court that the belief is based on reasonable grounds. The conditions of an order will be largely identical to those contained in the agreement but with greater emphasis on conditions assisting the parent to address those aspects of their own behaviour that are preventing them from taking responsibility for the care of the child. It might include compelling the parent to attend a drug and alcohol or anger management program, or a targeted parenting or problem gambling management program. An order may provide for the provision of in-home support if it is considered appropriate in the circumstances. Orders can be enforced for up to 12 months unless revoked earlier. Orders can be made for any child over the age of 10 years and under the age of 18 years.
To accommodate the Northern Territory’s broad demographic mix, the system of family agreements and orders will apply to any guardian of a child rather than limiting the scheme to parents only. This acknowledges that many children do not live with their parents and may be cared for by various other family members such as grandparents or aunts or uncles.
Under the scheme, police may proceed to bring applications for an order without undertaking an agreement with the parent in circumstances where a young person is charged with an offence or has breached a condition of bail. This application will be made separately from the prosecution of the offence. If it is a first offence, the order will largely replicate the conditions of bail to direct the parent to ensure that the child meets the conditions of bail.
If a child is charged with a breach of condition of bail and the breach is proved, the order will direct the parents to address those aspects of their own behaviour that are preventing them from taking responsibility for the care of the child. This may mean compelling the parent to attend intensive parental guidance counselling, a parenting support group, or other relevant personal development courses.
If the parent has a drug or alcohol problem, the order may contain the condition directing that person attend drug and alcohol rehabilitation programs. An order may also provide for the provision of in-home support. A central body will be established to monitor agreements and orders. While every effort will be made to support parents to meet the conditions of an agreement or order, some parents may be unwilling to engage in the process and it is therefore necessary to have in place some element of compulsion. It is therefore proposed that a breach of an order will attract a penalty of up to $2000.
I turn now to consider the non-legislative aspects of the Youth Justice Strategy. As I mentioned earlier, the strategy is designed to identify children and young people with challenging behaviours at an early stage and to address the issues underlying the behaviour so as to prevent the drift of such young persons into the small category of youth who are involved in serious crime. Delivery of this strategy will vary from region to region, but will share the following common elements: coordination, links to family and youth case management, links from case management to sentencing options.
The first component involves coordination between and within government and non-government agencies. Key Northern Territory government agencies are police through school-based constables as well as operational stationed officers, Family and Community Services, the Department of Employment, Education and Training through schools and counsellors, and the Department of Justice through Youth Justice Court and Community Corrections. Key non-government agencies will vary from region to region but include the services that provide support to young people. Weekly interagency meetings will be convened to share information and intelligence and to assign client case management. Such case management could include alternative education and school attendance programs. Data on youth at risk in the region will also be collected and monitored.
In Darwin and Alice Springs, youth hubs will be established to provide a link to family and youth case management. Youth hubs will be a safe place where police can use legislative powers to bring young people at night if they are unable to be returned home or if there is no one at home to take responsibility for them. Outreach workers will also be able to bring young people to youth hubs with the consent of the individual.
Youth hubs will not be a traditional youth centre or drop-in centre but will be staffed by a coordinator and other staff sufficient to meet the expected needs and hours of operation. These facilities will include some space for young people in transition to home or another safe place as well as office and meeting space for staff in interagency meetings. The coordinators will also operate from these premises.
Staff at the youth hubs will undertake assessment of the young person’s immediate needs and current assessment tools will be further adapted as required. The coordinator or other staff will do a more thorough assessment of youth and family needs for a referral to appropriate youth and family support services. This referral will be managed through weekly interagency meetings.
Young people and their families who are referred for further help will have multiple needs requiring complex case management and intervention. All of the agencies which agree to provide referrals from this service will boost their capacity to provide this more complex case management. Case management plans will also assist police who are processing young people through the youth diversion program, as well as assist with the pre-sentencing conferencing and sentencing in the Youth Justice Court.
In smaller regional towns, a youth hub may operate through community organisations and appropriate community elders.
The third element of the strategy links to sentencing options in the Youth Justice Court and addresses the smaller group of young people who are offenders before the Youth Justice Court. It will utilise the existing provisions in the Youth Justice Act for pre-sentence conferencing and will provide advice to the court regarding case management of young people charged with offences and who are on bail. Aspects of case management can then be incorporated, where appropriate, into conditions of bail. Young people on bail will be monitored to ensure they comply with their case management plan and will be informed in clear language what their responsibilities are on release on bail. Repeated serious breaches of bail conditions or commission of further serious offences whilst on bail will be listed as specific factors in determining whether bail should be revoked.
A Youth Justice Court clinician will provide advice to magistrates about case management of young people charged with offences and will prepare and facilitate pre-sentence conferences to present the outcomes to the magistrate. The position will be an important link between the court and the youth and family services system.
Another key element of the Youth Justice Strategy is the establishment of youth camps to provide a residential setting where services tackling antisocial behaviour by young people in the Territory can be delivered. In December last year, I announced that the government will use existing facilities at the Hamilton Downs Station near Alice Springs to run a new youth camp. The facility has in place dormitories that can accommodate up to 65 young people, kitchen facilities, toilets and water supply. There is the option of development of further infrastructure as needs are identified.
This youth camp will get kids away from the cycle of crime by spending time at Hamilton Downs for intensive skills development programs. These young people will then be required to complete education and skills training programs which will help them make a positive contribution to the community. Government is also working with the Hamilton Downs Board to get the facilities ready to start running shortly.
Yesterday, I announced government funding for the Balunu Foundation at Talc Head and the Brahminy Foundation at Batchelor to provide opportunities for Top End kids to participate in a youth camp. Our work with these camps starts now. The Balunu Foundation is a not-for-profit body that currently utilises facilities at Talc Head. I anticipate that up to 30 young indigenous people could utilise the foundation’s program this financial year. This is the beginning of an important partnership. The Brahminy Foundation is also a not-for-profit foundation and operates from a facility outside Batchelor. The program run by the foundation works to build capacity and self-esteem whilst allowing participants to develop life and work skills.
By making funding available for young people in the Top End to participate in the program, I expect that up to 10 to 15 young people could be referred to the service by the end of the financial year by agencies such as NT Police, Family and Children’s Services, and the Youth Justice Court. I have asked the Attorney-General to develop further options for integrated youth camps to address antisocial and low-level offending behaviour of young people in the Darwin and Palmerston areas. I expect that this work will be completed towards the middle of the year.
In conclusion, I believe that my government’s Youth Justice Strategy provides a balanced, integrated approach. The long-term solution is to coordinate the activities of police, other government agencies and non-government agencies so that the individual circumstances of each young person exhibiting challenging behaviour or breaking the law are properly assessed and remedial strategies adopted.
The focus of remedial strategies is to get young people back on track so they set a positive course for their future. Where young people do not respond positively to this approach and they continue to offend or ignore court requirements concerning bail conditions, the new legislative provisions will send a clear message that such behaviour will not be tolerated and the consequences of such behaviour will be an appearance before the court and, ultimately, incarceration.
Entering politics a little over eight years ago was, and continues to be, about giving back to the Territory - giving back to a place that I and my family call home. In taking on the privilege and responsibilities of being a Labor member of parliament, a core belief that I take in my work is a commitment to do the right thing. It is this belief that lies at the heart of my commitment to Territory families.
Madam Speaker, doing the right thing and saying enough is enough must be the centrepiece of our task in protecting all Territorians in their desire to lead lives not blighted by crime and antisocial behaviour, whether that be in our remote townships, on our streets or in our neighbourhoods. Our community is paying the price for a small group of kids who do not respect the law, their parents, or the public - and enough is enough.
Juvenile diversion will no longer be a revolving door. Parents will be made more accountable and youth camps will help get kids back on track. We want to get those kids who are at risk of criminal offending back on the right path, as well as give guidance and support to others who need to build self-esteem, develop life and work skills, get back in to school and reconnect with family.
The work does not stop; I know that. My sleeves are rolled up. There is no simple solution to crime. I, and my government, will keep working on reforms to the legal process and giving the police the tools they need to get the job done. It is about making our streets safer for all Territorians.
Madam Speaker, I move that the Assembly take note of the statement.
Dr BURNS (Justice and Attorney-General): Madam Speaker, I support the Chief Minister’s statement setting out how the Henderson Labor government will attack youth crime. Since becoming Attorney-General, and at the direction of the Chief Minister, my top priority has been to develop legislative reforms and targeted programs to hit youth crime from every angle.
The community is justifiably sick of young thugs roaming through Darwin suburbs who think they are above the law. We are sick of seeing media reports of young people engaged in the destruction of property, intimidation of neighbours and, worst of all, violent attacks on innocent people. We are sick of parents who refuse to accept their fundamental responsibility to raise their children with respect for the community, the police, and the law.
Parenting is a serious business, and the vast majority of parents in the Territory take their responsibilities towards the young lives in their care very seriously indeed. We all know that our parents have been the most important influences in our lives. What parents teach their children invariably shapes the next generation. Occasionally, good kids from strong families drift into bad behaviour despite the best efforts of their parents.
However, what is becoming very clear is that some parents have abdicated their position as positive role models for their children. They do not know where their children are, they do not care what they are doing. Some parents have drug, alcohol, gambling or emotional problems which makes the care, support and direction of their children a secondary consideration at best. There is unambiguous evidence from around the world that negligent or negative parenting is amongst the strongest predictors of juvenile involvement in antisocial behaviour and criminal behaviour. So, if we are going to seriously tackle youth crime in the Territory that is where we need to start.
As the Chief Minister has made clear, a strong, supportive family is our community’s strongest bulwark against youth crime and destructive behaviour. The Family Responsibility Framework the government announced yesterday, which will roll-out immediately in major urban centres and, ultimately, throughout the Territory, will help those parents struggling to provide the necessary strength and support. This new approach is not about punishing parents, but providing them with the tools and motivation they need to be better, more positive, family leaders. We are not setting up parents to fail; we are giving them what they need to succeed.
This government recognises simply enacting legislation will not achieve our goals of reducing youth crime, stopping young criminals and removing the social factors that create them. That is why this legislation will be complemented by the introduction of a range of new support services. Most importantly, we will establish a dedicated specialist unit of officers who will case manage families whose children, through their poor behaviour, come to the attention of authorities. As the Chief Minister noted, this will not only be activated if a young person is arrested or charged with an offence, it could include children involved in repeated truancy or found out late at night with no excuse.
Authorised officers will enter into a family responsibility agreement with parents or care givers which will clearly set out the goals and requirements they must meet. In exchange, parents will receive the benefit of a dedicated case officer who will be able to link them into all available government support services, programs and resources. Requirements under an agreement will be matched to the problems in the parent’s lives that are contributing to their children’s behaviour. For example, an alcohol-dependent father may be required to attend a rehabilitation program, a mother who takes part in excessive gambling, taking her away from the family and wasting money, may need to attend gambling counselling once a week or refrain from entering a venue with gaming machines; or an agreement may contain something as simple as a requirement that the parent take their child to school each morning, or call the authorised officer if a child is not home by a specified time at night.
By giving these parents clear goals and proper support, they will be able to make a positive difference in their kids’ lives. However, if they refuse to do everything they reasonably can to get their kid back on track, they will face fines, community work orders perhaps working alongside their own children, and loss of non-essential household items. At the end of the road, there needs to be a form of compulsion everyone can understand. No one wants to pay a hefty fine or lose non-essential household items; no one wants to spend the weekend doing community service.
Madam Speaker, there has been some comment in the media over the last week about people who are impoverished, people who are not well off, that they are being penalised, either by fines or by the confiscation of non-essential household items. It was said during one media interview I heard with a child physiologist that being poor or of little means is no excuse, or it does not absolve you from your parenting responsibilities. Parenting responsibilities are something we all must live up to, so being poor does not absolve people from those responsibilities. Some people I have known through my life have not had very much means at all, but I have seen that their kids are fantastic kids and fantastic citizens compared to people who might be a bit more affluent and spoil their kids. This is not about poverty. This is about supporting those who need support and getting those kids back on track.
However, despite everyone’s best efforts, some young hoodlums will continue to try to capture a pathetic amount of notoriety by smashing lights and windows, hassling hard-working, late night staff and assaulting innocent passers-by. Under current laws, they think they can get away with it again and again. Some kids have attended diversion programs a dozen times or more, and whether they complete the course or not, they are back on the streets causing havoc. Well, no longer, Madam Speaker. The revolving door of diversion stops now. Now they will know that a line is being drawn.
Juvenile diversion will no longer be an option. They get to experience it time and time again. If juvenile diversion programs have not turned you around in two attempts, you lose your right to go there again. You will go to court and be prosecuted. The court has a range of options available in sentencing young offenders including good behaviour bonds, community work orders and, ultimately, detention.
Under the government’s Youth Justice Plan, courts will get another option: youth camps. The government’s youth camp initiative, both in Central Australia and Top End regions, will provide kids with the structure, self-development tools and support they need to break free from destructive or criminal behaviour. I put on the record here today, in terms of youth camps; this is an option that government has been considering for some time. In Central Australia, there has been consultation regarding the establishment of youth camps.
However, what we needed was a centrepiece of our strategy which is the legislation which is being presented in parliament tomorrow and will be debated. The legislation around family responsibility and juvenile diversion is the centrepiece. The camps are an integral part of that. It was important to establish the legislation, to get all the points of the legislation right before announcements were made about youth camps.
The Chief Minister set out in some detail the facilities where these camp programs will operate; I will not go through them again here. I thank the owners and operators of the Hamilton Downs, Balunu and Brahminy Foundations for their partnership in this exciting project.
Also, I want to make it very clear that the camps are not designed to punish or terrorise children into compliance. They will not try to break kids down and rebuild them in the way that some overseas systems operate. Instead, our camp program will act as a circuit breaker; a chance to get kids out of the spiral of crime, drugs and alcohol, and in some cases, a poor home environment. It will give them some clean air and some free space to think, to reconnect with who they are and who they want to be.
Most importantly, the youth camp program currently being implemented in Alice Springs regions and developed for the Top End will not just leave young people to sink or swim once they complete their time at the camp. They will be intensively case managed and supported through flexible learning and living arrangements so that they do not fall back into their old habits and with their old cohorts.
Some organisations and individuals may accuse the government of pushing these new policies into effect too rapidly. I strongly disagree. The Chief Minister’s statement today makes it very clear that we will not delay; it is time to act before the problem escalates even further. The community wants solid workable policies implemented now. This package goes to the heart of youth crime and attacks the factors that create young criminals. It gives parents the tools to help their kids before it is too late. It also hits the hardcore minority where it hurts. They will be stripped of their revolving door of diversion, their free ride and their followers.
The Northern Territory is a place of fantastic opportunity. We have full employment, there is so much sport for young people to play, and there are so many things to do. What we want to see is young people engaged in the community, making something of their lives, and to see parents supporting them to do that.
Madam Speaker, I commend the Chief Minister’s statement to the House.
Members: Hear, hear!
Mr MILLS (Opposition Leader): Madam Speaker, as I said in the media, when I heard that the government was choosing to go down this path, I marked that as a very satisfying moment: that there is now the will demonstrated by the government to approach the matter of juvenile crime, in particular, in this manner. Members opposite will know that this has been an area of interest that I have held even before coming into parliament. I find it a satisfying response, and on the face of it, it has support.
There is one line in the statement that refers to it being a coordinated and articulated response. I would concur that the entire package seems to be well thought out. It seems to articulate quite well, and it has all of its bases covered. There is even the injection of new language from the new Chief Minister to bolster the intent that is being demonstrated by government.
I am not a cynical person. Others are, however, and they will quickly recall other similar tough measures that have been presented to the Territory community at different times, usually not too far out from an election, which demonstrates this new extraordinary resolve of government that impresses them and they are able to back up that message with a fairly well coordinated, sophisticated communication strategy so it strikes deep into the heart of the electorate: they know that this government means business because the glossy brochure said so.
However, what we have as a reality, an honest fact, is that there have been other similar announcements and similar resolve shown. The anti-gang legislation was breathlessly described as ‘new tough measures’. There was a raft of new tough measures communicated to the community and those new tough measures impressed the electorate, but did not cause the Caz Boyz to think twice about their actions, or any other stone thrower or thug in the community who has little respect for the standards and values that good families hold.
There have been other alterations of existing laws, widening and enlarging, promotion and broadcast of new tough measures. Most recently, with the assault of a bus driver there was the creation of a new provision which, in fact, was an enlargement of an existing provision. This demonstrated that, at its essence, the existing law had failed and we are going to widen it. In its essence it was not applied. That is where the rubber is going to hit the road. I am very concerned that for those who hold the cynical view, that the description of this package, which is very well described - it looks good on paper - does not have the necessary values set to drive it all the way through. The real enemy here is not the necessity for a new program. It is the necessity to deal with this notion of victim-hood: that if we have the bureaucrat or the practitioner operating this new template and they still deliver it in terms of ‘do not worry, you are not ultimately responsible, the system is responsible and we are going to spend a lot of money to fix the system up’. You exempt that individual from responsibility. You do not drive that message home to the individual and their family. If that message is ambiguous, the whole system will fail.
I was pleased to hear the Attorney-General depart from his notes. I believe you are sincere in that it is nothing to do with your means, your background, or anything like that. It is : ‘if you have painted graffiti on a wall, I do not care what excuses you may give, you painted graffiti on a wall and it must be dealt with, as it is wrong. I do not care what your background is’. I like that kind of language and I think you mean it.
I am concerned that there has been extensive polling. We all know that polling is going on. We are not involved in that; I wonder who is. You are generating this view of the electorate, and what the electorate is really concerned about. Okay, you run through it like a marketing exercise; strategic planning it is called. The objective is to stay in power, so you find out what the community is really concerned about and you craft something that looks pretty flash. You communicate that through your electorate, ‘Hey, they have heard us, we are concerned’ and then you implement it.
If you are going to implement a program, it is not necessarily the policy itself. It is the basis upon which that policy rests; the philosophical base. What is the core of this? What are you really trying to achieve other than to maintain your hold on power with your 19 seats? At the last election we had a very strong measure articulated, the result of focus groups, that there was concern about drunks and itinerants. So you had new tough measures that impressed the person sitting at the bar having a drink and other people at barbecues, but once you were delivered to power you then softened them.
Now, do you have the necessary resolve to drive this all the way through? That is going to be the question and because of my background, my passionate interest in this area, my extensive lobbying and work in the community on this matter, I am not going to let it go. I want to hold you to account to ensure that you deliver what the community expects you will deliver.
I predict it will be a challenge to implement what has been described. For example, there is a measure already available – in fact, a number of them, and we can go into those in detail at a later stage. Measures are already in existence that even the former opposition Education spokesman, when Labor was in opposition, was concerned about; that was using the Education Act to fine a parent for not sending their kids to school. I went through the transcript of Estimates and there was former minister Toyne - and my thoughts to him and his family at the moment – describing his concern that this measure that was in the act had not been used to impose a penalty upon a parent. I think it is $200. Then Labor came to office. That same measure is there, able to be applied at any time and there is the same answer to the same question: how many times has that been used? None, never been used.
If the resolve is now there, I would expect that the measures that are already in existence – forget the marketing strategy and the promotion of a new tough approach; start using some of the measures you already have in place. Downplay the need to draw attention to yourselves and apply the measures that are already in place. Then, I think you will win, first, the confidence of the community, and second, some respect for the way in which power is administered and community leadership is delivered.
I have heard the phrase ‘doing the right thing’. That is what I am talking about: make sure you are doing the right thing for the right reasons; that you really mean it and are able to deliver these programs for the right reason, for the right purpose, and it is not the acquisition of power because we have seen you do that before. You have made many announcements that posture and present a tough image, but they are used largely for the purpose of acquiring and maintaining power.
I am listening carefully. That is why I waited for two of you to speak to hear what philosophy this rests upon and what value system this sits upon. I want to hear a more rigorous description of that notion of personal responsibility. I acknowledge that the Attorney-General made reference to that in a way which I really believe he meant. There is a distinct difference in the way we approach youth intervention and intervention with the families - personal responsibility. In order to hold a person responsible for their actions, there needs to be clearly defined standards.
That starts in the classroom. There needs to be a clearly defined standard set through our curriculum. This model here will not change unless we see a change in the way we deliver our curriculum, deal with truants, and respond to a child who is exhibiting all the signs of being at risk. You start to see that in about Year 3 or 4. You need the capacity to respond then. I urge you to consider the frame of the curriculum, the resourcing available to schools, particularly the primary schools, and the capacity to identify young people who are at risk. You can see the signs in the family at Year 3 and 4 - even earlier in same cases - and you see it in the student. The capacity to intervene then would save much more later on.
There have been a few comments made about the camps. I have researched a number of these camps, both interstate and overseas, and described what I believe is the right framework for these programs. There have already been comments made and it is part of the turf wars in this. They will say I am talking about boot camps, and boot camps seem to conjure up ideas of kids marching around and being brutalised. Members who are sincere about putting in proper programs will see that there is a whole range of programs available. Other jurisdictions have ranges of different programs. The Balunu Foundation, I think, fits a spectrum of response beautifully. Brahminy fits another sector well.
There is a place for the tougher approach, which some people call boot camp. I am not in favour of the term ‘boot camp’, but it has been used because it helps some people to understand what sort of action we are talking about. It is a broad approach that can go from the more rigorous approach that you might have seen in the brat camp-type programs applied in the Australian context all the way through to Brahminy, and then you have leadership development courses. It does not have to be punitive, but it is the way in which this whole range of programs can be delivered, and I am listening for more detail on the framework and the principles on which these programs would be delivered.
The key to all this, and I hope we will have the Treasurer speak, is to describe where the money is coming from to fund this program. Is it new money? Is it money being taken, perhaps, from other agencies, other sectors and other programs and applied in this new way? Will there be a resolve to deal with the world view that has society as the problem, we are all victims, particularly these poor kids are victims and their families are victims, and we just spend as much money as we can in a benign sense and a hope that by spending money on society we will end up fixing the problem. I do not subscribe to that view.
There is an element of compassion that is required to intervene in families that are in difficulty, but you must preserve the standard, the value, that the majority of our community holds as valuable. You start that in the education system, you see it echoed through the programs you deliver so that people are left with no misunderstanding that you mean business for very good reasons. You are defending standards, you are defending principles, and there are times that you will be required to be tough. There will be many in the community who will rail against this if it is properly implemented. If it is implemented in a manner which still gives a lot of nourishment to the notion of victim-hood, you will not get, say, the left wing, the do-gooders, screaming too much. They will just be asking for more money.
However, if you go down this path and you tread across that line of saying: ‘No, we mean business’, we are calling for people to be personally responsible for their actions. No ifs, no buts: ‘We do not care about your background or the excuses that you may bring to bear. We can deal with those later at another stage. We are dealing with the fact that you throw stones at cars, or that you repeatedly fail to turn up to school and show contempt for the school system’. We will deal with that, and then the other issues we can deal with later, but the action is dealt with in isolation. You chose to do something you should not have done, and the full weight of the law will be brought to bear on that person and their family. Then the other extenuating circumstances are dealt with separately. One does not feed the other: ‘I do not care about your background; you have done the wrong thing’.
Our community needs that kind of resolve. I hope that comes through the implementation of this. I hope it is more than a response to an obvious community need. For seven years, this government has made announcements of this nature that impress people because people need these problems responded to. You are in the driver’s seat; you must provide the leadership and the courage to implement this in the manner in which the community expects. There will be some opposition if you implement it properly. Do you have the courage to push through the opposition from those people who view the world entirely differently and think that everyone is a victim of circumstance and that we must do the best we can to deal with that problem first? You deal with that problem second in my view. I have a different approach, that being that the individual is responsible, the family unit is responsible, you strengthen that, and then you deal with the other matters. There must be a consequence.
I will finish the way I started. The look of this, the description of it, the language that is used, gives me cause for hope. I am satisfied that government has shown the resolve to depart from their inaction of the past and go down this path. I am aware that there is polling going on at the moment. I am aware that there is an election in the wind. I am aware that there are plans on the side of government to get ready for the election. I hope this is not that. I hope this is the real deal because the community needs this kind of leadership.
Debate suspended.
LEAVE OF ABSENCE
Members for Arafura and Stuart
Members for Arafura and Stuart
Ms LAWRIE (Leader of Government Business): Madam Speaker, I move that leave of absence be granted for two sitting days for the members for Arafura and Stuart. They are attending federal parliament at the invitation of the Prime Minister.
The Chief Minister will take questions on Indigenous Policy and Education, Employment and Training. I will take questions on Family and Community Services, Women’s Policy and Arts and Museums.
Motion agreed to.
OPPOSITION PORTFOLIO CHANGES
Mr MILLS (Opposition Leader): Madam Speaker, I table a paper outlining the new opposition office holders:
Member for Blain, Terry Mills: Leader of the Opposition
MOTION
Note statement - Youth Justice Strategy
Continued from earlier this day.
Ms LAWRIE (Treasurer): Madam Speaker, I congratulate the Chief Minister on his statement on our Youth Justice Strategy. There is probably no greater issue confronting Territorians than dealing with youth crime. In providing both the carrot and the stick – the tough love approach in tacking youth - there is no excuse for youth crime. Youth who think that they can commit crimes and get away with it will feel the full force of the law come down on them. There are very important elements in the Youth Justice Strategy in regards to that.
In tackling the causes of youth antisocial behaviour and family dysfunction, we will also be looking to assist vulnerable young people by identifying at risk behaviour earlier. The Youth Justice Strategy provides assistance, support and, as a last resort, enforcement of the responsibilities of young people and the family responsibilities through legislation, those family orders, but also the enforcement of family orders if required.
It imposes tough treatment on the small minority of young people who are involved in serious or escalating offences. The amendments to the Youth Justice Act provide that the revolving door of our diversion programs will no longer be an option for serial juvenile offenders. This is a very welcome move. In travelling across the Territory, and having formerly held the portfolio responsibility of Family and Community Services, I know this is an area of concern whether you are in Alice Springs, Darwin or in a regional town such as Tennant Creek or Katherine, or in a remote community. Members of the community have been looking for a way to crack down on those serial offenders who are thumbing their noses at our society and particularly the law.
The system will provide appropriate options, such as warnings, youth justice conferences, and diversion programs. All of these play an important role in getting many young offenders back on track and away from crime. We will focus on that small group of serial offenders, those who treat juvenile diversion and the opportunities of juvenile diversion as something of a joke. Well, it will be no laughing matter in the future. There will be some very harsh options considered by the courts for those who want to continue to re-offend. As a former Minister for Family and Community Services, and as the member for Karama, I welcome these initiatives and these changes.
Serial offenders will be dealt with by the Youth Justice Court and ultimately they will face incarceration. The family orders, the element of the new legislation which will be introduced during these sittings, provide for those family responsibility agreements which are important in the sense of case management and mediation processes, but, ultimately with the sanctions of orders. They will be focused on parents with a child or, in some cases children, who are repeatedly absent from school or in public places late at night or who participate in antisocial or unacceptable criminal behaviour.
I believe the two step approach to engaging parents is a fair and reasonable approach. It is a tough approach. It allows for authorised officers from the Department of Employment, Education and Training, Justice, Police, and Health and Community Services to refer cases of children who are repeatedly truant, or in our public places late at night, or demonstrating antisocial or criminal behaviour to a specialist service which will enter into a family responsibility agreement with identified parents on behalf of that government agency.
Family responsibility agreements will be a written contractual agreement. They will be an arrangement that will provide that the parent will, in exchange for agreeing to certain requirements, receive assistance from a dedicated officer to access government and non-government support services. These agreements can be entered into on a voluntary basis and can run for six months with a capacity to extend. Agreements may be entered into with the parents of children who have not yet turned 18 years. The agreements could include that the parent attend parent guidance counselling, a parenting support group, or other relevant personal development course or rehab program which is critically important in looking at the catchment of parents we are referring to in these circumstances. We know many of them have drug and alcohol abuse issues. I believe the requirement of entering into a rehab program is a practical way of addressing these family agreements.
They will ensure that the parent agrees to ensure that the child attends school - this is fundamentally important for the child’s future; that the parent ensures that the child is home by a certain time – a curfew, if you like; or ensures that the child avoids contact with a particular person or a place.
In exchange for agreeing to meet such conditions, the parent will have access to a dedicated officer who will assist the parent to access important government and non-government services. The officer will provide the parent with reasonable assistance necessary to help them comply with the agreement. We will not be setting people up to fail and walking away; there will be dedicated services funded and resourced by this government to support the family agreements and the families who are bound to those agreements.
If a parent refuses to either enter into an agreement or comply with an agreement, an agency may seek a family responsibility order from the court through the Chief Executive Officer of that agency. It is a very high-level delegation. Orders must be based on reasonable grounds. The order will largely mirror the conditions contained in the agreement, but with greater emphasis on conditions assisting the parents to address aspects of their own behaviour that are preventing them from taking responsibility for the care of their child. As I said, it could compel a parent to attend drug or alcohol rehabilitation, or anger management programs, or a targeted parenting program. An order may provide for the provision of in-home support if considered appropriate in the circumstances. Orders can be in force for up to 12 months unless earlier revoked.
Family agreements and orders will apply to any guardian of a child rather than limiting the scheme to parents only because, as we know through practical experience, many of these children who are in the at-risk category or committing antisocial behaviour are not living with parents; they often find themselves in circumstances where they are living with extended family and guardians.
A central body will be established to monitor these agreements and orders. There are penalties of up to $2000 for parents who breach the orders - the carrot and the stick.
In Darwin and Alice Springs, youth hubs will be established to provide a link to family and youth case management. I believe this is a very critical element of the Youth Justice Strategy. Outreach workers will also be able to bring young people to these youth hubs with the consent of the individual. The youth hubs will be staffed by a coordinator and other staff sufficient to meet the needs and hours of the operation. There will be a strong link with the court, the youth, and the family service system to ensure that bail conditions are met.
I have had the opportunity for quite some years now to engage with the youth sector. I can appreciate the importance of these youth hubs in being able to provide a link between the youth who is case managed and a variety of youth services funded by the government. We provide funding in the order of $4.8m for youth programs across Alice Springs and $2.3m across the Top End. We have a raft of non-government organisations receiving this funding to run programs that are critical to working with youth. The youth hubs will be an ideal way of ensuring there is a much greater coordinated approach to their work.
Another important element of the initiatives in the statement is to do with youth camps. I am pleased that the work done for some time now by government behind the scenes to identify appropriate youth camp opportunities in the Top End and Central Australia will be delivered. The youth camps will provide a residential setting where services that tackle antisocial behaviour by young people in the Territory will be delivered. The government will use existing facilities at Hamilton Downs Station near Alice Springs to run a new youth camp. The facility has in place dormitories which can accommodate up to 65 young people, kitchen facilities, toilets and water supply. The youth camp will get kids away from the cycle of crime by spending time at Hamilton Downs for intensive skills and development programs. Young people at the facility will be required to complete education and skills training programs to help them make a positive contribution on their return to the community.
As announced yesterday, the government will be funding the Balunu Foundation at Talc Head. I have had occasion to meet with the Balunu Foundation. They are fairly young in terms of their time as a foundation but I have great confidence in their commitment and passion in running appropriate youth camps at that facility at Talc Head. The Brahminy Foundation at Batchelor has a sound track record in providing Top End kids an opportunity for a youth camp. These initiatives, delivered in a coordinated manner, will provide a balanced integrated approach to this Youth Justice Strategy.
Our key focus is to get young people back on track and to provide a hopeful future. There is a clear message here: antisocial behaviour will not be tolerated. This government will do its best to support and provide options for families to give the best opportunity for positive long-term outcomes.
Madam Speaker, I have every confidence in the Department of Family Community Services to pick up many of the operational aspects of the youth justice initiatives. They have the pre-existing relationships with the non-government youth service providers, they know where the programs exist and where the need for coordination can be pulled together under this Youth Justice Strategy.
I congratulate the Chief Minister for pursuing these initiatives. I know that the Justice minister has gone to a great deal of work with the Department of Justice to ensure that these initiatives can be delivered for government. I thank the Department of Family and Community Services and the Deputy Chief Minister for their commitment to deliver on a robust range of options to tackle antisocial behaviour by youths; deal with the diversion programs in their role within the youth service delivery system; introduce the options of the youth camps to get them away; to introduce challenging situations to those wayward youth; and, importantly, include education and skills training.
Madam Speaker, as the Chief Minister said, this is not a silver bullet solution. This is a range of initiatives pulling together and building on what we already have and what we already fund, with some $6m plus of government funding out into the non-government sector, which will have that strength and coordinated approach. Importantly, it will now have the legislative framework to back it up so that we provide the teeth within the court system to close the revolving door of the juvenile diversion that we have seen with those recidivous juveniles who seem to think that crime is a way of life. They will soon learn that in the Territory they will pay for their crimes. I commend the Chief Minister for his statement to the House.
Ms CARNEY (Araluen): Madam Speaker, it is a little difficult to know where to start with a statement like this so let us cut straight to the chase. For the most part it is intended to get headlines in a newspaper prior to the introduction of legislation. No doubt, the government will succeed in that objective.
I have listened carefully to the previous speakers and I have read the statement carefully. If this is not policy on the run, I do not know what is. How you people can look your fellow Territorians in the eye and say this is not policy on the run, I do not know. It beggars belief. This statement cobbled together - and I have done the work, I know where they are from - a bunch of ideas from all over the place, thrown in some stuff that the CLP has been talking about for some time, coming up with your puffery in a statement which will precede the introduction of legislation tomorrow.
When I heard from the Government Whip what the statement was going to be - I correct that, it might have been my office, my apologies. They called me and said this was going to be the statement. I went up to get it and it is a very thin statement. There is not a lot here. It is clearly intended for a headline.
Having said that, and subject to the detail in the legislation, the opposition is - as the Opposition Leader said - generally supportive of some of the measures to the extent that they are understood in a statement like this. We are generally supportive of them. Why? Because the opposition, together with many other Territorians, has been telling this bunch of arrogant rabbits on the other side for three or four years that crime in our local communities is out of control. If you look at Alice Springs, for instance, that is one of the reasons why 500 people turned up to the Convention Centre when parliament sat in April last year. It was only a few months ago when the now Chief Minister had gangs roaming around in his electorate. I think the member for Karama had them in hers as well. As the Leader of the Opposition said, the Caz Boys are alive and well.
That takes us back to the much lauded anti-gang laws passed in October 2006. I am holding the then Attorney-General’s media release of that date. Mr Stirling said: ‘The provisions in the bill are aimed at giving the police the tools they need to prevent and deal with gang activity’. Well, they did not, did they, Madam Speaker? If memory serves me correctly, the bill was subsequently amended. In any event, gangs continued to roam around electorates in the Top End and in Central Australia.
I made an adjournment speech in February 2007 in which I said in relation to my own electorate, calling it ‘a relatively recent phenomenon’, that we had youth gangs in Alice Springs. We had tended not to have them in Alice Springs. Not so long ago I went to a meeting of 20 constituents who were telling me about a gang of youths, around 30 to 50 of them, walking down their street terrorising the residents. Yet, we have the government saying they are on to it and they have produced the anti-gang legislation. Well, it did not work.
Let us go back and see how else the government has failed. I noted with great interest, I think it is page 9 of the Chief Minister’s statement, that he does not say the word ‘curfew’. If I heard the Treasurer correctly, I think she mentioned the word ‘curfew’. What an interesting word. The CLP went to the 2005 election wanting a youth curfew and we argued the case eloquently and well. This government returned to power and did not and has not taken up the curfew idea. However, it went further. In about 2006, the Alice Springs Town Council, feeling very aggrieved that the government of the Northern Territory was ignoring them, came up with their own youth strategy. I will come back to the words ‘youth strategy’. The Alice Springs Town Council came up with their youth strategy and it called for a youth curfew. The now Treasurer was the relevant minister at the time and she said: ‘No, no, no. It is seriously un-Labor’, or words to that effect, ‘and in any event you do not have problems and therefore we are not having a youth curfew’. My, how the worm has turned. Obviously we will not know until we have seen the bill but one wonders whether there is going to be a version of a curfew contained in the legislation.
I saw the interview with John Lawrence on Stateline the other night and I have it in front of me. Government pleases itself when they do and when they do not quote representatives of the legal profession. Anyone who saw or heard that interview or has read the transcript will know that the Law Society seemed to be unenthusiastic and underwhelmed with government’s pronouncements so far when it comes to dealing with youth crime and youth justice issues. The government has pleased itself. It goes to the Law Society and Criminal Lawyers Association when it suits them, ignores them at other times. I suppose that is politics; that is certainly Labor politics.
I stress, and I have said it numerous times in this Chamber, that there is a quantum difference between the government spin - and this statement is part of it - and the details of the legislation. The government has seriously bad form on this particular issue. I can assure members that I will be looking very carefully at the legislation when I get it.
Having looked, as I did, at the Chief Minister’s relatively vague and relatively brief statement, there are some other matters that I would like to raise on the way through as it were. I note on the first page the Chief Minister refers to the vast majority of Territory families seeking a safe and decent place to bring up their kids, a safe and decent place for senior Territorians, and so on. Well, the opposition has been telling members of government for six years that the Territory is no longer safe and the government’s own crime statistics prove it. One need only look again at the example in Alice Springs. The former member for Greatorex and I repeatedly raised concerns about Alice Springs. Every time we did, not only were we howled down, but the government had the audacity to pump out obnoxious media releases saying we were talking down our town. That was not the thinking of over 500 people who turned up to parliament - and I know them and respect them more than members on the other side.
The Chief Minister talked about his integrated strategy for addressing this issue on page 2. We look forward to seeing the integrated strategy. We have seen the words ‘integrated strategy’ and when the government has its strategy, as it presumably will with other strategies, it will come in the form of a glossy brochure and it should be tabled in the parliament. In his response, if the Chief Minister has his strategy, perhaps he would be good enough to table it.
I note on page 3, the Chief Minister refers to his government’s already tough stance on crime, especially youth crime. That does beg the question: if the government is already tough, then why is it going to other measures? Perhaps it is not working. We have said this repeatedly to government and they have howled us down. Halfway down on page 3, the Chief Minister talks again about his government’s Youth Justice Strategy. I formally call for it. Where is the Youth Justice Strategy? It does not have to be in a glossy document; it might be on a few A4 pages, we will have the black and white version. Please, any version will do. You cannot get away with just calling it a Youth Justice Strategy. You should produce it and you should table a copy in reply or by no later than the end of this first week of parliamentary sittings.
The Chief Minister goes on to talk about the strategy. I ask: where is it? The Chief Minister refers to the Youth Justice Act. He announced last week that amendments were required to the Youth Justice Act. I remember when that one came in as well - August 2006 or thereabouts – and the government lauded the Youth Justice Act just as it did with the gang laws and said that this was going to be the answer, this was the way forward, and no one should question them. Any questioning was outrageous because government had the answer. Here we are, back again and those on the fifth floor have deemed it necessary to amend the act.
While we are talking about the Youth Justice Act, let us go for a legislative trip down memory lane. Section 133 of the Youth Justice Act, for all intents and purposes, replaced section 55A of the good old Juvenile Justice Act enacted, on the basis of my documents, 8 March 1997. Now, I have not been able to do a straight up cut and paste, but mark my words section 55A of the old Juvenile Justice Act and section 133 of the Youth Justice Act are remarkably similar. What are the similarities? The CLP government prescribed under the Juvenile Justice Act this concept called parental responsibility. Not a new phenomenon, not recently discovered by the Chief Minister and his scheming colleagues. This concept has been floating around in the Territory easily since 1997. Section 55A of the Juvenile Justice Act provided for a parent or parents of a juvenile to pay an amount towards the cost of detaining the juvenile in a detention centre. It went on to say that the amount should not exceed $100 per week for each week during which the juvenile was detained. Section 133 of Youth Justice Act - and I do not have a copy in front of me - is remarkably similar. The CLP brought in the concept of family responsibility; Labor in about 2006 with its Youth Justice Act, rehashed and redid the parental responsibility.
I ask this question, Madam Speaker: how many times has section 133 of the Youth Justice Act been invoked? In other words: how many parents have actually been pushed to pay the $100 per week for detention? My guess is none. The Youth Justice Act referred to the Fines Recovery Unit, something brought in by Labor in about 2002. I ask now: how many fines, pursuant to section 133 of the Youth Justice Act, have been recovered by the Fines Recovery Unit? My bet is none. I will flag now, because it is blindingly obvious to anyone with half a brain, that I will be pursuing this matter in Estimates. Those of you listening on the fifth floor please start looking at your records and get your departmental heads to have a look at it also. We are going to ask some serious questions about the Fines Recovery Unit and how many times section 133 has been invoked.
Why do we ask that question? Because the new Chief Minister, who bluffed his way into the job - and we all know he did …
Ms Lawrie: Did not!
Ms CARNEY: … who bluffed his way into the job - said he had the numbers when he did not. He bluffed his way into the job. He is duplicitous, Madam Speaker. He is coming in here trying to persuade his colleagues - who seem to be constantly persuaded by him – and his fellow Territorians that family responsibility is a great new thing discovered by the member for Wanguri. Well, it is not, and it has not.
We look forward to details in Estimates but, more specifically and more immediately, we look forward to seeing the exact nature of the legislation to be introduced by the Attorney-General tomorrow.
Let us talk about a couple of serious issues. One is police on the beat. This government has famously failed to live up to its own promise of delivering, within its imposed time frames, 200 extra police on the beat - and we all know how the Attorney-General’s language started to change. He started to squib and duck and weave because he knew he could not deliver them. We know that he has not delivered them and the police officers know that you have not delivered them.
However, I digress. Let us talk about police on the beat. The Chief Minister talked in his statement about all these young‘uns who are going to face incarceration and the cheeky little buggers are not going to be able to avail themselves of juvenile diversion any more. Well, we have to catch them first, do we not? We have to catch them! Now, let us find out how we might catch the young‘uns around the length and breadth of the Northern Territory. I am thinking police on the beat. I am thinking that police on the beat, the active use of the mobile police van - and we all know the stories about that in Katherine and Alice Springs, and Alice Springs in particular. All well and good for the footy, but you tell the 20 people in my electorate with whom I met only a few weeks ago and ask them whether they would be well served by the police van being at the end of their street so that the 30 thugs walking past their house night and day were not going to further persecute them - and persecuting them is exactly what this bunch of people are doing. In any event, I am very interested to see no reference to police on the beat.
I have about five minutes left so I will move on to a couple of other things. However, it is interesting, is it not, member for Greatorex, that you can say that these young‘uns are going to face incarceration; you have to catch them first. They are quicker than all of us put together. These are quick little people and we know them. We know who they are most of the time in our communities and, boy, do they run! Any government needs enough police on the beat, and you should deliver that before you start to try to get your headlines in the Northern Territory News.
There are other interesting references throughout the statement. For instance, on page 5, it refers to ‘a specialist service body’, ‘a specialist service body which will enter into a family responsibility agreement …’ etcetera. What, I ask, is a specialist service body? I am not sure if I have heard of that before. There is no elaboration in the statement. Then I see on page 7 in the statement that there is a reference to ‘a central body’. So we have a ‘specialist service body’ that does something. We have a ‘central body’ that does something else. We have a strategy that we have not seen that is spread over this very thin statement.
My point is that there is no detail here. It is a bunch of words strung together, presumably as a result of polling, presumably as a result of some local members on the other side being marginally more active than others, saying: ‘We have real problems in our electorates, our people, we need to do something’. This statement, however, seems to be more along the lines of being seen to be doing something rather than actually doing it. We wait for details in the bill tomorrow.
I note further there is a reference, on page 6, to ‘a dedicated officer’. I wonder if the dedicated officer works for the specialist service body that may somehow be related to the central body, which somehow does something to protect our fellow Territorians. These are the sort of things that we will be looking for when the bill finally hits the table.
I note also with interest, on page 5, that it says, ‘Agreements will be entered into on a voluntary basis and will run for up to 12 months’ - an agreement on a voluntary basis. It was interesting to read that an agreement was going to have to be voluntary, given all that preceded it in the statement and the public utterances of ministers once they had announced that they were going to try desperately to be seen to be doing something about youth crime. I am not sure that an agreement on a voluntary basis is necessarily the best way to go. What if the parents of recalcitrant young’uns say: ‘No, I am not signing it.’? Reading on through the statement there is a very vague reference to, and it is almost muttered, that there is this possibility that people might end up going to court. We want to see much more detail about that one.
Dr Burns: It will be in the legislation.
Ms CARNEY: You have to catch them. You have to come up with good laws. You have to enforce it. There is no point in saying any young’un who does something wrong goes to gaol for 1000 years. You need to come up with fair dinkum practical legislation. You failed when it came to your anti-gang bill. That is regarded as a laughing stock and I think even you mob would concede that. The Youth Justice Act is not all that it was cracked up to be.
We look forward very much - in fact, I am so excited I will barely be able to sleep tonight as I look forward to the legislation. So, bring it on, minister. We look forward to having a look at it.
Mr VATSKALIS (Business and Economic Development): Madam Speaker, I still think the member for Araluen is the better leader for the CLP. The fact that Rick Setter does not like her reinforces my opinion. Yes, you are the better leader for the CLP. It is good to see that you have a supporter, too. The member for Greatorex supports you. He is prepared to jump up to give you some more time. It is really good for you. However, it is very bad for the current leader as he could not even manage three votes as it was two and two.
It is interesting to see the dynamics of political parties. It is great that we have our differences but you have to tell the truth. She is a better leader for the CLP full stop. She is not the only one who believes it. Many on my side believe it too. She speaks well, she has passion. She does not take a trip to Taiwan at a critical time like a political campaign of a fellow member. She sticks by her friends and she works hard.
It is very interesting to hear her saying we have to catch them first, when we know the capture rate of criminals by the CLP under the mandatory sentencing was 10%. For every 10 crimes committed only one person would ever get caught. The reason for that was there were no police. And who said that? It was the police themselves. In my 2001 campaign in Casuarina, police would stop me in the streets and tell me there were no police on the streets and that was confirmed later when we had the review into law and order which said that the CLP had stopped recruiting police in 1994, making up their numbers, using police behind desks rather than on the streets. We invested time and money to put extra police on the beat.
I am not going to deny there are problems. There are problems not only in my electorate, not only in the Territory, not only in Australia, but all over the world. Our society has become more violent. Recently, the Police Commissioners in Victoria and Tasmania expressed the same opinion that our young people are becoming violent. I do not know the reason. Is it the fact that there are a number of television programs that show violence every night? Is it because people actually see wars in their living rooms during dinner time and become de-sensitised to human suffering? Is it the breakdown of families, or is it because we live in a society where everybody has rights but no one has obligations? We have problems and we have to address the problems.
I have worked very hard with the police and the community in my electorate and have visited Casuarina Police Station to seek solutions to problems caused by youth. It has been a hard and heartbreaking job. I see the impact of these youths on the social and the commercial life in my electorate every day. I have seen the effect on my friends and my friends’ businesses. I see the people who come to my office to complain about the youths roaming late at night. Bus drivers tell me that they have seen 6-years-old and 4-years-old kids out between 10 pm and midnight. I have heard from police that when they take these kids home, they are abused by the parents, the parents do not want to know the kids, the parents are either drunk or stoned and do not take any care of their children.
We have had enough. Enough is enough. The community has had enough. I, like many other people here, have had enough. It is time for action. Our government is prepared to take tough action to show these little creatures that they cannot act like that without being punished.
The Chief Minister is correct. The number of children and parents involved is a small minority – we know that. If you have a look at the juvenile court list on the web every morning, the same names appear time after time. These little kids go to many schools. I know that for a fact because some of them go to where my wife teaches and these kids are a small minority with the same names. It is a small minority who cause the majority of the problems. Unfortunately, they cause big problems in Darwin and in other areas of the Territory.
I said before that I feel some become more violent. Because of that violence, even though we are speaking of the minority of young people, the impact they are having on our community is increasingly felt. The attitude demonstrated by these young people is increasingly hostile and increasingly arrogant. This is very disturbing. I have been told many times that when these people commit an offence they brag that they are underage – they are under 14 years, or 13 years, or 12 years – and the police cannot do anything about it. The surprising thing I hear is the moment these people turn 16 or 16 and they realise that if they are caught they have to go to court, all of a sudden the criminal activity stops. Unfortunately, some of them become indoctrinators for the younger kids.
There has always been a tolerated level of exuberance of youth. We have all been young and we have all yahooed around. We have all done things we should not have done but we tolerate it because sometimes it is a fine point from exuberance to committing a crime. All too often today the exuberance is labelled violence and the targets more and more indiscriminate. It is this change in behaviour which is raising levels of genuine fear in the community, and also the fact that many of these young kids somehow access alcohol, and alcohol and youth is a very dangerous mix.
I am pleased that the Chief Minister has announced how we are going to get to the nub of this issue. The limits placed on diversion are strongly welcomed. The idea of diversion was to ensure, where possible, young people do not get caught in the criminal justice system without having an opportunity to change their ways through alternative programs.
I remember mandatory sentencing under the CLP. I recall the article in the newspaper where a father gave a report to the newspaper; his young son got involved with some kids. They broke into Toy World, stole some toys and his son came home and admitted what he had done. The father approached the shop and was prepared to pay all the damage his son had done. Because the police were involved, his son was arrested and he had to be sent to gaol under the mandatory legislation. That kid probably never committed, and will never commit another offence, but because he was trapped in the mandatory sentencing of the CLP he had to go to gaol. We remember that there was a big hoo-hah at that time as the Commonwealth government was very unhappy with the CLP mandatory sentencing regime and they were threatening to intervene to wipe out the legislation. Under duress, the CLP agreed to introduce diversionary programs. They actually advocated the diversionary programs before mandatory sentencing so they would not have that legislation overturned by the then federal Liberal government.
Diversion programs work sometimes. Some kids go to diversion programs and afterwards they never cause any problem. For some other young people, this process leads to an increased contempt for the law as they become untouchable, they can do one, two, three, or 10 diversionary programs and they do not change. Have a look at the juvenile court list again. It is very interesting to go on the Internet to the Darwin Juvenile Court and you will see the same kids - and I have seen the same name appearing five, six, seven, 10 times, day after day on the court list. Sometimes they go out with bail constantly. I welcome any introduction of legislation to limit the number of times people can get bail when they continuously commit crime.
The measures announced today say to these young people that you are not untouchable, you are on notice. For those failing to reform after diversionary programs there is the criminal justice system, including incarceration, which is fair enough. Two chances and then you are in. Evidence shows that diversion works with those young people who fall foul of the law once and were most likely to return to mainstream. However, I am less convinced about those young people for whom breaking the law and antisocial behaviour has become a way of life. It is this group of young people that the Chief Minister has targeted by putting a limit on the opportunities they receive for diversion and he has my wholehearted support.
As I said before, we live in a society where every man has got rights but no one seems to have responsibilities and for that reason I am supportive of the intention to make parents more responsible for the actions of their children. I am a parent, I have two sons, and it is not easy to bring up children these days. There are many temptations out there and sometimes you have to govern them wearing a velvet glove on an iron fist. Sometimes they do not like it, sometimes we have to make tough decisions, but this is the way to bring up children. Often we have these people, the bleeding hearts, who say you cannot punish your children, but there are different ways of punishing them. I am not advocating hitting a child with a whip, but removing the television for a few days or the computer can be a form of punishment. They can then realise what is right from wrong.
On the other hand, I know very well that poverty and disadvantage is not an excuse. Not many of us have grown up in a rich family. Most of us probably came from working class families who were probably not well off. They were struggling and working very hard. My family was very poor when I was growing up. We did not have the luxuries that kids have today. We did not have even the quality of food that we eat today. That was not an excuse for me to go off the rails and it is not an excuse for anybody to go off the rails. Sometimes poverty and disadvantage make people stronger. Often, many of the kids who are today yahooing down the streets and causing all the problems are kids with very good families in Darwin, the Territory and Australia.
There are parents who want to continue to party, get drunk, get stoned and live a lifestyle with no responsibility for their children. These are the parents who abuse the police when they return their children at 2 am. These are the parents who, when the kids go away, do not check where the kids are, where they have been, and what they have done during the day or the night. They are increasingly selfish and uncaring.
The government has said enough is enough. It is your responsibility. You are the parent, and you have to take responsibility for your children and their behaviour. If you are not willing to fulfil these responsibilities, there will be consequences. Parents must be and should be held responsible. We recognise circumstances where people are not capable of fulfilling those roles without better preparation than they have had. I have people coming to my office telling me about their children running off, living a life that they do not approve of, children as young as 14 years old getting drunk or smoking or having sex. We can do the best in our life for our children, but sometimes we cannot succeed and we need outside help.
Our government is prepared to help these parents who go off the rails. We will be able to link them to effective parenting support programs. Essentially, the Chief Minister is saying if you make an honest attempt to get the lifestyle of your child under control the government will make an effort to help you through. If you thumb your nose at society, your neighbours, your friends and your community we will come down on you like a ton of bricks. The provision of voluntary contracts or a compulsory order means that the authorities will have an option of how best to deal with the family involved. In some cases, a corporate approach works; in other cases, the limits must be set with a punishable response for failure. The family is the core of our society; it will be supported strongly by our government. However, where families shrink from their own responsibilities and leave it to others to pick up the pieces, they will be made to bear the consequences of their actions.
The announcements regarding youth camps here and in Alice Springs are also welcomed. I have believed for some time that reintroducing youth camps was the way to go. However, the necessary preparation work has to be done. The Wildman River youth camp experience has already been touted as a model. I am aware there were significant issues with this model; in particular the failure to properly identify ways of ensuring that young people who went through their programs connected to a meaningful role once they returned to society.
I was very interested to hear the CLP touting the youth camps when it was the CLP that closed down the Wildman River youth camp. Members do not think that this new camp will be the revolving door that has happened in the past. Unlike previous experience, this camp will be tied to a youth hub and to services to ensure that what occurs at these camps is individually aimed at lifting that child out of the mire and setting them back on a useful lifestyle. I do not want to see a camp that will be a holiday camp. I do not want to see a camp that is airconditioned with three meals a day, a soft bed for the night, television blaring all day, and a gym. What I want to see is a camp that kids will go to that will not have the luxury of television. They will be able to undertake accelerated leadership programs because many of these kids skip school and do not learn to read and write. They will be able to learn a trade.
I cannot understand why we have to build a luxury camp out in the bush when we can teach these kids to build some of the essential infrastructure such as fences, roads, and toilets, and when they come out of this camp, first of all they will be tired, and second, they can start learning a trade. I do not want them to have television and a gym as a reward. Gyms should be out of the question; it costs too much anyway. These kids should learn to be involved in team activities, playing sports like basketball, football or soccer. All these sports can continue after coming out of this camp.
This announcement will mean more options for police and the courts, and great peace of mind for the public. It will also be a diversion from crime for these kids who went off the rails, made a mistake, and they will never do it again. It also shows the kids that if you stuff up twice, the third strike and your out. This announcement has my wholehearted support and I will be spreading this information through my electorate as soon as possible. I believe it will be well received by people of the Territory. It will be well received by the people in my electorate of Casuarina and, over time, we will see significant reduction in youth crime and antisocial behaviour as a result of these policies.
Madam Speaker, we have to make a stand, and we are prepared to do that. We are prepared to tell kids enough is enough, three strikes and you are out. We are also prepared to tell their parents that it is their responsibility; the community does not have to pay for their failures. If they cannot look after their kids, we will ensure that either the kids or parents are punished in one way or another. However, if they make an effort, our government is prepared to help them.
Mrs BRAHAM (Braitling): Madam Speaker, I am pleased with the minister’s statement today. I hope he follows through with what he is promising; that it actually happens because there is concern out there in the neighbourhood. We have to have a multipronged approach to handling children and these young teenagers who go off the rails. Therefore, I support many of the things the Chief Minister has said in his statement.
I would like for people to get away from the terminology ‘boot camp’. That is not what I have in mind at all and it conjures up an image of something that is punitive. Some of the concerns I have had are for juveniles who have not broken the law in any way. They are on that slippery slope and they are very likely to; they are running with the wrong lot. Quite often, if you can grab them, then perhaps you will save them.
There have been a couple of cases in Alice Springs where parents have asked: ‘Do you know of any program I can enrol my teenage son into? I cannot control him anymore. I need to break the cycle, break the gang he is with, and put him on the straight and narrow’. To be honest, we looked at many options. However, the final answer for those parents in the few cases that I had was they left town - they took their teenager away to set up home somewhere else so that they would get them away from that environment. That was probably a good thing, but a bit hard on the parents who had their careers and they had to leave those behind. It is important that there are a number of options for young teenagers who are on the slippery slope. To be honest, the diversionary programs I have come across in Alice Springs have not been a deterrent, and that is what we are talking about.
I have seen the requirements some of our juveniles who have broken into businesses have signed, you know, these are things that we agree to do. One might be to write a letter of apology to the business person, but the business person said that they had never seen it. One of them may be that they will go to school every day, but you often see them out on the streets, and you wonder who is following up. It is an enormous task if you are asking police and the diversionary unit to follow up on all these diversionary contracts that they have. I do not want to waste police resources doing that when there are probably more important things for them to do.
I was pleased to meet with Tony Kelly, the consultant in Alice Springs, who came to look at various ways we could address the problems in Alice Springs. I support the Chief Minister talking about a location at Hamilton Downs. Hamilton Downs has been there for some time. It is run by the Hamilton Downs Youth Camp Committee. It is owned by the Miller family and leased to the committee. I ask the Chief Minister if he has consulted with the owners of the property because part of their lease states that they need to approve whatever is going on there. I hope that that has been done. I would not like to raise the hopes of people in Alice Springs who are going to have something at Hamilton Downs on a short-term basis if there has not been the proper consultation with the owners of the property, and that is Andy Miller. It has been well used for a number of years with different groups.
I know there was a group from the Alice Springs High School who went out there last year. While they were out there it was a camp. They put on a musical production for the kids, so that at the end of camp there was something they came away with. We have seen good results from camps. We only have to look at what Barry Abbott does at Wallace Rockhole to know that he can look after young people with substance abuse problems and, at the end of the day, they can often walk away and be better citizens because of it.
Hamilton Downs seems to be the choice of government. It is already a purpose-built facility. It has many advantages in regards to location, and it is far enough out of town not to worry us. It has a proven record of catering for groups, and it has services such as power and water, telecommunications and accommodation. I believe it is an ideal place for it to be. However, when I discussed what would happen at Hamilton Downs with the consultant, as I said earlier, I do not see it as being a boot camp, nor do I see it as being a pastoral camp either. I believe that for any teenagers who go into such an establishment, before they go there has to be an assessment of their needs, and that the program is tailored to make them better when they leave, and then there is follow up back in the community. So it is not just a holiday camp, but something that is substantial and catering for that particular child. I would not like to see a combination of children who have offended and done something illegal with children who are just on the slippery slope about to offend. We need to keep those groups quite separate so there is no influence.
We need to address education. We need to look at these children, assess them and see where they are with literacy and numeracy. That could be one of the options whilst they are there; it could be an educational-type learning program, or that may be an option we make sure they have when they go back to town.
Kids always enjoy recreational activities, so it has to be the carrot and stick approach. Young teenagers also enjoy art and music so we can run a very good program catering for that. These days there is a real need for us to also make young people aware of the environment and it would be an opportunity for us to get them into understanding the environment, how they can care for it, upkeep and learn more about it.
The Minister for Business and Economic Development talked about not having television. Astrology is a wonderful thing in the Central Australia skies. It is absolutely …
Mr Wood: Astronomy.
Mrs BRAHAM: Astronomy. What did I say?
Mr Wood: Astrology.
Mrs BRAHAM: Well, we get both. There are beautiful clear skies out there and that is something I am sure they can do at night rather than watch television, as we have said.
We need skilled workers. We talked about the Pathways program in Alice Springs where young apprentices do both training and school work. Perhaps this is the time to introduce them to many of these skills that are needed. We should also provide them with a program on justice, on law and order. I am not quite sure what goes on in the curriculum in schools today, but we need to focus on law and order, what is right and what is wrong, what are the rules of the community that we live under and this would be a good opportunity.
Obviously you would conduct health screening. Most importantly, you need counselling and management at the entry to the program and you need it at the exit of the program. It is no good sending kids out to have a good time and then forgetting them when they come back into town. It is not an easy task to set up the kind of camp that I would like to see. The consultant is returning to Alice Springs this month and I hope to catch up with him again.
Perhaps we need to get a reputable non-government organisation to run it with oversight by government agencies as well, and staff could be employed on a needs basis. Operation Flinders, which works very well in South Australia, has many volunteers who move in and assist with the running of the programs. I can see that there may be volunteers who would be willing to go out and teach skills, to get involved with these young people out on these camps.
I am pretty hopeful about Hamilton Downs as a place to take these students. Many of the schools already do bush camps and students usually respond in a pretty positive manner. They take on tasks and responsibility in an environment like that which perhaps they do not when they are at home and they do it with a great deal of pride and enjoyment. It is important that we break this cycle and the interference of their peers which often is wrong. The type of camp I would like to see should be rewarding and stimulating so they can feel free from peer pressure.
The bottom line is that although it is going to cost the government a lot of money to implement these programs, in the long run, if you balance the savings to the government from what they may have inherited from the justice system, it probably balances out. So spend a little money up-front and you may save a lot of money in the future. We also need to review what is going on at these particular facilities, but it is worthwhile that the government has decided to take on a program such as this in Central Australia. It is one place where we feel that diversionary programs are no longer an option for many of our young people; they have not worked in many cases and the victims of these crimes see them as a soft option, and that families should take a lot more responsibility, and young teenagers should take responsibility for the way they behave.
There is nothing better than seeing a young teenager take a different path. There are many times I have heard it said to a young teenager: ‘You have your choice. You have skills. You have leadership. Go down this path and you will end up in gaol. Use the skills you have, the talents you have, and you will be a great contributor to our community’.
I like the term ‘youth hub’. As I said do not like the term ‘boot camp’. It brings up images of something we do not want to push. When you look at some of the other programs around Australia, they do not use that image of being a punitive-type establishment. A ‘youth hub’ presents something that is going to be worthwhile in the end.
We already have some good programs in Alice Springs, and out in the bush, which have worked. I can see no reason why we cannot utilise some of those as well. There are many other ways the government should be re-enforcing what young people should do. One is truancy. I have spoken about truancy in this House. In Port Augusta in South Australia, and Kalgoorlie in Western Australia, you see signs in windows saying that there should not be any school-aged children in this shop during school time; if you do see someone, ring this number. We do not have truancy officers in the Education department anymore and I believe they had a role to play. They had a place within the system and they were able to follow up when anyone was reported.
We have liaison officers who have a different role altogether. We need to get children who are truant in public places during school hours taken back to school and the parents notified. I have to admit as a teacher many years ago that I did knock on doors and ask why a child was not at school. I think now and again you need that. You need to be able to say this is where you should be, get a move on, and if we get kids to school we can do something with them in the long run.
The parent responsibility repayment for the cost of the damage has been called for by many people for a long time. As the member for Araluen stated, we already have rules regarding that but the courts are seen to be slow in implementing it, saying that in many cases the parents may not be able to refund or repay the cost of the damage. Parent responsibility cannot just be financial. It can be in other ways as well and we should investigate and ensure parents realise their responsibilities. Most parents want to do the right thing. It is usually when the parents are dysfunctional that the kids are dysfunctional. If we can get parents who are dysfunctional, give them the means to get their lives together and to lead a better life, then perhaps we have some chance of managing the children.
I noticed that one of our mayoral candidates, and I thought this was rather amusing, suggested that the council or government, I am not sure which one, buy the Todd Tavern and turn it into a community hub. I would hate to think what sort of cost it would be to buy a pub or to buy back a licence. It seems a silly idea because we have a youth centre just up the road from this particular establishment that seems under utilised. There needs to be much more cooperation amongst the youth groups within town to utilise the facilities that we already have. I also notice that the Gap Youth Centre has been closed due to lack of funding and support. That is unfortunate because the previous Chief Minister promised that particular youth centre $300 000. I will be asking the question tomorrow about why was it closed and where did the promised money go. Why was it not funded and why was a youth centre which has been catering for young children from a disadvantaged area for many years forced to close down? It is a question well worth asking to find out what is going on there.
I suppose it is now a case of us ensuring that the government fulfils their promises; that they do what they have promised in their statement. I will support them; I believe that the way they are going is the right way to go forward. People out there on the streets have been saying for too long that kids are treating everything as though they do not care. Why do the kids have that attitude? It is probably because no one cares about them.
An interesting program I saw when I was overseas was Hug a Hoodie - these kids walk around with hoods on their faces. Instead of treating them in the way that we do, let us tell the kids that they are good kids. Most kids are good kids; they start off as good kids. Somewhere along the way, they might get messed up. However, Hug a Hoodie is not a bad program, and perhaps that is what our kids need - a little love, a little respect and a little teaching to get them on the right path.
Madam Speaker, I thank the minister for his statement. I will be keeping an eye on it to ensure that he delivers.
Mr WOOD (Nelson): Madam Speaker, I also welcome the minister’s statement. Year after year we have debated issues of youth crime and youth exploits. I have spoken about hoons. Hoons do not get much of a mention here, but is something that will get a mention - I can guarantee, minister - in these sittings. That is also antisocial behaviour; we need to put more emphasis on it.
In relation to what the Chief Minister put forward, no one is going to go crook at an attempt to try to fix something that we know is a problem. It is important to state that it is a problem of a minority of young people.
I helped organise some Australia Day celebrations at Howard Reserve in the Howard Springs area, and there were great young people out there. Anyone who has been to school assembly nights at the end of the year will see great young people achieving. You will see young people volunteering in the scouts, in the Red Cross, and in St John Ambulance. We should also make note that there are young people out there doing the right thing in their community, not being antisocial, but being pro-social - if you want to put it that way. We should remember those people and encourage them so that they are showing an example to the young people we are having problems with.
My understanding of what the minister is saying is that this deals with repeat offenders and that, in itself, raises a question. What the minister is saying is that after two diversionary orders, that will be it; they will be subject to the particular legislation that the government is presenting to this House soon. This legislation being put forward by the minister refers to people between 10 and 18 years, but I hazard a guess that between the ages of 15 and 18 years that you know what is right or wrong. You know that if you smash a window of a shop then that is wrong. You know that if you pinch something from somebody’s car then that is wrong.
I believe there should automatically be some form of punishment. I am not talking about mandatory gaol, as was a policy of the previous government. I have always believed in mandatory punishment instead of mandatory sentencing. That is, not necessarily incarcerating people but saying that they have done something wrong and to recognise that there is a penalty for doing the wrong thing, and they have to do some community orders such as mowing the lawn at the local park, or cleaning up the mess if they break a window. Either they or their parents have to pay. Perhaps they would be the better person and, if it takes 10 years to pay, so be it. However, there has to be some responsibility for things that are obviously wrong. I imagine that whilst diversionary programs certainly help young people that should not divert us from the requirement that when someone does something wrong they should also have to own up for it and pay for it in some way or other.
Be that as it may, the system as it is exists, and through the diversionary programs, and after that you are into the system which the government is putting forward today. It is not only for people who are getting into trouble. As the member for Braitling said, truancy and those sorts of things are also included in this legislation. The minister says there will be an agreement with the parents. After that agreement, if that is not working, you can come up with an order which will be set out by the court to try to force parents to some extent to do something about their children. This may also apply to guardians, grandparents, aunts or uncles.
When the minister announced this, I had great concerns that this was going to be a program which said, basically, if the parents of the children that are playing up do not do anything about what is happening, we will fine them, we will force them to do something about their children. It is pleasing that the minister has included in this process some help for those parents.
That is important, because we are dealing with human issues here. They are not clear cut and not every case is the same. There are parents who might try their best. These children might come from a very good background but that is not a 100% guarantee their children are going to end up model citizens. Those children could get mixed up with the wrong crowd. They could get involved with drugs and alcohol when their parents have no idea that it is happening. You could have cases where, basically, the parents have disowned the child; they just cannot handle them so they kicked them out of the house. Or the children have left home of their own accord and there is no way they are going to go back into that house, all the forcing you might like and those children are not going to go back there. Each case needs to be taken on its merits.
I notice also that, in his statement, the Chief Minister says that this may apply to guardians, grandparents, aunts or uncles. I am partly in that case. I cannot say that I am a guardian, but I am one of those with three grandchildren at home. My daughter is at home but, in many cases, it is my wife who looks after those kids. They come home from school, she does much of the washing, she gets to prepare meals for them and my daughter is still working. I am interested to know what the situation is there. Officially, I may not be a guardian, but we have control over those children from the point of view that they live at our house. Would we fall into this category? Would I be required to have an agreement if one of my grandchildren started to get into trouble? I am not sure where that would leave us in that situation. It would be an interesting aspect of what has been put forward to see whether agreements and orders would apply to grandparents and aunts and uncles. In many Aboriginal communities, a family is an extended family, so who would be responsible for this particular court order or agreement?
I can give you another case. I know that the Leader of Government Business was out on a bus the other day. I also did the same thing. I spoke to one of the bus inspectors and asked him which bus was the best to take if I wanted to see a bit of antisocial behaviour? I hopped on the No 4 from Darwin at 7 pm on a Friday night to Casuarina. That is the long way around; it goes up Dick Ward Drive and through Nightcliff and Casuarina. The bus trip on the way was not too bad - there was only one drunk. He was non-Aboriginal. He staggered on and staggered off and did not do much harm to anyone. There seemed to be more problems at the bus station.
I was talking to the bus driver at Casuarina and said who I was and why I was travelling on the bus. This full-blood Aboriginal person, probably about 16 years old, walked straight up to the bus, straight onto the bus - we were not taking passengers at that stage - and had a threatening look on his face. I must admit that if I was not standing next to the bus driver I probably would have moved away because I was not sure what his intent was. From a practical perspective, if you have people like this who have probably come from out of town and they are causing a problem, how do you get to their parents? If their parents are living in outback communities, how will these agreements and orders work for them? I am pretty sure that this bloke did not come from Darwin; his family is somewhere else, and it could be in a very remote community. I will be interested to see the application of what has been put forward in a practical sense in some of these remote communities.
Say you have a young bloke who has left home from one of these remote communities to come into town. He has been given a couple of diversionary orders. He is old enough to leave home but he is still under 18 years and then he commits his third offence, and they say: ‘Right, we are going to sue your parents’. How is that going to work in the case of an isolated community? It is just a practical consideration that needs looking at.
There are some other things that the government is doing in relation to this. They are talking about youth hubs which are a sort of safe house. The questions I ask the minister are: where will the money come from to fund these safe houses? Where will they be established? If you said one in Darwin and Alice Springs, what about one in Palmerston, maybe one in Humpty Doo, maybe one in Katherine. What is the process behind this? Will children who want a safe house, who do not have a place to sleep for the night, be allowed to bunk down for the night there or not? Or is it a place you just stay for a couple of hours and then get shifted out? In other words, is it a refuge or is it just a place that you can go and talk with a few mates and then you move on? There needs to be more clarification of what these youth hubs will be.
The minister mentions there are two forms of sentencing options. There is case management, which is important, and making sure that agencies work together. You do not want the police doing one thing and somebody else doing another thing. You need to ensure that we use our resources as best we can. Of course you have the youth camps and I have spoken about youth camps ad infinitum in this House.
Years ago I went to Wildman River when it was operating. I was most impressed by what it did. Of course, it cost a lot of money and there is no doubt that finances came into the calculation of whether the place should have been closed down. Then they upgraded Don Dale and to some extent they said that the people who used Wildman were not that many and part of that was also because of the diversionary programs. Wildman, to me, still had a good purpose and yet we now seem to have gone the full circle. We had the government close it down and give you all the reasons why we should close it down. Now we have said let’s have some youth camps. You have to wonder if there were problems closing the youth camp at Wildman River in the first place, what makes the circumstances different now to opening a new youth camp. That is not saying I do not support the youth camps. I am just saying the government had an agreement to shut down Wildman River at that stage in history, and at this stage of history it says it is going to open something that is not much different to Wildman River. Why? The government needs to give us reasons as to why they have changed their mind.
I have not been to Hamilton Downs, but perhaps during the longer break I will try to get there for a look. There should be far more of these youth camps. If you are going to break up gangs you cannot put them all in the one place. Otherwise you are just taking a gang out and it is still a gang where it is. You need to break up those places so these young fellows are not associating with their mates. They have a chance to have time out from the pressures of urban society which is important. I have said many times that one of the great things about sending people out bush is that it gives time for kids to think. There will no be radios and no computer games, there might be a little television, but basically they will not have those distractions which soak up a lot of young people’s lives when really they need to work, to learn, to have some discipline, and to have some quiet time in their lives as well.
I agree with the member for Braitling about kids having a hug. I remember going to Wildman River and speaking to some of the young people there. They were talking about how they would love to get back to their girlfriend. These were 14-, 15-, and 16-year-old kids, but there was an instant feeling that these kids had no one to love them. Perhaps that is a reflection on society and perhaps that is a reason to some extent why these kids are where they are.
There was a program I picked up on BBC2 the other night. It was in relation to a single mother with three children who had awful troubles looking after the boy in the family. He would gain her attention by eating, and she did not realise this. He would climb up cupboards, go to the neighbours, and he would just eat. He would eat the family out of house and home. They brought in a psychologist who filmed what was going on. She told the mother that what he was really doing was trying to seek attention. So she changed her way to work with this young fellow. He was only four. He would help around the kitchen and she would encourage him to help with the cooking. She would help him do some things like play doh or plasticine. She took time out with him. Eventually, it came out that she had not given that child a hug in four years. He was a boy looking for love from his mother.
So you do wonder whether some of the problems we have later on in life relate to some of the parenting issues that need addressing. Many of our young people who become parents do not have the parenting skills that are needed. Therefore, a lot of emphasis about today’s discussion should be placed on putting money into programs that can help young people or others becoming mothers and fathers for the first time learn how to be good parents. Watching that show raised a very important issue. We, as politicians, sometimes have that problem because we are not home for very much time at all. You can tend to lose sight of some of these more important things with your friends and family.
The other area I will quickly speak about is that although we are talking here about youths up to the age of 18 I think we must look further than that. There are many people in gaol whom I feel you would not necessarily class as full-time criminals; they have offended and they are paying the price. They might have belted someone up; they might have done something silly. They may go back to gaol again, they may not go back to gaol, but sometimes there is a waste of resources. It would be better for those people to be on work camps. I look at programs run on cattle stations, maybe in national parks where they have time to work and time to learn, where there is some sort of teaching program where their literacy and numeracy skills can be increased.
When I was in America, I visited two prisons. The big emphasis in Ohio was trying to bring prisoners up to a much better literacy and numeracy standard so when they left the prison they had a fair chance of getting a job, there was no need to get into crime. The same applies to the people who are in gaol today. I imagine with 80% of our gaols occupied by indigenous people that their level of literacy and numeracy is quite low. Though we have teaching facilities in these gaols we need a combination of getting these prisoners out of the concrete gaol into the bush, in an area that is familiar to them, where they can do things that they do well such as riding horses. Bill Fordham ran a program at King River some years ago for young people. What did they like the most? They liked stock work and I believe we need to be working in those areas.
I thank the Chief Minister for his statement. It can be broader in the sense that we should not just look at youth on its own. What happens when a youth gets to 19 years and is still in one of these gangs around Casuarina? Do we say: ‘Sorry, this does not apply to you’? The government might say: ‘You are too old and your parents are not responsible for you anymore’. That would depend on whether that person is still living at home. If they are still living at home maybe some of the matters the government is raising about agreements and orders might come into play.
Overall, I wish the government luck; that the program they are putting forward will work. I have heard many programs put forward before. We have anti-gang legislation. I believe there has been legislation passed in the south many years ago regarding the responsibility of parents where a child damages property. I do not think that law is used very often because of some technical issues in its implementation.
We need to be looking at the situation now and, in two years time we need to see what the situation is, and come back to this parliament and say: ‘This is the difference this legislation has made’. I would rather see the legislation scrapped if it does not work instead of it just making us feel good. This legislation can work if the government puts sufficient funds into it, because you have to have sufficient funds to make it work if there are the right people involved. I am interested to know if we have enough qualified people to help run these programs. Who is going to run all the new programs and youth hubs you are establishing? I hope you have the finances; that is all important.
Let us see after, say, two years what the state of affairs is, and ask the minister to report to see if there has been any improvement in juvenile offending. Then we can see where we go from there.
Mr CONLAN (Greatorex): Madam Deputy Speaker, this is a statement that has been covered quite well from this side of the House, so I will not take up too much of the House’s time. This government does not have a great track record in this area.
Once I got through the feel-good first or second page, and started to get into the gist of what this was all about, at page 11, the minister talked about a youth justice clinician. The question I have for the Chief Minister is: what is a youth justice court clinician? I would like to know what that is. We are flat out getting FACS workers into the Northern Territory, so how is a youth justice court clinician going to apply to this youth justice issue?
On page 3 of this statement, he said:
- The measures I will outline will strengthen my government’s already tough stance on crime …
Already tough stance on crime?
- … especially youth crime. While we will be even tougher on young, repeat offenders ...
Well, it could not get much worse. As I say, the government does not have a very good track record in this area. You must be kidding, Chief Minister, if you think you are tough on crime? In the seven years that you have been in office, crime has gone through the roof largely due to this government’s soft-on-crime approach.
Why has it taken so long to address this issue by this Northern Territory government? That is a pretty good question I would like the Chief Minister to answer. Surely it was not as a result of a gentle stroll through his electorate of Wanguri and reacting to public concerns about this? If he was reacting to public concerns on this issue I am sure he would have acted a lot sooner. It has something to do, as someone mentioned before, with Labor party polling. This Labor party knows that they are on the nose when it comes to this issue. We see this 14-page statement on youth justice issues as a way of placating that feeling across the Northern Territory.
Another question: has the Territory government finally realised that in the Northern Territory we do have a problem with youth crime? Have they finally woken up that we have a problem with youth crime in the Northern Territory; that these gangs of kids are wagging school, patrolling the streets looking for someone to harass at best, someone to attack, injure, rape and murder at worst? This is happening in the streets, make no mistake. They finally realised what the rest of the Territory has been saying for at least seven years while this government has been in office. Have they finally realised it? That the streets are full of violent young offenders and, as the member for Nelson said, violent adult offenders? It does not just stop at 18 years of age.
Nevertheless, if we are to believe that this government is serious about bringing antisocial behaviour and antisocial criminal behaviour under control through these measures outlined in this statement by the Chief Minister today, then go for it. Please do something. Show a commitment to the rest of the Northern Territory. Demonstrate that you are actually interested, and what a serious concern this is for families, for tourists, for business owners and the rest of the Northern Territory community. It is not hard. Last year, the member for Johnston said on radio in his guise as Police minister – he has since been sacked from that job for failing to execute his duties properly – that he did not think there was a problem with crime in Alice Springs. He categorically denied that there was a problem with crime on the streets in Alice Springs – this was only 12 months ago. In fact, talkback callers would ring him up and say: ‘Listen, I can’t walk down the mall, I do not feel safe’. He said: ‘I don’t believe you. You are telling me fibs’. Call after call he just batted away and completely dismissed their concerns.
One year on, where are we? One year on from that radio interview with the member for Johnston, a little under one year, in fact, where are we? We have seen a major protest in Alice Springs, with maybe 500 or 600 people …
A member: A thousand.
Mr CONLAN: Well, it felt like it, surely - 500 or 600 people outside their regional parliamentary sittings this past year in Alice Springs. We have seen two exposs on national television. One on Lateline, which prompted the federal government to start taking over areas that this government has completely failed on, plus another one on the Today Tonight program or something like that. So we have seen two exposs on national television; a damning report, the Little Children are Sacred report that this government failed to introduce, and then all of a sudden the federal government felt that they had to do something urgently. So they stormed in, they came into the Northern Territory. It is interesting that Kevin 07 has not decided to roll back anything on that at this stage, so clearly he feels that this federal intervention is necessary.
We have seen long-term residents forced to take to the streets in an attempt to curb street violence; we see ever increasing crime statistics, the latest one for Alice Springs is a 36% increase in crime in the town; we see general disrespect, humbugging and foul language. It is a massive sliding scale of failure by this government to address these issues. The will to improve our lifestyle and to show leadership has deserted the Northern Territory government.
We have seen what happens when this government wants to act, we have seen the results, and it is amazing what can be achieved in a very short space of time. Last year, as a result of that protest, as a result of those exposs on television, and as a result of letters in the newspaper and talkback callers, and just general unrest in the community, we have seen what happens. We have seen the mobilised troops, you might say; Operation City Safe was introduced last year; police establishment figures finally brought to establishment. Some would say that it is still not enough. We have seen the dry town legislation, and other measures introduced to address this problem.
Unlike the Top End, in Central Australia we have seasons. We have a winter time. It is no secret: anyone who lives in Central Australia will tell you that, come winter time, crime does drop. It is a simple fact that crime drops when the winter months hit.
A member: It is cold.
Mr CONLAN: Yes, it is cold, that is right. People hang around the fires and they stay inside. Come the warmer months, people start to wander the streets. It is no secret. Again, this government had the will to act. They did not take it upon their own – it was not their own initiative - they did it as a result of the public outcry about this government’s failure to address these situations. Just recently, we have seen what can happen with such public outcry with the member for Nelson and his campaign to save the Litchfield Shire. It is amazing. It cost the member for Barkly his job but we see what happens when this government is prompted by public outcry.
Madam Deputy Speaker, they do not have a good track record, and they are not very good at taking their own initiative. We were told that alcohol restrictions would solve the problem. We were told that the dry town legislation would solve the problem. The ill-conceived measures by the member for Johnston as the Minister for Alcohol Policy, and let us not get into the Minister for Alcohol Policy - this new initiative by him to introduce scanning machines at takeaway outlets would solve the problem, that anti-gang legislation would solve the problem, that these and an absolute raft of so-called tough new measures would address the problem of youth violence, antisocial and criminal behaviour throughout the Northern Territory.
This government does not have a great track record in addressing these issues. They have had seven years to address these issues, and now we see something else in a glossy little report titled Ministerial Statement, Youth Justice Issues. It is another attempt to hoodwink the Northern Territory. The gist of what is in this statement is welcomed, and it does look good on paper, without much detail, but it does look good. I am interested to see the legislation when it comes out during the week. However, while it looks good on paper and the gist of it is welcomed, the track record is not good, and Territorians can expect no change from an already soft-on-crime bunch of political placebos.
Mr BURKE (Brennan): Madam Deputy Speaker, congratulations on your well deserved appointment.
Members: Hear, hear!
Mr BURKE: As has become a bit of a tradition for me the first time I stand up for the year, I again acknowledge the Larrakia as the traditional owners of the land on which we meet. An important point, I believe, as we celebrate the cultural diversity of the Northern Territory at the opening with the Chinese Lions and a smoking ceremony. I am glad to see that the federal parliament is picking up on the foresight of this parliament with its smoking ceremony and other arrangements and celebrations.
We have heard a great deal from speakers already, and it is difficult when you come in late in the speaking order not to rehash what people have already said, only in slightly different language, so I will do my best to avoid that.
One of the key components of the mechanisms detailed in the statement is reaching out to young people and finding ways to legitimately address their antisocial behaviour. It is not a simple ‘lock people up’ approach. I believe that would be a wrong approach. There is a place for diversion; there is a place for alternate ways of addressing crime, not just youth crime. It is a shame, however, that unless you are calling to lock everyone up and throw away the key, you are suddenly attacked for being soft on crime. A feeble argument, but that is what we have this House for: a difference of view, feeble arguments and, hopefully, some not so feeble.
Addressing crime properly is not just about locking everyone up for the smallest offence and for the first offence. Maybe people here have forgotten a bit about what it is like to be a teenager or growing up. There is a certain level of rebelliousness and some kids go off the rails. Some kids do not have the support that they could, and should deserve, from home, so it is not really surprising that some kids get into trouble. However, they are not without hope and there are ways of bringing them back into productive lifestyles other than a term of incarceration somewhere.
I believe I would be correct in saying I have the support of many police in saying this. Sure there are people for whom diversion is not appropriate, but there are still plenty of young people for whom it is appropriate.
I give my congratulations and public support to the Northern Territory Police who do a fantastic job in Palmerston. Crime is one of those things that you will never completely get rid of and, frankly, one rape, one assault, is one too many, but we are never going to get to this Utopia of a completely crime-free society. And let us not forget the white collar crime and given the level of skill many teenagers have with that, computer crime is no less antisocial and can have severe effects.
I pay tribute to the number of different community organisations within Palmerston and elsewhere for the work they do in assisting young people. The Palmerston Regional Safe Communities Committee within Palmerston City Council is one. These groups are frontline associations whose people deal with youth homelessness, youth running away from desolate homes, wanting to try to create something for themselves, not knowing how to do it, getting into trouble.
I congratulate the Palmerston YMCA for the drop-in centre they thankfully continue to run. It was in doubt due to the federal government removal of some $200 000 in funding from the Palmerston YMCA. The Palmerston YMCA made it very clear that they would be unable to continue operating their drop-in centre without that funding, a drop-in centre which has run for some 18 years if not longer. When I found out about that I tried to get media attention and I tried to let as many people I could know that I was against the removal of the funding. I said that it was short-sighted and it did not help the prevention of crime one iota, because everyone acknowledges the great work that the Palmerston YMCA does. You can imagine my surprise when I failed to get any support whatsoever from the then member for Solomon who, as a member of the federal government, refused to make any application on behalf of the YMCA, and the good Senator who refused to lift a finger to assist the YMCA. They could not even pick up the phone and tell the YMCA that the funding had been lost. The YMCA found out by searching through the departmental website.
Who else is missing from this equation?
Mr Vatskalis: The member for Blain?
Mr BURKE: The member for Blain, the current Leader of the Opposition, who is so full of ‘I am here to fight crime; I am here to try to help’. Where was he? Did he come out and decry the cutting of funding from the YMCA? No, not a word, not a sausage. It was all fine as far as he was concerned. He hardly ever goes down - in fact, I am not aware that he has ever gone down to the YMCA.
Mrs Miller: That is a pretty sad statement.
Mr BURKE: It is sad that he has not, I agree member for Katherine, thank you very much. Very sad. He has no interest. All he wants to do is score cheap political points, bashing the youth of Palmerston and elsewhere by focusing on those elements that are involved in antisocial behaviour. He does not want to do a blind thing for those organisations which are attempting to prevent youth getting involved in antisocial behaviour. I know the police are very thankful for the role that the Palmerston YMCA drop-in centre plays; it gives young people a place to go.
It is with some incredulity, some sense of doubt, when I listen to the Leader of the Opposition talk about crime and his determination to do something about it. He wants the media; he wants to appear like he cares; he wants to appear like he has some solution. Unfortunately, he does not. All he is interested in is the media headlines, and that is where his interest ends. Perhaps he can go to the Palmerston YMCA on a Friday night, as I have, to talk to the kids. There are 60, 70, 80-odd kids who use that drop-in centre. Maybe he can explain to them why he is only interested in bashing them in a verbal sense and getting on their case, and wanting to direct them: do not pass go, do not collect $200, go directly to gaol. If he were in government he would do absolutely nothing to fund these services.
I congratulate and thank the Northern Territory government that we have for stepping in, once again, and providing the funding so that the YMCA can continue to operate. I know that the children and young people who attend the YMCA are grateful, and I am pretty sure that the police are quite happy that it continues to operate as well.
If the Leader of the Opposition wants to get serious, maybe he can explain to people why he failed to support the YMCA and the great work it does, and why he continues to fail to support the other organisations and the work they do, because it is not just about police. Police have a role to fill and they can certainly target antisocial behaviour. However, they need the ancillary services as well, the community support groups, and the community organisations. In Palmerston, they certainly need the YMCA drop-in centre which operates so effectively. If the opposition want to get serious on crime perhaps they ought to get serious about the prevention and giving young people and children positive alternatives and positive role models.
I congratulate, once again, not just the Palmerston YMCA but the other community groups that give our young people a chance when they have other chances removed from them. I thank the House for its attention.
Mrs MILLER (Katherine): Madam Deputy Speaker, it was nice of him to thank the House for its attention but it was quite a little theatrical performance. I have always thought that the parliament is a revered place where people present their case and debate. However, I have never seen such dramatics since being elected; it is better than going to the theatre. It really is quite theatrical. I certainly am not part of it. Unfortunately, I am not quite sure how to put on all that grand stuff. I think you might need a degree in law or something to be able to do that. I just like to get the facts across …
Mr Burke: Oh, very droll!
Mrs MILLER: I just like to do the facts ...
Mr Burke: Practice what you preach, Fay.
Mrs MILLER: I thought what you preached was quite good, actually. I was wondering if you were going to give a few copies out to the YMCA. You will probably print them out a few copies of that, seeing you were caning the Leader of the Opposition.
Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, I read the ministerial statement on youth justice issues and, without a doubt, every one of us here would be extremely concerned about the problems we are having with youth right across the Northern Territory. I welcome anything that would make an improvement to that.
What I have a little challenge with, and get a bit annoyed about, is the fact that some of what the minister has talked about have been in various places throughout the Territory over a long period of time and have been dismissed as failures. Now, all of a sudden, the Chief Minister is saying we have to put this in, we have to take a stand on it, we have to be strong, and we are just not going to tolerate it any longer. That is fine, because I am sick of it too, as is everyone else in this House. We want to see some changes made.
I would like to know how you are going to implement these changes. We already have so many different things working in our communities across the Northern Territory to address youth issues, and they do not seem to have made much difference. There are many people working very hard looking at different programs to address youth issues. Some of the programs are working.
I have talked about Fred Murphy before. He has addressed problems with young indigenous men and he has had a really big turn around, especially to age 18. He has done that with leadership roles. He has used leadership and set examples for these young boys to aspire to. That is why Fred has made such a big change. Fred, with some other helpers, is running the Clontarf Football Academy in Katherine at Katherine High School. I was talking to Fred when I was there last Friday, and I have not had a chance to look at the academy yet, but he is very excited about it. He is enthusiastic about everything that he can do to keep kids on the straight and narrow. So there are some things that are working in communities.
The member for Nelson said, and I believe this is really important, that many of the issues we have with juvenile crime these days stem from children who have had a poor upbringing, or they are missing something very important from their upbringing. I know this is terribly old-fashioned of me, but I believe in hugs too. When I worked in a primary school in Port Pirie, South Australia, one of my roles was to work with children who had remedial problems. I had a group of six, all little boys, aged from 5 to 8 years, for literacy every day. That would probably be 20 years ago now, when it was still acceptable and not seen as being something dirty to actually give kids a hug in school. Those children used to come into the classroom and the first thing they did was run over for a big hug. It was a big hug and a squeeze and then we got on with the lesson. I had great success with those children. I must say that I got as much out of it as what those children did. I, like the member for Nelson, do believe there are not enough hugs given. There is a funny, old saying that you need 13 hugs a day to survive. I must be surviving very badly at the moment, and I think a few of us are not surviving very well, but there is a saying that you need 13 hugs a day to survive.
A majority of good parents across the Northern Territory do the right thing by their children and work hard at being good parents, ensuring that their children have every opportunity. As previous speakers have said, what we are dealing with is a minority of parents who do not have the skill to provide a good family environment, they just do not know how, or they are hooked on drugs or alcohol. There is some extenuating factor that does not, unfortunately, allow them to bring their children up in the way that is acceptable and for those children to go on to contribute to society. We are dealing with a minority of parents. This same thing happens with all of the issues that we seem to have across the Territory: with substance abuse, it is a minority; drunken behaviour, a minority of people again. The big challenge is to come up with an answer to deal with those people.
I believe we send mixed messages to young people. They are allowed to leave home – some of them have left home at 13 and 14 years - and it seems to me that some of them have a very valid reason for leaving home due to the environment they are in. Some of them, and I know this for a fact, have not had a very good reason at all. They have left home and the parents have not been able to do a darn thing about it. The children have had more authority than the parents. They are catered for by Family and Community Services and told that they have rights.
On the one hand, we have kids who are told that they have rights and their rights need to be respected, and on the other hand we are saying to parents that you have to be tough, you are going to be responsible for your children and you are going to have to pay if they do something really bad. I do not disagree with that. I believe parents should be responsible for ensuring that – not so much they pay, but they make their children pay. I do not care how long it takes, but the kids can have a payment arrangement and the kids have to pay, but the parents could put that into place.
However, we are actually saying to them if you do not really like home you can leave and it is okay, we will look after you and we will find some way to protect you. We send mixed messages to kids. Some of these kids think they can have it both ways: we can leave home if we like and if we do not like it, we can go back home, or when we get into strife, mum or dad will get contacted by the police and we will go home and I will just leave again next week or whenever I feel like it. Unfortunately, there is a mixed message there.
I am interested to see what the Chief Minister is going to do when he talks about his youth hub and outreach workers. Where are they going to come from? I trust the Chief Minister, in his winding up, will tell us where these outreach workers are going to be. How are they going to be assessed, and how are they going to be trained? Where are the youth hubs going to be set up? Are they going to be something different to what we already have in our communities? In Katherine, we have the YMCA - our YMCA is going very well, member for Brennan - so what happens to those? Where is the hub going to come from? Where is it going to be set up? Are we going to make police responsible for bringing these kids there on top of what else they have to do?
If you are going to give these roles to police, and the minister says, yes, he is going to give police the tools they need to get the job done, you are going to need a lot more of them. I do not want to hear that sad story that you have, that you have 200 more police in the Police Force. Look, if it takes another 200, there needs to be another 200, because it is obviously not enough. The problems that we have - I will use Katherine as an example of this. We became a dry town three weeks ago and, in that time, I have watched so many things happen in the main street that the police we have could not possibly take control of what is happening; there are not enough of them. I have watched people blatantly exploit the dry town law in the Woolworths car park. I have watched them fight and yell, I have watched physical violence happen, and the police are already busy doing other things somewhere else in the town. There are not enough police, and you are expecting them to do more.
I am very interested to hear what tools the Chief Minister is going to give the police to get this job done to make our streets safer for all Territorians. We all agree that we want safer streets. My colleague, the member for Araluen, referred to the interview with John Lawrence on the Stateline broadcast on 8 February. John Lawrence, from the Criminal Lawyers Association, said this bill, which is going to be introduced tomorrow, resembled very similar provisions brought into New South Wales over 10 years ago. After they had been in for 10 years they were reviewed and the review came to this conclusion:
- The act is neither an appropriate nor effective means of dealing with issues relating to juvenile crime. The committee acknowledges the role of family dysfunction in contributing to juvenile crime, however the act addresses this issue in only the most superficial way, and in many cases might exacerbate family problems and place children at further risk.
That committee recommended that the law be abolished. By all means introduce legislation that is going to make a difference to juvenile crime in the Northern Territory. Look at what has not worked elsewhere and look at what they have so that when you do it, you do it right the first time. I encourage the Chief Minister to review this regularly to ensure he gives the police all the resources they need to enforce this youth justice legislation. I look forward to hearing how he is going to provide the youth hubs as well as hub workers to ensure this really works.
Mr KIELY (Natural Resources, Environment and Heritage): Madam Deputy Speaker, I support the Chief Minister’s statement. Like the Chief Minister, I moved to the Territory for one reason and that was the lifestyle. I am pleased to say that the Territory has rewarded me and my family in many ways. It is important that we mark the spot here. Being a family man in the northern suburbs, I am keenly aware of the issues and problems that occur there. The Territory has rewarded me very well. I have a house in Anula, a wife and a young family of 12- and 13-year-olds. We participate in many sports. We get the kids off to different youth activities. Many of their friends come around and I get involved in the local youth endeavours. We get to see it all. We get to talk to the kids, find out what is going on. That sort of lifestyle informs you about the issues. I consider where I live in Anula, and Darwin, to be the best place to live, work and raise a family.
All Territorians deserve to have a home in a place which is a safe environment where they are not worried about their kids going out; a place where kids grow up and leave home; or senior Territorians feel safe in their homes and feel free to get out and have a walk in the afternoon or evenings and not be fearful of what is going on in our streets. I am afraid that it has reached the stage where do we hear senior Territorians saying they are scared to go out; we do hear kids saying that they are worried to go to Casuarina because of gangsters.
I believe American television programs have a lot to do with what we are dealing with at this time. You see a lot of this antisocial behaviour emulating what is essentially American culture. That is a really sad thing because it goes back to children not being able to get out and socialise with their peers, not getting out playing sports, not getting out and learning a healthy lifestyle - all those are qualities which we say we value so much here in the Territory.
Of course, it is because their parents are not encouraging them to get out, are not driving them to local sports events, or are not giving them push bikes or showing them where to get involved in these groups. Because of these things, they start developing antisocial behaviours. You really have to question why parents are not becoming involved with their children. Why are they not helping them to develop in such way that they value the social interaction and have respect for what goes on in their neighbourhood and those people around them? The parents’ role in all this is part of this comprehensive plan to tackle youth crime.
The opposition is keen to say this problem has been going on, and for seven years we have had a chance to address it and we have not done anything. I put it to you today that we are looking at it and we are looking at generational issues. We are looking at antisocial behaviours that go across the generations. From that perspective we have parents who have not learned parenting skills, who have nothing to model to show their kids and to bring them up correctly. We look back at the past 20 years or 30 years and what do we have? We have this dug-in CLP government which has been going for years and years which neglected to address any of this. It is all right to say we have this issue, but I put to you that this is a generational issue that was born in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s in the time when we should have been putting money into helping our families, by people obtaining parenting skills so that they were able to bring up their kids and instil the values we like. Unfortunately, it is not the case and now we have this situation which has been building up which we have to address.
I was raised in Melbourne. The youth issues going on in Melbourne in the days when I grew up make the issues we are dealing with here pale into insignificance. They were pretty rugged times. I believe we are seeing a building-up of these social issues. To think that the Territory is alone in this is to paint a skewed picture of what is, after all, a societal problem across the Territory, across Australia and, to a large extent, across other communities of like type in America, London, Liverpool - all across the globe. I accept the criticism of the opposition and the community asking what is going on. However, do not for one minute think that what is going on is something that is only happening in Alice Springs, Tennant Creek, Katherine or Darwin. It is not. We have a global problem which we are trying to come to terms with.
I am happy to see that we are going with the Balunu Foundation and the Brahminy Foundation. These people are the first ones to say these are not boot camps. This is not about the Leader of the Opposition’s tough love approach. When they say it is about healing, they are right. I see this healing not in some great mystical sense; it is a healing of people, learning and knowing how to get along with each other and build that respect in individuals so that when they come out they will respect one another, themselves and property, and we will see a better society for it. That is what we are about. We are not about boot camps. If we want a boot camp we will bung them into prison. That does not do anything really significant for these youths. We have seen that. What we have to do is look at changing and modelling them into good citizens - getting respect back into them. Full points to the Balunu and Brahminy Foundations for the way they are going about it and for the work that they do. I am pleased to see that as a way that we are going forward.
The opposition is saying: ‘You have stolen our policy’. Whose policy is it? It is the community’s policy; it does not belong to one political party or the other. We have all agreed there is a problem out there. When I get around my own suburb, every now and then I see a broken shop window which has had a rock chucked through it. This costs the shop owner money. It is not an attempted break-in. It is a plain, ordinary straight-up act of sheer vandalism because they are bored and show no respect for property.
When I look at the graffiti that pops up on the bus stations, or on the walls of shops, I am not talking about some grand artist’s vision. I am not talking about a mural. I am talking about some pretty tacky texta colour or spray can painted initials. The more creative vandals manage to pick up a tag. That is the fashion; that is the American way, so the kids want a tag. The most marvellous thing about graffiti tags – I do not expect any of the antisocial juveniles or criminal elements will be reading Hansard to pick this up, so I feel free to give this tip – is it is like putting a signature on a wall. It is getting out there and just signing the wall and saying: ‘I am the one who did this.’ The police know these tags, they see them around, and bang, they have you. It is not really the sharpest tool in the tool kit when you put a tag on that is special to you because all you are doing is saying: ‘Here I am, come and get me’, and believe me, they do go and get them.
While I am talking about what is going on in my area, I will go back to what the opposition was talking about in regard to drinking and antisocial behaviour in the streets of Katherine and all the alcohol-related initiatives that we have brought in. This statement is dealing with youth justice issues. The alcohol and drinking that you are referring to, unless you are talking about it in the sense of parents who are not looking after their kids, is the subject of another debate. But, you are right in that respect. If you have a home with parents who have a severe alcohol problem and are neglecting the children, the chances are that these children will be running amok, and that also is part of the strategy we are looking at.
As you can see, it is quite an holistic approach; it is not just a matter of lifting these kids off the street, tucking them away for a month or two and hoping that the problem dissipates only to have it arise a bit later on. It is a really well thought out strategy that is before us. We do need it, because I am reluctant to see my kids go off to Casuarina to the cinema and come home on the bus. Like any parent, I do not want them hanging around that interchange.
So we really have to get in there and sort it out so that kids who are 12 and 13 years old can catch the bus and come home at a reasonable hour, and they are not afraid to do so. There are all sorts of different ways that this can be done as far as building design and everything that goes with it, but there are other factors and we are addressing issues such as the transport officers we have on the bus services for security and the CCTV which is helping police. Hopefully, we are also making anyone who is thinking about playing up think twice because they will come to the attention of the police.
I have praise for the police at Casuarina. They are the local constabulary that I deal with when someone comes into my office and tells me there has been a break-in - and many times, around my area, it is doors left unlocked and people come in, grab whatever it is and take off. I am not too sure of the crime that is, illegal entry or something, I suppose. They grab the goods and take off, or they get into the fridges out the back or steal property from around the house that has not been secured. I have had people come into my office and talk to me about that. I am straight onto the e-mail to the police officer in charge and I advise that this is going on in my area. If I hear stories of any other sort of antisocial or illegal behaviour, I tell the police. I do not have the expectation that they are going to drop everything and tear around there in a heartbeat – well, most of the time, I cannot say all of the time. I do not have the exact figures but I would say that, most of the time, the police have been in contact with these victims of crime and are working with them. I send this information in because it lets the police get an accurate picture and builds up their intelligence database about what is going in the neighbourhood, and it lets the police know that the people are concerned about crime because it is important that the police know what is going on in the suburb and where it is happening.
It is important for local members, when people come in, not to sit there and say: ‘This is all the government’s fault. There should be more police or there should be more of that. It is their fault’. What does that do? How does that solve an issue? It does not go anywhere near it. It might give you a quick political run, but as far as helping the poor survivor of the crime, the victim, it does nothing. It does not do anything to help identify the perpetrator. As local members we need to contact our police and let them know what is going on. If you know of kids who are running amok, advise the police. I certainly do.
I also listen to my kids. We talk about doing things with families. I put a call out to families: if you do not want your kids involved in antisocial behaviour, because sometimes good kids get caught up in this for no particular reason, talk to them, help them learn to read and write, read to them at night, have an interaction with them. Do not just sit there and give them a PlayStation. Do not just watch the television with them. Go and watch their sport if they are involved. If you cannot afford a sport or you cannot get to it because you might be a single parent or something, try to make time to get involved at their school. Get involved with your kids. That is the message.
If we really want all this antisocial behaviour to stop, if we want the criminal activity amongst our youth to decrease, the only way we are ever going to do it is to really get involved with our kids. We can have all these measures in place, which is always after the event and they are commendable, and this does need addressing. The really commendable thing I would like to see our community do is get involved with their kids. That is the main thing. That is the best message we can give to all of our families who are concerned about crime. Get involved with your kids. Know what your kids are doing. Play with your kids. Talk to your kids. Understand their issues. I will guarantee that we will see a decrease in crime better than that achieved by any amount of money that we throw at it could ever do.
Mr BONSON (Sport and Recreation): Madam Speaker, I support the Chief Minister’s statement on youth justice issues. I agree with the Chief Minister when he says that there are children and families in the Northern Territory who do not seem to respect the responsibility of parenthood. As someone born and raised in the Territory, I can say with absolute confidence these problems are not a recent phenomenon nor are they unique to the Territory. Every society in the world - North America, Asia, Europe, South America or the southern states - faces issues to do with youth crime. What formulates the issues of youth crime? In most cases there are some prime indicators: poverty, lack of education, poor housing or no housing, alcohol and other drugs, broken homes, abuse, and dysfunction.
I have heard contributions from both sides of the House and I have a genuine belief that both sides of the House would like to address many of these law and order issues relating to our youth. But, I think the clear difference between the two is that the Chief Minister is offering a Youth Justice Strategy which has a plan. Whether you agree with it or not, that is what he has put on the table. I happen to agree with it. I happen to agree that in many different policies this government has introduced over the last six years, we are addressing many of these issues. The issues that we have in the Northern Territory are the same as anywhere in the world. The youth who are committing these crimes come from situations of poverty, lack of education, poor housing or no housing, or they are affected by alcohol or other drugs.
Since 2001, we have seen this government take proactive steps in relation to alcohol and drugs. We have created 200 new police in our time, we are enforcing the laws in terms of alcohol restrictions. The Minister for Alcohol Policy outlined the dynamics in his attack on issues to do with alcohol. As a born and bred Territorian, the environment in which youth grow up today is much different to the environment that I grew up in. In the environment I grew up in, the issues were related to alcohol and marijuana. Right now, whether you are white, black, green or purple, you live in Darwin or bush, there are other drugs affecting these young people. There are designer drugs, speed-based drugs, etcetera, that we all know are in our community, not only in Darwin and Alice Springs, but in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, in Asia, in North America and Europe, This is a blight on all people in the modern world.
Antisocial and criminal behaviour by adolescents on the streets of Darwin occurred when I was growing up, there is no doubt about that, but there is definitely a change in behaviour. I believe when you look at the criminology, at the circumstances in the environment of what these kids are facing, many of those issues are related to increased poverty, increased lack of education, poor housing or no housing, and increased alcohol and drug abuse.
We have shown over the last six years a concerned and considered effort to attack these issues. I absolutely support the intent outlined in the Chief Minister’s statement. We need a comprehensive plan to tackle youth crime. Simple, one-dimensional approaches have never worked and they certainly will not today. Territorians should not have to put up with unacceptable and antisocial behaviour, but it is also important to keep things in perspective. The problems are neither new nor unique to the Territory. What we do have in the Territory are elements of antisocial and criminal behaviour that are different to those being experienced elsewhere.
In our circumstance, alcohol plays a significant role in antisocial and criminal behaviour. The habits of Territorians and their drinking behaviours are significantly higher than other Australians. Until we can manage a significant reduction in our alcohol consumption, we are going to have to continue working on strategies to curb antisocial and criminal behaviour right across our community. If you cast your mind back to the October sittings you would recall that the Alcohol Policy Minister delivered a statement about the government’s plan for alcohol reform in the Territory. The facts outlined by my colleague in October are relevant to the government’s justice initiatives, whether youth issues or antisocial behaviour. I will quickly re-cap on some of the points the Minister for Alcohol Policy made in October.
On average, adult Territorians drink 17.3 litres of pure alcohol a year, compared with 10 litres elsewhere in the country. In the Katherine region, the most recent statistics show alcohol consumption to be twice the national average. In the Top End, we are drinking at the Territory average. The good news is that the Barkly has the lowest alcohol consumption in the Territory per capita, but the bad news is the average adult in the Barkly region works their way through 14.7 litres of pure alcohol per year compared with the national average of 10 litres. This statistic in itself only serves to highlight the extent of our battle with the bottle. The minister outlined in October the damage alcohol is inflicting on Territorians’ health, but perhaps even more importantly, he also highlighted the dramatic reduction in crime, disturbances, police call outs and hospital admissions in those places where alcohol consumption has fallen as a result of alcohol management plans. That particular debate was characterised as one of the most constructive in the Assembly in recent years, and one in which there was genuine agreement from all sides supporting government plans to tackle alcohol abuse.
Various administrations have tried to deal with these problems over the years. The CLP had 27 years to sort things out. You have only to look at the statistics on property crime in 2001, when we assumed government, to realise that the former government had not dealt with the problem. In fact, I remember a former Chief Minister saying he was going to monster and stomp perpetrators of antisocial behaviour. History shows the only significant legacy of that particular campaign was the rhetoric. It requires more than a cute turn of phrase to address these issues. What is required is a considered and comprehensive strategy, based on an understanding of the causes of the problems and an integrated strategy involving government and non-government agencies to address these problems.
Simplistic, one-dimensional approaches are not going to get us anywhere. While there are problems with particular elements that are peculiar to the Territory, we should not ignore the lessons that have been learned elsewhere. That is an important point. Often we operate in isolation. Often we operate as if we are inventing the wheel. These factors affect all human beings right across the planet and in very similar circumstances. We should be using this knowledge from around the world to develop our strategies to deal with this issue. The Minister for Alcohol Policy is an academic researcher. He has a deep interest in this field. It shows the type of qualifications we have to address these problems. We are putting this man’s skills to use.
In speaking to non-government agencies in my capacity as Minister for Young Territorians, the issue of youth camps has been raised and it was a concept that won support. The same people also agreed that there was a small group of young people who had absolutely no respect for the criminal justice system. These are the young people the Chief Minister is specifically referring to. Their behaviour is affecting the lives of too many fellow Territorians. It is important that we identify and deal with young people engaging in at-risk behaviour early. This government’s Youth Justice Strategy will do that. It is also important that we are tough with those who continue to break the law. Territorians have a right to expect that, and this will happen under the Youth Justice Strategy.
The causes of antisocial and criminal problems facing the Territory are complex and, in many cases, deeply ingrained. As the Alcohol Policy minister has observed, we must continue to work to address the Territory’s historic culture of alcohol usage, but that is a long-term task. Even so, we must keep investigating options that can help in keeping people out of the cycle of negativity and grog that contributes so much to our antisocial behaviour problems.
As not just the Sports minister, but as a local Territorian, I believe that sport has a role to play. I know there is still a lack of data about the benefits of sport and recreation in keeping young people out of strife. However, the anecdotal evidence appears to confirm that sport and recreation has a role to play, particularly in relation to indigenous people. Sport has played a defining role in developing a sense of identity amongst young Aboriginal people. In my own family over the generations, sport has helped us in our interaction with what you might call mainstream. That is because in those times, when social rules were not equal, the one place Aboriginal people knew the rules were the same for everyone was on the sporting paddock. In my time as a player, coach and administrator, I have seen what sport has been able to do to young people’s sense of self-esteem.
I recall one young Aboriginal man whom I first met when I was working as a lawyer. He came to me and asked for a run in the football side I was coaching at the time. This young fellow had a history of low-level crime activity, but he applied himself to the game and committed himself to the club and became a valued member of the team. He went on to develop qualities of loyalty, honour, integrity and honesty. He subsequently took up art and has been highly successful. He is now seen as a role model by younger Aboriginal people. I cannot say it was all down to sport, but I have no doubt that sport played a role in his turnaround as a person. That is why I am confident that well-targeted sport and recreational programs, particularly in bush communities, can play a role in developing that vital sense of self-esteem and hope in young people.
Let us be honest, boredom is a major contributing factor in much of the trouble that young people find themselves in today. I can only imagine how crushing that sense of boredom must be at times among young people in isolated communities in the bush. If we can engage young people in worthwhile activity, it must help. We are delivering programs in the bush, but we could do a lot more work in this area. The Territory government provides more than $2.9m a year to fund sport and recreation grants to remote communities. In addition, the Australian Sports Commission commits just over $522 000 per year to support the employment of seven indigenous sports officers across the Territory. I am pleased that last year’s Closing the Gap initiative committed an additional $4.5m to sport and recreation programs for remote indigenous communities. Much of the focus of our sport and recreation grants program has been in Central Australia.
Madam Speaker, I will touch on our grants under the Department of Sport and Recreation and the local government bodies’ programs this financial year to show, essentially, the type of initiative we are supporting. I believe they are the type of program that can make a difference to the outlook of indigenous youth:
I believe sport and recreation has a role to play in developing community spirit in the face of challenges young people experience in remote Aboriginal communities in the Territory, with their problems of poverty, unemployment, poor health and at times apathy. This challenge is one I want to address in my time as Sports minister. I believe that the link between sport and positive outcomes among Aboriginal people, particularly young people, is one that needs greater research effort.
Empirical evidence would obviously assist services in providing (inaudible) sport and recreational programs (inaudible) health and social outcomes in the bush. I know some funding bodies and services providers have designed their own particular mechanisms to monitor their programs, although this is not hard data.
I will be working to ensure Territorians are given every opportunity to engage in sport and recreation activities no matter where they live. The Territory government currently contributes the second highest investment per capita in Australia to sport and recreation. While we continue working to bring elite sports to the Territory, I want to keep a particular focus on delivering grassroots programs.
One of those areas is women in sport. I believe that generally, across the Territory and across the nation, we do not do enough for women’s sport. I believe that there is a great potential there to harvest a benefit. What we do know is that women in sport are often volunteers, umpires, referees; they take young children to different events. We need to not only support them in terms of participation, but acknowledge all the work they do behind the scenes. This is because I believe not only in the benefit of sport and recreation activities for the individual but also the social aspect.
This is quite a serious issue and it has been used historically as a political football. I am proud of being part of the government that recognises that this is an issue in our community and is attempting to tackle this problem. I know the Chief Minister has a plan. I know that Cabinet and my colleagues in the Labor party understand that there needs to be punishment in dealing with these youth issues. However, the youth are the future of the Northern Territory and we need to invest the time to ensure that we prevent the law and order issues that some youths get into. We also have to minimise the dangerous effects of alcohol and other drugs on these youth which often links to the problems they cause.
We also have to get tough on those children who are doing the wrong thing. We have to find ways to ensure that the punishment fits the crime so people understand that certain behaviour is just not right. The family responsibility issue is a big one. I walk around the streets of my electorate and there is no doubt the community of Darwin has changed. There was more a sense of community in the past. That is a fact. People were responsible for their children, and they took pride in their family values whatever their cultural or religious background. There now seems to appear to be a certain group of parents who have no responsibility for their children and that is a shame. We have to target those parents who do the wrong thing. In reality, like everyone in this House, we are all committed to addressing the negative behaviour of young people and we will continue to do that.
We also need to invest in all young people and, as Minister for Young Territorians, I will guarantee this House that I will endeavour with all my ability to ensure that the youth of today in the Territory will have a voice and that that voice will be heard by government and the policies we develop will benefit the youth of the Territory and will reflect their views.
Ms McCARTHY (Arnhem): Madam Speaker, I support the Chief Minister’s ministerial statement on youth justice issues. It is quite clear from the package that the Chief Minister has drawn to the attention of this House, that this government is clearly very concerned about the welfare of children right across the Northern Territory.
I would like to specially focus on my electorate of Arnhem. As we saw towards the middle of last year with the intervention that the member for Greatorex pointed to in his response today, that certainly the focus was highlighted nationally. When we talk about the responsibilities of parents, of children, or any guardians of children, it is more than just a responsibility about whether that child is from the bush or is from a town or city. It is a responsibility that comes back to us, to each of us as individuals, as members of society, and what kind of society we create with the response that we have to one another in relationships that we have with each other and how we react to one another.
It has also been very clear, certainly in the media, over the last few months in regards to what has been going on in the northern suburbs of Darwin and in areas around Alice Springs. The behaviour of youth on the streets has caused alarm to residents and also caused alarm to their own friends who are unsure of whether to join them in these activities. I think it comes back to the question of who is responsible for these children.
There are situations where you have a single parent trying to raise four children. That parent has suffered severe domestic abuse largely related to alcohol and other issues. They are unemployed so there is not much money coming into the household. That violence has an impact on the parent and the children. We are seeing more of the effect and impact of that violence as we travel around the Northern Territory.
When we see these kids we have to ask ourselves: ‘What is happening? Why is there such disrespect? Why is there such anger? Why is there such carelessness in kids who are roaming the streets who do not seem to worry too much about their future?’ When you talk to these kids, and I have spent a lot of time with some of these children, much of it comes back to a sense of not having confidence in themselves, not feeling loved, not feeling cared for, that they do not have a place to call a home. These are very simple parts of life.
It is nothing that governments can create. It is not an invention that can be made in a scientific laboratory. It is quite human and very basic. It is about the feelings and respect that we have for each other. These children tell me about their experiences in their young lives, some of them as young as 13 and 14 years.
Ms CARNEY: A point of order, Madam Speaker! I draw your attention to the state of the House.
Madam SPEAKER: Ring the bells. We now have a quorum. Member for Arnhem, you may continue.
Ms McCARTHY: Thank you, Madam Speaker. I will try to recollect where I was.
In talking to these children, they tell me the stories about their lives and the fact that they do not have parents who are there full-time or who worry about where they are. They might have grandparents, or an uncle or auntie. But what happens when a child does not have that parental guidance? It falls on those nearby - whether it is teachers, counsellors, or extended family members - to take an active part, an active interest in that child.
As was heard from other members in this House, that active interest is also participation in sports and recreational activities. For a parent or guardian or grandmother to be able to take part in that child’s activities is all about learning the basic principles of caring for one another, of sharing, of looking out for each other. It is basic principles that we see with families in the Arnhem communities.
We heard the Opposition Leader talk about the emphasis that is placed on families within the Chinese community. That emphasis on families should be everywhere. It is actually in most communities. It is in the Greek community, the Italian community, and it is very much in the Aboriginal community. In fact, sometimes there is too much family in the Aboriginal community. Sometimes you are trying to visit all the family members and you just not sure what you are doing: if you go to this one, you are not pleasing them; and if you do not go to this one, they think you are forgetting about them. You can go from one extreme to the other.
The member for Millner said that when he was growing up here, Darwin was a much smaller community where everyone did look out for each other. That sense of community is what we should not lose sight of no matter how big the Northern Territory becomes. That sense of community should not be lost.
We talked about the future. What kind of future do we want? We want a future where the children of today will be the ones who will be looking after us when we are older. We want to ensure that they grow to be adults that do care for others.
I will give you an example of what happens when things go wrong for a child. I will not reveal the identity of the community because I do not want to reveal the identity of this particular child. There was an incident with a school and a school teacher with a child who was about 13 years old. The teacher and teacher’s family were very rocked by what happened to this particular child. The future of that 13-year-old child was in question since the offence the child committed was quite serious. We all had to take a deep breath and think: ‘Whatever decision is made now within this small community, and within the teacher’s family and within this child’s life, is going to have a profound impact on this child and on the community’.
It took another couple of years of talking and constant vigilance of the child’s development to make sure that the child was able to talk about why they did what they did; to feel that they were in an environment where they could try to heal from the issues that caused them to commit their crime, and also working with the community so that the community did not feel like everyone was pointing their fingers at them and saying: ‘You’re a really bad community. You should never have allowed this to happen.’ There was a lot of blame going around. That sense of healing was very important for those three areas: for the child and the child’s family, for the community, and for the family of that teacher as well.
Regarding the healing program provided by the organisation called Balunu, I certainly commend our government and, in particular, the Chief Minister on the emphasis that has been given to Bobby and David Cole, not as a solution by itself, but as one part of the solution of trying to deal with these young children so they look at themselves, have a sense of identity about who they are, and have discipline in their lives which is an important part of growing up, and to have a place where they feel comfortable enough to talk about these issues. That is the environment that Balunu is creating for some of these children who are either recommended to go there or whose family members are asking for them to go. I do not want to put too much on Balunu because it can sound like it is going to be the ‘fix it’ organisation. However, it is not, because we have seen too many times in the past that many organisations that are doing well get lumped with too much and they cannot do it.
I congratulate the Balunu Committee. I remember when you first came into my office in 2005 - I think it was around November. You came to lobby me and to sell your ideas about what you were on about. I thought it was fantastic. I just thought: ‘Wow, that is huge! You are talking about a healing program largely for young men - certainly for young teenagers up until adulthood - and about things that meant that young men could talk’. It is not an easy thing, especially for young Aboriginal men, to talk about these problems and these issues of why they offend, why they re-offend, and why they do not have family support that they respect at home. These were pretty serious issues to tackle. I just looked at David and Robbie and said: ‘What you are doing is fantastic. You have a long road ahead of you, but I wish you well.’ We need to see more programs like this, in particular with our young men in our communities. It is a credit to the Chief Minister and to the ministers in Cabinet that they have seen the value of Balunu. I wish them well over the coming months and years. However, I add a note of warning not to try to take on too many kids in your desire to want to make a difference.
That comes back to that whole healing process. Tomorrow is going to be an important day when we look at the Stolen Generations’ apology in the federal parliament. I reflect on the first – certainly the only - federal court case that took place here in the Northern Territory with Lorna Cubillo and the late Peter Gunner. Lorna always said that, as a mother, she did not know how to be a mother. She did not know how to raise her children. She did not know how to care for them because of her own experiences of having been taken away. That has, somewhere along the line – and it is just not Lorna - had an impact on any parent who has not had a role model. They do not know how to be a parent or a good parent. I suggest to the Chief Minister that it is not always about parents not being good parents; it can also be about a parent not having enough support around them to be the best parent they can be.
I also look at my communities in regards to the intervention and the quarantine programs that are going on in some places. We always have to be vigilant, particularly in this environment, with the intervention and aspects of it that are affecting family life. We have to ensure there is that balance for the parent, family members, or the guardians to be able to lean on someone else - be it social workers, counsellors or guidance counsellors in schools, or the police who have their own units that can work to support people. It has to be broader than that. It also has to be about the community in general taking an active interest in one another, knowing a family, knowing whose kid is whose, saying: ‘Yes, I know that young boy; I know who his nanna is’, and taking that active interest.
It is very simple stuff; there are no new secrets here. A very simple human process: take an active interest.
We need to have that balance in these communities so that parents who are struggling, who are single parents, who have issues of domestic violence or issues of unemployment and not enough money coming in, are supported, that there is not a sense of everything being taken away from them, that they have the support to help their children as well. Whilst we might want action immediately on these issues, the long-term process is about supporting the whole family, and the family as a whole. We cannot lose sight of that in whatever laws we may bring in.
I would also like to point out some of the highlights of our government in terms of youth. Jocelyn Uibo in Numbulwar is an amazing young woman who is coming through the system with the support of the Northern Territory government, being a part of Al Gore’s climate change forum, being on the Youth Round Table forum, being able to talk about these youth issues that are important to them so that they can advise government, and they can advise councils and say, ‘Well, this is what we as young people would like, this is what we need’. The problem is many young people feel they are not heard. So that is an important forum.
Our version of The Big Day Out is another way our government is reaching out to the youth of the Northern Territory. It is not the only means but it is another avenue where we are trying to tap into the needs of youth.
The final thing is the push to have a Children’s Commissioner, Madam Speaker, which I believe speaks volumes about our government and our government’s intent in wanting to make a difference in the lives of all children across the Northern Territory. I commend the Chief Minister’s statement to the House.
Mr HENDERSON (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, I thank all members for their contribution to this important debate for the Northern Territory, given some of the issues we have had to confront over the recent past in regards to antisocial and criminal behaviour by small groups of young people who commit, disproportionately, a huge amount of trauma in our community.
I pick up on the sentiments and the comments of the member for Arnhem first, inasmuch as when we are having this debate it is important for us as leaders in the community to acknowledge that the vast majority of our young people in the Northern Territory are absolutely fantastic. They are growing up in the best place to grow up in the world. They are striving to achieve what they can be, and they are going through all the growing pains that everybody goes through as they move through the stages of childhood to adulthood. By far, the vast majority of our young people are fabulous people and the same goes for our parents. The vast majority of parents or carers do the very best they can in the most difficult job, which is to raise a family. It is not until you are at a stage of your life when you have the greatest privilege you can know, which is to have kids of your own, that you realise what a tough job it is. It is not a cakewalk. Sometimes, with the public debate, we can reinforce broader perceptions that our young people are not great people, and the vast majority are.
I thank the members on this side of the House for their considered and sensible contributions, all drawn from their own experiences, their own backgrounds and their own electorates.
I thank the Independent members for their contribution, particularly the member for Braitling for her supportive comments in relation to the development of a youth camp in the Alice Springs region. Implementation is well under way and scheduled for phased implementation throughout the year. I thank the Hamilton Downs people and owners for working in partnership with government to get it up and running as soon as possible.
I thank the member for Nelson. It is important to note that this is not about revisiting policies of the past. This is about a comprehensive reform agenda for the future. We recognise that both kids and parents require support, not punishment. We are not setting people up to fail. That is what my colleague, the Justice minister, reinforced at yesterday’s press conference. This is not about setting up parents to fail and punishing parents for not disciplining and controlling their kids. This is about giving support to parents who are genuinely struggling to ensure adequate care and to take responsibility for their kids. There will be further announcements about how we propose to do this with a whole-of-government approach and an inter-agency approach with weekly meetings around case management of families who require that support. At the end of the day, for a small minority, there does need to be more punitive measures and sanctions in regards to court issued orders and sanctions for failure to comply. I do not believe that we will need to use that on many occasions.
Unfortunately, the opposition could only offer limited support and it appeared at times they either had not read the statement or understood the statement, and with public policy in this area, a one-shot-in-the-locker approach seems to be where they are at.
People do not want words; they want action. This is what this reform package is going to do. I believe that it will make a difference. I am not nave enough to believe that there will never be another crime committed by a young person in the Northern Territory again. However, I also call a spade a spade and we will not tolerate this type of behaviour. We will strengthen the community’s capacity to bring these kids under control with this package of reforms that we will be introducing this week.
In December 2006, the opposition criticised the anti-gang laws that I brought in as Police minister. I do not have the numbers in front of me but police have used those laws extensively across the Northern Territory to interfere, interrupt and deal with gang-related activity whether it occurs in places like Wadeye or Casuarina or within our criminal elements. The opposition criticised those measures, but did not have any policy agenda at all to disrupt gangs across the Northern Territory. I have asked for the laws to be reviewed to ensure they are working on the ground.
One part of the review is non-negotiable following disturbances in Wadeye at Christmas. I have already announced that the penalty for violent disorder will be doubled to a maximum of two years in prison. The feedback that I get on the ground when I visit Wadeye is that people are sick and tired of having their lives disrupted, displaced and, in some instances, property destroyed by a group that is out of control and causing so much harm. They were very strong on that. They wanted significant penalties. That is what we are going to be doing by introducing a doubling of those penalties for that type of behaviour. There is no silver bullet; you need to keep working on new initiatives.
The Leader of the Opposition does not understand the measures we took to protect private bus drivers and taxi drivers. These people are hard-working Territorians who are earning an honest living and dealing with the public as they convey passengers throughout the Northern Territory. From time to time we have reports, too frequently, of people throwing rocks at buses and taxis, and assaults on taxi drivers and bus drivers who are working independently. They are isolated and it is just not on. We introduced changes that would see better protection for our bus drivers and taxi drivers across the Northern Territory. The Leader of the Opposition did not understand the issue, did not read the legislation, and was critical of the measures.
I will just go through them. Drivers of commercial passenger vehicles such as buses and taxis provide, as I said, a very important community service. Section 188(1) of the Criminal Code provides the offence of common assault; that carries a maximum sentence of imprisonment for one year. Section 188(2) lists 11 circumstances of aggravation. Assaulting a member of the public service acting in the execution of his duty is one of the circumstances of aggravation. Section 188(2)(f), not all bus drivers providing public transport in Darwin are employed by the Darwin Bus Service. Darwin Buslink, which is privately owned, also employs drivers so we have legislation that provides for aggravated provisions for public servants. The Leader of the Opposition does not understand that about 50% of all bus routes are actually contracted out to a private sector company and those drivers were not covered by that aggravated provision. Neither were taxi drivers - who are obviously not employed by the public service. They deserve the same protection.
They also deserve an Opposition Leader who at least understands the legislation that he is criticising – instead of being critical of the measures the government is taking to try to improve the protection of those people. It is obvious that the Opposition Leader has not taken the time to read the legislation or understand the issue. I have received a bit of negative comment from the community that I represent. Quite a few of them are taxi drivers who were very happy at the signal that the government sent. They thought it was long overdue and they could not believe that the Opposition Leader would criticise the government for doing so.
I repeat my commitment as Chief Minister that criminal and antisocial behaviour when it is perpetuated once, but particularly when there is an ongoing cycle of that type of behaviour by young people in our community, will not to be tolerated. The revolving door on juvenile diversion will be closed. Parents will be better supported but, at the end of the day, if they refuse to attempt to control the behaviour of their children there will be sanctions in place. We will be introducing youth camps in Central Australia and the Top End to provide alternative options for rehabilitating young people who are getting involved in antisocial behaviour and crime. That is our commitment as a government. We are going to follow through on it in a comprehensive package of reforms to try to make a significant dent into what is a very real problem that concerns all Territorians.
Madam Speaker, I agree with the comments made by the member for Arnhem. Parents are not necessarily bad parents because they cannot or will not control their kids. They might not necessarily know how to be a parent. The reforms we will put in place will provide those supports. However, at the end of the day, there will also be significant sanctions for parents who absolutely refuse point blank to attempt to control the activity of their kids because the whole of the community pays a price. That is not going to continue. I thank members for their support of the statement.
Motion agreed to; statement noted.
Adjournment
Ms LAWRIE (Leader of Government Business): Madam Speaker, I move that the Assembly do now adjourn.
Mrs MILLER (Katherine): Madam Speaker, the Australia Day ceremony in Katherine this year began with the raising of the flags at the Civic Centre at 9 am. The National Anthem was sung beautifully by the Kantarbillay Choir under the guidance of Jan Murphy. Everyone then moved inside to the air-conditioned comfort of the Civic Centre gallery where the rest of the function was carried out.
Mayor Anne Shepherd gave a welcome speech and conducted a citizenship ceremony where seven people took the pledge to become a citizen of Australia. Our newest Katherine citizens are Nicola Goldbach; Jennifer Lindsay; Sinead Linton; and the Spafford family – Peter, fondly known as PJ; Hilda, fondly known as Judy; and their children, Patricia and Douglas. The Spafford family looked resplendent in their yellow T-shirts with Southern Cross stars and Australia printed down the front. Following their enthusiastic pledge, they waved green and gold flags printed with Aussie, Aussie, Aussie. It was great to see and it caused some amusement.
This year, we were very pleased to have Australia Day Ambassador, Susie Elelman from Perth attend and participate in the ceremony. Susie gave us a wonderful insight into her family and the challenges her parents and siblings faced before their migration to Australia, and of settling into a strange, new country - one we all take for granted.
During the Australia Day ceremony in Katherine, it has become a tradition to present the Katherine Times Senior and Junior Sportsperson of the Year Awards. This year, Vince and Jill Fardone of the Katherine Times gave the Senior Sportsperson’s Award to Stephen Wilson. The runner-up was Greg Schmidt. The Junior Sportsperson was 9-year-old Hayley Glass, and the runner-up was John Bretten.
Senior Sportsperson, Stephen Wilson, moved to Katherine with his wife, Sharni, and two children in January 2000. He started riding motor bikes when he was 14 years old and started racing them at 30 years of age. Between 2001 and 2003, he took up BMX riding in Katherine with his son, Jacob. During this time, he competed in the 2002 NT titles, placing third in the Masters Class.
In 2003, Stephen participated in the Kampfari and placed third in the Masters Class and 13th overall. Stephen rides mountain bikes every Wednesday night with a group of riders and, on Saturday morning, he rides road bikes. He has also participated in many triathlons, either teaming up with others or on his own. Stephen has, unfortunately, had a track record for sustaining injuries while riding. He has broken ribs on three separate occasions and has broken his leg, but this has not deterred him from continuing to pursue his passion.
Senior Sportsperson runner-up, 46-year-old Greg Schmidt lists his favourite sports as swimming, bike riding, yoga and tennis. He recently qualified for the World Masters Championships in 50 m and 100 m freestyle, and has also taken up butterfly.
Junior Sportsperson, Hayley Glass is only nine years of age and belongs to, I believe, a third generation Territory family. I am going to get some more information on Hayley because, whilst she is only nine years old, she has packed a lot into those nine years. I will put that in another adjournment at a later time.
Junior Sportsperson runner-up, 14-year-old John Bretten has travelled to New South Wales, South Australia and Queensland where he gained a bronze with the Katherine Judo Club in 2007. John played in Katherine Junior Rugby League’s Under 14 competition, and also played Rugby Union earlier in the year.
Katherine’s Citizen of the Year was awarded to Jenny Duggan, a very worthy recipient. Jenny has lived in Katherine for 30 years. It is hard to know where to start naming the voluntary work that this very energetic mother of five is involved in. To give you some idea of Jenny’s community involvement, she was unable to come to the award ceremony because she was busy volunteering at the St Vincent de Paul shop. Jenny and her husband, Marty Duggan, own and operate Astral Contracting.
For many years now, there have not been too many mornings that you would not see Jenny and her friend, Di Jennison, walking with their dogs somewhere in Katherine with a collection of plastic bags, picking up every bit of rubbish they see. These two women have played a significant role in keeping our footpaths clean all over Katherine and they do a fantastic job. Jenny also participates every year in the Clean Up Australia day and whenever there is a call to help tidy up our river corridor. For several years, Jenny has lobbied to have the railway heritage bridge repainted, and it would be appropriate if that dream was realised this year while she is Citizen of the Year.
Some of the activities that Jenny is involved in include St Joseph’s Catholic Church, St Joseph’s Catholic School, St Vincent de Paul, Katherine Junior Rugby, Katherine Golden Oldies Rugby, and off-road motorbikes, in addition to sponsoring local sports over many years and fundraising for numerous activities. Jenny is a quiet achiever who does not like the limelight but her invaluable contribution to the Katherine community over many years is very much appreciated.
Students who received Australia Day Awards through their schools were Shakita Lindner, MacFarlane Primary School; Karan Symes, Katherine South Primary School; Phillip Morrow, Katherine High School; and Rory Palmer, Michael Lindsay, Katherine Noyce, Rachel Robins, Tara Guempel-Crothers, Tiannah Bernard, Amy Harding, Caleb Patrick, Maxwell Gillett, Kristian Anzac, Teegan O’Keefe, Cleven Woods and Kira Jolly.
This year, the Australia Day Speech was given by long time local resident, Kerryn Taylor. Kerryn’s very interesting speech was on what it means to be an Australian citizen, and was very relevant to every one of us. I am going to include her words in this adjournment. I quote:
- In the past few years there has been discussion and decision on what it means to be an Australian citizen. For those who become citizens on Australia Day they have undertaken to appreciate and live by these Australian values.
These understandings are that:
2) Australian society values equality of opportunity for individuals regardless of their race, religion or ethnic background; and
Our newest citizens have given this undertaking - but I am asking you, as Australian citizens, just how well do we practise these values in our everyday life.
The first of these values is respect for the freedom and dignity of the individual and for freedom of religion. In Australia, we have not always been good about this. I can remember growing up in the 1950s where there were demarcated differences and name calling between Protestants and Catholics. This dissolved over the years. Did we become more mature? Did we see it as mindless exercise that could never be resolved? Or did it matter more that you got to know people as people rather than as labels?
The next outlined values are commitment to the rule of law and parliamentary democracy. We have just had an election in which no one has been jailed or killed for expressing their democratic right to vote. This aspect of being Australian is something for which we should be thankful.
Australians respect ‘equality of men and women and a spirit of egalitarianism that embraces mutual respect, tolerance and fair play’. Our history shows that this has not always been the case. We have a pernicious habit of giving disrespectful names to groups of people seeking a new life in this country. In the late 1940s, it was ‘reffos’, then ‘wogs’, ‘chinks’, ‘yarpies’ and more recently ‘towelheads’. What changes this bad habit? I suspect that the experience of getting to know your neighbours, no matter where they have come from, helps to break down the stereotypes. We realise that we are all people wanting a fair and safe existence and being willing to work hard to achieve that security. We are all humans not commodities.
The values statement reiterates that ‘Australian society values equality of opportunity for individuals regardless of their race, religion or ethnic background’. There are some in our society who would dispute this. I would agree.
Take the example of equality of educational opportunity.
In the Northern Territory, we have well equipped schools, well trained and dedicated teachers and government support for students. The opportunity exists for all families and their children to make the most of what is on offer. Education, like health, is not received by osmosis; to make the equality opportunity work for you, you have to make a sustained effort. It is the effort of attendance, of listening, of applying yourself to the task at hand and of not making excuses or blaming others for your lack of individual effort.
The last understanding of Australian values is that ‘the English language, as the national language, is an important unifying element of Australian society’. I agree with this statement, but question the government’s commitment to helping people obtain proficiency in English.
When I first came to Katherine in 1974, there were regular adult education classes at night and on weekends for anyone who wanted to learn or improve their English. I am not aware if this opportunity is currently available in our community.
We have a statement of Australian values and we can ask ourselves how well do we practice these values? I would also like to ask ‘Where were these values learnt?’ I place this responsibility squarely with parents. Children learn from what they see and hear around them and they learn most acutely when they are young.
Years ago, I read a page of advice called ‘How to bring up your child to be a juvenile delinquent.’ I recently Googled this and was able to read the 12 points again. They are still relevant. The essence of the 12 points is about the consequences of not teaching your child to take responsibility for his or her actions.
This is where we need the balance within our society. As Australian citizens, we have rights, but on the same scale of justice, we have responsibilities.
We have a good town here in Katherine, but it requires communal effort to keep it functioning well, so on Australia Day ask yourself these questions:
If we make the same commitment that we are asking of our new citizens, then I look forward to being a citizen of a compassionate and responsible Australia.
That was the end of Kerryn’s speech.
Following the ceremony, Mayor Anne Shepherd invited all to a light morning tea in the Council chamber. The Australia Day birthday cake was cut by the Mayor, the Australia Day Ambassador and me. As she has done for several years, Bronwyn Haggar decorated the cake magnificently. This year she had themed the decorations for the anniversary of the Scout movement complete with pitched tents and a flying fox joining Australia and Tasmania. Bronwyn’s cake decorating talent always creates a lot of interest and it seems such a shame to cut the cake.
The 2008 Australia Day ceremony in Katherine went very well and was well supported.
Mr VATSKALIS (Casuarina): Madam Deputy Speaker, unfortunately, the Territory recently lost a businessman whose contribution to the Northern Territory tourism industry should not be forgotten. John Newland shaped the face of tourism in the Territory and will be remembered for tourism campaigns such as ‘Part of the story of the Northern Territory’, ‘See Alice While She’s Hot’, and the Top End’s ‘Green Season’, and who could forget the ‘You will never, never know if you never, never go’.
John Newland’s love affair with tourism started in 1963 when he came to Alice Springs to assist his brother, Robert, to build the Alice Flag Motor Inn on Undoolya Road, which still operates today.
John, like many visitors to Alice Springs, wanted to make ‘the Alice’ his home and secured employment with E J Connellan which took him to many outlying communities and tourist attractions. John later became Operations Manager for Cornnellan Airways, later renamed Connair and, in 1972, became Manager of the NT Tourist Bureau in Parsons Street in Alice Springs.
After Cyclone Tracy in 1974, the head office of the NTTB was relocated to Alice Springs. John was asked to be Director of Tourism and was given the unenviable task of rebuilding not only tourism in the Top End, but in the Northern Territory. Without John’s dedication and commitment in continually pushing federal, state and territory governments for better infrastructure, tourists today would not enjoy driving on our Stuart Highway, then called ‘the South Road’, or the sealed roads from Alice to the Rock and the Arnhem Highway to Kakadu.
John was also instrumental in getting the new Ghan from Adelaide to Alice Springs and then immediately started working on extending the Ghan’s route to Darwin. John had some terrific allies in the former Lord Mayor of Darwin, the late Alec Fong Lim, Keith Smith, AO, former Chairman of Australian National Railways, and Keith Castle, CEO of CATA tours. Presentations were put to the private and public sectors around the country to enlist their support for the continuation of the railway to Darwin.
Without visionaries such as John Newland, Territorians and visitors would not enjoy the infrastructure facilities that we have today at Ayers Rock and Kakadu.
Other iconic events that John was instrumental in developing were the Camel Cup, the Beer Can Regatta, the Finke Desert Race, Halley’s Comet and the Alice Prize.
Madam Deputy Speaker, I pay tribute to the contribution that John Newland made to our tourism industry. I extend my sympathies to his wife, Janet, children Jenny, Tim, Michael, Steven, Liz, Richard and Chris.
Mr WOOD (Nelson): Madam Deputy Speaker, I would just like to say something about a person who has been very much in the spotlight today. I have known this person since I was elected to parliament. In fact, he entered parliament the same time as I did. He is a deep thinker, an honest, passionate and hard-working man. He is committed to trying to make a difference in the bush, especially for his people.
He and I have had our differences. I have been working for the last six or seven months trying to stop what I believe was the wrong approach to what he was trying to do and, of course, he thought exactly the opposite. He is a man the Territory needs. It would be a great shame for him to sit on the backbench for the rest of his time in this House. I hope the government will reconsider him for a ministerial position.
That man is Elliot McAdam. He is a good man. Unfortunately, as I am learning in politics, that means one has to take a stand even against your friends. I hope that regardless of that …
Dr Burns: You called for his resignation. Do not be a hypocrite.
Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order!
Mr WOOD: You would not know. You would not know.
Dr Burns: I heard you and I read it in the newspaper, so do not be a hypocrite.
Mrs Braham: Let him say some nice things about Elliot. Elliot is a good man.
Dr Burns: Oh, let him salve his own conscience, but that is what he said.
Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order!
Mr WOOD: I find it strange that the member for Sanderson is so bitter about something he knows very little about.
Mr KIELY: A point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker! I was not bitter about anything.
Mr WOOD: Sorry, my apologies. I meant the member for Johnston.
I hope that regardless of our differences we will remain as friends. I still believe there is much that I need to do in relation to local government reform. I will continue to ask the questions, investigate and debate because I also want what is good for the Territory. You will probably not agree with me, but I hope that the noise on the outside does not always reflect the feelings on the inside.
I say to the member for Johnston that asking a person to resign, whether I said it or someone else said it, does not change the fact that I respect the person in question. I was saying - and the minister is representing the government and the government’s policy - that I felt that the government’s policy was terrible, and I still do. Asking the minister to resign is something that we all call for at times. It is not hypocritical. I am sorry, member for Johnston, if you do not understand that; then it is your problem.
I would just like to raise another issue. This involves a young family in the rural area. Mum and dad have a five month old baby. Mum has cervical cancer and hopes to receive treatment interstate. She gets an airfare paid by the government, but I understand she has to find the money up-front. She receives $10 per day to help with accommodation when she is interstate. Her husband also has to pay for an airfare because he needs to travel with her, but he has to apply for a reimbursement which may or may not happen. He had to give up his job to help. Do not forget: this is quite a young family who has had a loss of income.
Why they asked me to bring this to the government today was that they are concerned that there seems to be a lack of understanding in the government about the financial pressures people in these circumstances have to face. They are simply asking the government to look at ways to relieve this pressure. They are also concerned that there is still no oncology unit because they feel that if we did, the stress that relates to travelling interstate would be lessened if they were able to receive this treatment in Darwin.
The government needs to look at situations like this with a sympathetic approach. It needs to see if it can assist families in this situation, especially young families, where they do not get any other financial help and even more especially if one has to give up their job. Another issue they felt that needs looking at is a help line for people with cervical cancer. Maybe the government could also look at that.
I raise this issue in light of what these people have told me, with the hope that the government will look at making some changes which would prevent people in these situations enduring so much stress caused by a financial loss due to the illness. Also, you have the health worries on top of that, and that is something we certainly need to look at.
I would like to talk about Australia Day. We had a very successful Australia Day, both from the Litchfield Shire Council’s point of view and also the Family Fun Day which was held at the Howard Springs Reserve. I thank a number of people and sponsors who helped out on that day. Some people who did a lot of hard work were Bernadette, Di, Phil, Tom and Trish, as well as the Howard Springs Volunteer Fire Brigade members who supplied the soft drink, cooked the meat, and generally helped out all round. Kotch and Noel, who are members of the fire brigade, helped out with the games. Lisa George and Geoff Akers helped out with the Southern Districts Cricket Club on the day as well. Shorelands supplied all the meat, and Devondale supplied milk for the day. Mitre 10, Fin Bins, Reidy’s Lures, Top End Fishing, All Earth, Saddle World, Tommo’s Pies and Coolalinga Car Parts all donated goods or cash for the day.
There were many games including boule, and we tried speed scrabble for the first time this year. It took a little while to get people to be game enough to try it. You were limited to the time you could actually play your letters on the board. If you did not have them down in time, too bad, it went over to the next person. As it got towards the end, it became a bit like a chess game where there were many spectators hanging around watching the people, especially the ones who had reached the finals. It was different and a lot of people enjoyed it.
We had Aussie corn hole and the cricket match. I do not know how many kids we had out on the cricket field, but there were a lot of them. They all had a hit and a bowl and they all enjoyed themselves. We had the pie and hot Coke eating competition with the pies courtesy of Tommo’s. It might sound fairly easy but, when it comes to the crunch, it is not as easy as you think.
All in all, it was a great day that, hopefully, will be bigger and better next year. I thank all the people who helped out on the day and I appreciate the time they had given up on Australia Day when probably they hoped they could do something else, such as sit down and watch the cricket. It certainly was good.
On just a different note, we decorated all the power poles on Whitewood Road with Australian flags. They lasted about six hours and seemed to disappear during the night. We put another batch up early in the morning and they all went as well. It was a little disappointing on Australia Day. I can imagine, at some other time, it may not be a big issue. The street looked nice; people appreciated the colour. The idea was just to advertise that we were going to have some games nearby. Hopefully, we might be able to get some help from Power and Water next time and put them up high so people cannot reach them. I thank the people who helped me put those flags up. All in all, it was a great day on Australia Day.
I stand by my comments that I made regarding Elliot McAdam. I am disappointed in the comments made by the member for Johnston. He may think I am hypocritical, but I do not think he understands the relationship I have with Elliot. I have spoken to Elliot. I am hopeful that he will come back into the Cabinet because I believe he is good value. Calling for the resignation of a minister does not necessarily mean I dislike the person personally. I was dealing with a political matter that I felt was very important and it needed strong opposition to get the government to change. That is simply what it was all about. Because I call for something does not necessarily mean the government has to do what I say, but it is a tool a lot of people use in arguing their point where they feel the government is going down the wrong path. I respect Elliot. We will probably continue to have our disagreements, because I believe there are still many local government issues which need addressing. If this House says that you disagree with someone and therefore become some sort of enemy because you have a difference of opinion, then I would say pity this House. My job …
Dr Burns: Personal things said about Elliot.
Mr WOOD: My job - I beg your pardon?
Dr Burns: I said there have been a lot of personal things said about the man …
Mr WOOD: You would not know what was said.
Dr Burns: … as part of the campaign you waged.
Mr WOOD: The member for Johnston …
Dr Burns: You need to take some responsibility for that.
Madam Acting DEPUTY SPEAKER: Member for Johnston!
Mr WOOD: The member for Johnston has made a statement. If you would like to say that outside, I would be interested.
I have been to many public meetings and I have defended the integrity of the minister. Saying he should resign does not make him a bad person. It is to do with the government’s policy on this issue that I am dealing with. I have always stood up for Elliot. I believe he is a good man. I am disappointed in the member for Johnston for saying something that I think is reproachable. I will leave it at that.
Dr Burns: I did not say you had said them. I said things were said.
Madam Acting DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! Member for Johnston!
Mr WOOD: Inferred.
Mrs BRAHAM (Braitling): Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, I remind everyone that politics is a tough game.
Dr Burns: It is.
Mrs BRAHAM: It is. What you say in here, when you walk out the door, should be forgotten. We are all just people and we should all be able to walk out that door and be friends and colleagues. Do not take things too personally because you will get hurt far too much. I have been around a long time and, as you would know, I have been hurt on many occasions, but I believe we must remember we are all here for Territorians. We might have our arguments on the political scene, but let us not delve into personal attacks upon people. There is a little too much of that here.
That aside, tonight I want to speak of two characters who have recently passed away. I say characters because they were Territorians for a long time, perhaps not well known to people, but they contributed an enormous amount to the development of the Territory and I believe that is important.
The first person I want to speak about briefly is Thomas Ian McKnight, known to us all as Tim, who was 77 when he passed away. Tim seems to have been in Alice Springs forever. He was from the surveying fraternity. I did not realise that surveyors are a tight, close knit group and that they support each other as a profession. I saw a different side of what happened with Tim. It was heartening to see so many people remember someone who has been so long in the Territory by attending his funeral.
Tim was educated in New Zealand and it was there that he learned the technicalities of surveying. By the time he came to the Territory in 1971, not only had he worked throughout New Zealand, but also Nigeria, the Bahamas and Borneo. Being so well travelled, he could have lived anywhere in the world he would have liked because he had such a talent but he chose to spend his life in Central Australia. The people he worked with were really touched by this man.
He worked as a licensed surveyor with the Northern Territory Administration, which became the Northern Territory Department of Lands in 1978 with self-government. The nature of survey work in those early days was land boundaries, mapping control and engineering works in a developing outback region of Australia. Surveying in the Territory involved a tremendous amount of field work, but the surveyors and chain men really enjoyed the lifestyle and Tim became one of the characters in the industry.
They had a huge task at that time. Conditions were harsh with extremes of searing heat and icy cold. Mostly, it was hot, dry and arid, but now and again it could be unexpectedly stormy, windy, thundery and wet. All the trips involved camping, often for weeks at a time, and they certainly did not enjoy the luxuries of camping that we have today. A typical surveying bush trip involved between three to six or even more blokes. I am reading from some of the notes given to me by Roland Maddocks, the Senior Surveyor of the Lands Information Division of the NT Department of Planning and Infrastructure.
He said:
- Can you picture camping out in the mulga for three weeks in 40 degree heat? Richard and Rawson clearing line of sight through the scrub with axes and chain saws and the desert hard woods in Australia are as hard as they come; Chippy and Kenny measuring distances by chain or with electronic distance measuring equipment; Darryl King using a sledgehammer to bash in steel pegs and droppers, digging holes for concrete blocks. It was often difficult, tiring, hot, and tough. Russell, Koppy and Tim squashed into the hot dusty and smelly cab of the four wheel drive ute, with no airconditioning or radio in those early days. Toss in some frayed tempers, some booze and hangovers; all of this was part of the environment in which Tim comfortably fitted. We got to know each other very well. The survey party did more than just work together. They were good mates.
We all had different ways of organising our surveys. He did not have Terry’s colourful crash …
and I presume he is talking about Terry Gadsby there:
- … he didn’t have Terry’s colourful crash bang approach nor Mick’s flamboyance or Monty’s sharp wit. He wasn’t like Barry’s authoritative and direct manner or Tony’s yeah, yeah that’s okay some way. It wasn’t like Chud’s tight ship approach or Brian’s softly-softly manner. Tim had a patient, unflappable, serene approach to his fieldwork. He was very accommodating in many ways. It was almost regal. When running a project he was obviously the master of it all. Yet it didn’t make others in the team feels subordinate.
Tim accommodated our harsh environment, in summer and in winter. Tim has done surveys anywhere and everywhere in the Territory. It is a bit like the song I’ve been everywhere - Tennant Creek, Borroloola, across the Barkly, Harts Range, across the Plenty to Tarlton Downs, Argadargada, Tobermorey, Finke, Areyonga, and so on. There is a huge list of places that he had been involved with.
He was also involved with the Alice Springs to Darwin line; the beef roads across the Plenty and through Angus Downs and Henbury. He was on-site for the establishment of the tourist resorts at Kings Canyon and Yulara. You will find field books for Larapinta Drive, Lasseter Highway, the Petermann road - mention anything like that and you will get a story about Tim. It is incredible that there are people who have had such a huge history of involvement in the development of the Territory. This man as a surveyor has done so much and we do not even realise it.
Many people came to his funeral from all over Australia. They paid tribute to two particular people as well because as Tim resigned, retired and became not so well, he had wonderful support from Tony Markham and then in later years from Terry Gadsby. We all know that Tim appreciated what his colleagues did for him as he grew older. He even worked on Project Jindalee, the over-the-horizon radar, and laid down the Tropic of Capricorn monument on the Stuart Highway. This is a lot of history that I hope we do not lose. I hope Roland does something with these words that he put together about Tim.
All the surveyors regarded Tim as their mate. He always regarded them as Aussies because he was always a Kiwi at heart but he still called Australia his home. Tim’s family came from New Zealand for the funeral. I know Terry Gadsby is still doing a huge amount of work to settle his affairs. When you hear of people like Tim McKnight who has contributed to the Territory as a surveyor, you realise that the history of this place is never ending. I admire him for what he has done and I thank those people who came to his funeral.
I also want to make brief mention of William Brailsford, or Bill as we knew him. He lived in my electorate and also worked for my husband at one stage in his contracting business. As Bill got older and his wife had passed away, often the newsagent ladies would say things to us like: ‘You had better do something about Bill’, or ‘Perhaps somebody ought to get in touch with his son’. As they said, Bill’s driving became a little unsatisfactory as he grew older and eventually he ended up, I think, in the front of a baker’s shop, so we knew it was time for Bill to stop driving. I was pleased when he came to Darwin to live with his son, Roger. The last few years that Bill was in Darwin were important because he had family to support him. Living on his own in Alice Springs, his neighbours, everyone, seemed to be worried about him but he had a great network. Roger has given me these notes, and I will just mention a few of them.
William Brailsford was born in Nottingham in rather humble circumstances in June, 1920 to a former soldier. In his adult life the Army became a dominant theme. Soon after his 16th birthday, with his father close to death as a result of a wound received in World War I, he joined the Army Reserve. In June 1937, he joined the Royal Leicester Regiment and he continued serving with these Regiments for some time. In September 1938, he had been assigned to the regiment’s 2nd Battalion and found himself on a ship to Palestine.
In 1942, he arrived in Ceylon, which is now Sri Lanka, and then to India. He marched into Burma when the Japanese were advancing and he found himself amongst troops from many nations. Here he came to respect people from other countries as well. On returning to India from Burma in late 1943, he joined the Corps of Military Police and stayed with them until he managed home leave in April 1944. This was the first time he had been home for six years. He left Palestine in June 1946, some 10 days after his 26th birthday - I keep thinking he must have been so much older because he did so much in that time - and he returned to England. He left the military in October of the same year.
At the end of 1946, he entered training at Nottingham Central Fire Station and he stayed as a fireman for some years. He married Joan in 1948 and, in 1951, Roger was born.
By 1965, with 19 years service as a fireman, Bill had decided to follow his two brothers to Australia. He eventually came to Alice Springs in 1984. He was a part-time worker in my husband’s contracting firm. It was sad that Joan passed away and he was left on his own, but he was such a character and knew everyone so well that, in a way, he did not feel lonely, even though we always thought when Roger moved to Darwin that perhaps that is where Bill should be.
Roger says Bill’s driving career ended in a minor, but spectacular accident in the Coles car park at Alice Springs. Bill found himself seeking entry to the local pie shop while behind the wheel of a borrowed Nissan! Life as a single pensioner had become difficult and he agreed to move to Darwin.
Bill Brailsford had a life of extraordinary contrasts. He began life in a town that echoed to the standards, customs and language of the Victorian era. He used the armed forces to escape a life of industrial drudgery and he faced danger so many times in places that even today are challenging. Not content with the quiet life, he became a fire fighter, and when it became clear that life in Australia could offer more, he made a life-changing choice at 45, an age where many men would be contemplating a quiet retirement.
Despite his ways and his love of many things, he always strove to do his best. His Army discharge papers describe his conduct as ‘exemplary, a trier, most honest and sober, a stolid and reliable individual who at all times rendered highly satisfactory service’. While true, he did have a softer side.
He is survived by his sister, Dorothy; his brothers, Albert and John; his son, Roger; his grandsons, Adrian and Simon; and his great-granddaughters, Kiara-Jane, Amber Rose and Rhiannon. I pass on my sincere sympathies to all the family.
Ms CARNEY (Araluen): Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, tonight I pay tribute to a man very well known in Alice Springs who passed away in December last year. I am sure he is probably known to all members of the Assembly. Certainly, he was well known to many members of parliament over a long period of time. I talk, of course, about Bert Cramer.
Many people in Alice Springs would know Bert as that old bloke who drove around town in a ute of dubious roadworthiness who collected cans, annoyed public servants, politicians – usually at about 4 pm on a Friday – and a guy who would talk to anyone who would listen - I was one of them – about the impact of craters, religion and anything else those two subjects and many others would lead to. It is fitting to recognise Bert Cramer in the parliament of the Northern Territory. I will, throughout my contribution, be quoting parts of the eulogy read by his son, Rod, at his funeral which, unfortunately, I was unable to attend.
Bert was an interesting man. He was an artist, a poet, an inventor, an author and an entertainer. He was also a lateral thinker long before that particular term became common. Bert Roland Cramer was born in Tanunda, South Australia on 15 April 1928. He was the first of three sons to Willem and Adela. Bert left school at 14 and worked for several years for the South Australian Brush Company, first in the Adelaide factory and then harvesting and processing Darwin grass at Port Lincoln.
By this time, Army surplus was available and he and his brother, Colin, obtained .303 rifles and weekends were often spent on foot or pushbike expeditions into the bush hunting rabbits, foxes, brumbies and roos, and prospecting for gold. He became a crack shot with open sights. At about that time, he started recording his experiences with a Box Brownie but, unfortunately, many of the photos he took were damaged in the 1988 flood in Alice Springs. Bert taught himself to play the mouth organ sitting alongside a wind-up gramophone, endlessly playing country ballads at approximately 78 revs per minute.
A stint at RM Williams learning saddlery, boot and whip making further prepared Bert for the attraction of the real outback to head north. In February 1949, Bert found a job as a stock camp cook, equipped with rubber-tyred wagon hauled by two camels on Welbourne Hill Station which was 50 km east of Marla on the edge of Sturt’s Stony Desert.
Eleven months later, 21 and unemployed, Bert found himself at the Oodnadatta rail siding intending to return to Adelaide for Christmas, but he decided to have a quick look at what was further north. While on the train, he was offered a job in Alice Springs with the government bore maintenance gang which looked after the bores on the stock routes in the bottom third of the Northern Territory.
One trip found the bore gang a year later passing through Hermannsburg and Bert was shown around the mission by Pastor Albrecht. Bert could not help notice the number of single women working there - school teachers, nurses and so on. Bert commenced work at the stock camp at Hermannsburg in 1951 at the start of the pneumonia inoculation program. These were still frontier days in the cattle camps, long before fridges, radios, four-wheel drives, helicopters and road trains.
Luckily for us, Bert by that time had purchased a 35 mm camera which could fit in his shirt pocket. He started keeping a comprehensive colour slide record of his experiences in the outback - and how fascinating those slides must be. Hermannsburg at the time had plenty of scrubbers and brumbies and very few yards or fences. Saddle tack was falling to bits and stock horses without saddle sores were scarce so much of the time was spent breaking in horses and training the stockmen in horse hygiene and saddlery. Sale cattle were walked to Alice Springs for trucking on the steam train from the old Smith Street yards.
The Hermannsburg community purchased a Caterpillar D4 tractor and scoop, and Bert was tasked to clean out soakages in the Finke and Ellery waterways and to train an Aboriginal man, very well known, Herman Malbunka, then aged 19. Bert was happy to train Herman and he also taught him to read and write by the campfire of the tractor camps.
Romance was alive and well, and Bert found time to court a young school teacher, Mona Kennedy. At Christmas 1952, Bert and Mona announced their engagement and they were married at Light Pass on 28 January 1954. Marriage did not put an end to bush work camps. Mona accompanied Bert, and together they travelled to Gilbert Springs building troughs, or dam yard building or wherever. Their life took them to many places in and around Central Australia.
Soon Bert had other demands on him. They were family demands. With the birth of Rodney, and then Lance 15 months later, they needed a cot, so Bert decided to build one. He built one that had a fly screen that was fully collapsible. As the children grew, they also needed a pram and a high chair, so Bert built them as well and all, I am told, are still serviceable. Many people can still see the pram holding the wash basket at Mona’s clothes line.
The end of 1956 saw Bert and his young family leave Hermannsburg. They spent six months in South Australia and then, in July 1957, they started life in Alice Springs on the Emily Gap property, now Ragonesi Road. Times were tough: a bare block, the first years of drought, no water, electricity, phone, house, bitumen road or secure tenure. Initially, Bert shot roos for skins at night, pegging them by day and cleaning out and equipping an old well, originally dug by the Kilgariffs, another well known pioneering family in the Territory, to obtain water.
Bert did a short stint working on the night cart until he got the sack, branded as a trouble maker for asking for soap and overalls. Bert did the occasional saddle repair, fixed pumps and windmills and other pieces of equipment. There is no doubt that Bert was an enterprising fellow, and he became the agent for Villiers Engineers, Bodaco and Mona Pumps and Denkovit. A shortage of plumbers in town led them to melt down cases of roofing nails to recover the lead from around the heads and sold them to the plumbers. Bert was an enterprising man.
In 1958, he did a fencing job at the warehouse of Stuarts and Lloyds on Ghan Road opposite Sutton Motors. This led to full-time employment in the warehouse. A regular customer there was Jack Maskall, who offered Bert a job in his welding shop on Healy Crescent under the athel pines. In 1959, Bert took on a job as kitchen gardener for Connellan Airways at the pilot mess and Araluen Homestead.
In 1960, he saw the arrival of their daughter, Judy. It was a trying time for Rod and Lance, their mother was away and they could not see the point of Bert’s toasted lettuce sandwiches. No wonder that was worthy of a mention in the eulogy, Madam Acting Deputy Speaker.
After two years gardening, he took up the offer of employment in his welding workshop on a casual basis. This was an opportunity not lost on Bert, who soaked up as much as he could of the metal trade from the highly skilled Jack Maskall, and this gave him the skills and opportunity to start constructing bigger projects.
When new asbestos water pipes freighted into Alice Springs had a substantial number of breakages, he salvaged all the broken pipes and built the lathe to machine new ends on them for joining and installed them as mains on his farm, once again, evidence of his entrepreneurial nature. Bert mounted a large pump on the power take-off of the Land Rover, and monopolised the emptying and cleaning of five inground private swimming pools in town at that time. His penchant for pumps and pipes saw him annually employed collecting dirty diesel fuel and sump oil, storing, mixing and spraying it on the sand greens of the old golf course.
In 1963, Bert tendered for the contract to install the fence strainer posts at the Old Telegraph Station Reserve. Showing his calculations to his friend Jack, Jack had one comment, which was ‘double it’, which Bert did and he still won the contract. This was the beginning of a decade-and-a-half contracting relationship with the Northern Territory Reserves Board and the Chairman, Colonel Lionel Rose. The colonel took quite a liking to Bert and his workmanship, and no more tender documents were thereafter required. After the complete fencing of the Telegraph Station, Bert went on to design and construct a sophisticated pumping station, drawing from five bores in the bed of the Todd River, to supply to the Telegraph Station. Bert installed water supplies at Stanley Chasm and Simpson’s Gap and he installed the first toilet blocks at Stanley Chasm and Ormiston Gorge.
The income from these contracts trickled back into the farm. Bert bought the sad remains of a bee keeping enterprise. Finding the hives riddled with wax moth, Bert proceeded to boil, clean and repair the lot and started a honey business. The dairy was gradually forming, goats and cows were hand milked, bottled in whatever they could get their hands on, and delivered around Alice Springs. Eventually registered studs, the goats and cows were part of the ‘milk and honey farming’ until 1987, when after 30 years, the block was sold and Temple Bar was purchased.
The dairy herd needed fodder, so Bert built a fifth of an acre water-powered pivot sprinkler he had invented in his stock camp swag a decade earlier that ran on a mere 15 psi of water pressure. To harvest the lucerne crops, he imported an old binder and, on two daring occasions, grew wheat crops on rainfall. He also experimented with onions, cotton, dates, pasture, beans and other products. A secondhand Caterpillar D4 bulldozer, purchased in 1965, enabled other contracting jobs and bigger water harvesting projects on the farm. The cleaning of the rodeo ground at Blatherskite Park, the first stage of Jindalee (Mt Everard) and Pioneer Park were all done with this machine. It helped excavate the two-up pit at the Casino. Bert could almost make the bulldozer sing.
The dairy was prefabricated and erected in 1966, and a two stand milking machine was installed. The milking machine, an electric welder and a nine frame honey extractor were perhaps the only new large pieces of equipment they ever bought. Mostly, if they needed it, Bert built it. A boring plant, cement mixer, drill press, power hacksaw and air compressor were all supplied from his own ingenuity and the town dump, with access to Jack Maskall’s workshop and advice when needed.
However, not all of Bert’s inventions were successful. In the 1970s, Bert needed a rock saw to repair the sandstone fence in front of today’s Centralian Advocate premises. Bert looked at his metallic chainsaw, bought a masonry wheel and went to the workshop. A day or so later, he emerged with a hand-held, belt driven rock saw. The specifications on the masonry wheel advised the maximum speed was something a lot less than the RPMs of the chainsaw motor. Revving it out on the test run, the masonry wheel disintegrated and disappeared, the only trace of it being a ‘Zorro-like’ slice up the leg of his baggy trousers and scratches on son Lance’s knee and nose, as he was holding the rev counter.
Bert Cramer was a well known member of the Alice Springs community. Apart from his ingenuity and entrepreneurial nature, he was, for many years, the secretary of the Alice Springs Farmers Association and a Sunday school teacher. The foundation stone of the church had been collected by Bert while a stockman at Hermannsburg. He fully intended to use the stone for his headstone, but he donated it to the church instead.
There is no doubt that Bert Cramer will be considered one of Australia’s battlers, but he was a tenacious battler. The only time he ever gave up was at his room at the Old Timers on 19 December 2007. Bert is survived by his brother, Colin, wife Mona, children Rod, Lance and Judy, five grandchildren, and one great granddaughter.
As Bert observed in hospital: ‘You could say I have had an interesting life. I have done the best I can’. Indeed, Bert Cramer did lead a very interesting life, and he did more than his best. At times in the Territory’s history, when there were not the modern conveniences of today, the Territory depended on people’s pioneering spirit.
In the parliament of the Northern Territory, many members of parliament have talked about the pioneering spirit of our fellow Territorians. So many of them now are older and they are passing on. Bert Cramer was one such character, and the people of Alice Springs can be very proud of a man like this, always an interesting fellow to talk to.
His son, Rod, plays a very active role in the community in Alice Springs. I do not know Rod all that well, however I do have a sneaking suspicion that he shares his father’s ingenuity and entrepreneurial nature.
On behalf of all members of the Northern Territory Legislative Assembly, I pass on my condolences to Bert’s family and thank them for supporting Bert throughout his interesting life and, most importantly of all, thanking Bert for his tenacity, his ingenuity, his passion for things that not everyone else shared. This is the pioneering spirit of the Territory and the Territory, without a shadow of a doubt, has been enriched as a result of Bert Cramer’s experiences in the Territory and the fascinating life he has led.
Dr BURNS (Johnston): Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, on Australia Day this year, Robert Aubrey Bradshaw was awarded the Northern Territory Public Service Medal for outstanding public service to the development of Public Sector Administration in the Northern Territory.
Robert first arrived in the Territory as a newly graduated lawyer in 1976. He took up a position with the Department of Law, as it was then, perhaps not realising that this fateful decision would have such a big impact on his life.
Over the 30 years that followed that initial migration north, Robert has served the Northern Territory Public Service, and the Departments of Law and Justice in particular, with dedication, diligence and distinction. Despite such a long involvement with one department, albeit in as many guises, Robert has thus far - and I am sure there are many more years to come – had what I can only imagine to have been a most interesting and varied career.
Robert has held positions ranging from Registrar-General, Registrar of Land and Business Agents and Public Trustee to the Commissioner of Consumer Affairs and more recently, Director of Legal Policy.
Robert’s contribution in the area of law reform must also be noted. As a member of the Policy Division of the Department of Justice, Robert has worked on many and varied projects at both Territory and national levels, advising governments of the day on the development of legislation and legal policy generally. Most recently, Robert has managed to regain the record for the longest piece of Justice legislation with his work on the development of the Legal Profession Act.
Renowned for his enthusiasm for his job and his ability to work seven days a week at all hours of the day and night, Robert has provided me and my predecessors as Attorney-General with exemplary advice and service; he has been a source of advice and guidance to colleagues, other members of the public service and the public generally. He has also been a mentor and an example to young upcoming lawyers.
There is no doubt that Robert Bradshaw is a deserving and appropriate recipient of such an award as the Public Service Medal. I am sure that all members of the House join me in congratulating Robert Bradshaw and thank him for his service and urge him to continue his good work for the Territory.
Tonight I would like to acknowledge some schools in my electorate and particularly those students who graduated last year from schools in my electorate and started middle school.
I request that the names of the students from each school be incorporated in the Parliamentary Record.
Leave granted.
From Wagaman Primary School, congratulations to:
Anthony Alley Joshua Barnes
Ange Bachu Carloss Camposo
Dein Cantrill Jayme Cigobia
Dallas Collinson Shianne Craufurd
Jerome De Costa Khloey Djawas
Somenah Dooley Niressa Fenis
Emily Fletcher Vernon Francisco
Kallan Gill Brandon Hansen
Cain Hendy Riley Hendy
Taylah Hendy Jackson Hrotek
Emma Jackson Jesse Jones
- Yiannis Karafyllis Elizabeth Kastellorizios
Dhiraj Lal Tommy Le
Teikauea Maniju Lorena McIntyre
Hannah Motter Bianca Mowat
Trevor Nickels Joel O’Brien
Manoli Panatos Stergos Panatos
Jess Rees Donica Sarikon
Joseph Shereston Rui Sihombing
Cain Simpson Michael Skopellos
Karlee Truscott Tiani Van der Velde
Julienne Vargas Nathalia Wauchope
Marni Wishart
From Jingili Primary School, congratulations to:
Asher Bradbury Shayenne Carne
Stephanie Franklin Bradley Golik
Chantel Holloway John Hoskins
Max Kenna Leroy Larson
Nicholas Long Tre Manning-Watson
Lucas McAndrew Luke McIntosh
Theo McMahon Ryan McMurray
Alexis Merritt Shannen Pugh
Bryden Racines Emma Ramsey
Kailin Rosas Lance Schmidt
Ewan Sutardy Renae Williams
Rowan Williams Paige Wilson
Jacqueline Withers
From Moil Primary School, congratulations to:
Jessica Agung Shane Atkins
Mareysol Beltran Jedda Bennett-Kellam
Aidan Bird Jordan Briston
Eloise Bruekers Madison Campbell
William Carroll Warren Collins
Shane Creeper Beau Cubillo
Carlo Dela Pena Nick Deverill
Jethro Dickens Ethan Dilettoso
Maria Ergas Anthony Esam
Kieren Fiorenza Ryan Fountain
Stacey Gould Samuel Handley
Adam Hodor Elysia Jongue
Dylan Jones Vaanathy Kandiah
Lee Kenny Daniel Lai
Felicity Lay Livia Lay
Manap Lay Sau-Ching Leung
Christina Lopes Benjamin Lu
Ian Manolis Douglas Mansell
Phoebe Mansfield Tara Maxwell
Riley May Tara McIntyre
Cameron McKenzie Stephanie Mison
Keanu Moylan Jo Newberry
Sam Newberry Rebbeca Noakes
Tegan O’Connor
Sassikumar Packiakumar
Matthew Petterson Teyarra Pickering
Tolanda Pickering Annie Pidgeon
Alyssa Pidgeon Michael Pilling
Elycia Pittman Steven Polychrone
Mathew Rehrmann Nicholas Simmonds
Kostandin Smalios Chloe Smith
Jett Sukcharoen Vivian Tchia
Adrienne Turner Luke Urban
Emanuel Vieira Bianca Walsh
Denise Wheeler Kylie Wheeler
Jarryn Zyka
Dr BURNS: Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, the 2008 school year has begun and all classes are now well into Term 1. School council AGMs are coming up. It is a fantastic opportunity for parents to get involved in decision-making and management of their children’s school.
Fundraising events will start again and I hope to attend the Jingili Twilight International Markets to be held at the school in March this year. It is always great to see school councils forming committees for fundraising and coming up with such a wide variety of ideas for making extra funds to help the schools out. Jingili is also planning a trip to Canberra this year in August so it will be lots of action as far as fundraising goes to ensure that that trip is a success.
At the end of last year, I was happy to supply sponsorship for the Jingili Year 5 camping events at Batchelor. Breanna Haase from Year 4/5 Heysen sent me a wonderful e-mail seeking support, and following the great success of the camping trip, sent me photos to check out just what a great time they had. Breanna reported that the camp was really fun with many activities including archery, snorkelling, bike riding, canoeing, kayaking, rock climbing, high ropes, low ropes and swimming. I take this opportunity to thank Breanna for her letter and her photos.
At the end of last year, I presented prizes at the Greek School end-of-year awards to Mihalis Halkitis and Faneromeni Koulouritis for high achievement. Well done Mihalis and Faneromeni.
On Australia Day, the Student Citizen Awards for 2008 were announced. I offer my heartiest congratulations to Decideria Alves and Sheradene Solien-Senge of Alawa Primary School; Kym Baird of Casuarina Senior College; Ewan Sutardy and Jessica Harpur of Jingili Primary; Emma Jackson and Hannah Motter of Wagaman Primary; and Vaanathy Kandiah of Moil Primary School. These students are chosen for this award based on their outstanding citizenship qualities within their school and the community.
Last Friday, I had the opportunity to attend the presentation of Certificates of Merit from the Northern Territory Board of Studies and subject awards sponsored by various organisations throughout the Territory. The Northern Territory Board of Studies promotes excellence in school learning and recognises student achievement in the senior secondary years. The following students from Casuarina Senior College, another school within my electorate, are to be congratulated on their achievements and the college should be rightly acknowledged for its excellence in teaching.
Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, I seek to include this list of names in the Parliamentary Record:
Leave granted.
Kelly Beneforti Carmen Chau
Joshua Clayfield Helen Dockrell
Nadia D’Souza Daniel Ellen-Barwell
Shelley Keast Jayde Kellie
Hivaraj Klessa Georgia Leach
Erin Lim Bonnie McGregor
Joshua Miles Brooke Ottley
Stevie Shehan Chrysovalantis Sideris
Raphaela Thynne Ciella WIlliams
Dr BURNS: Kelly Beneforti was also awarded the Rotary Club of Darwin Ian McGregor Year 12 English Award, the Lord Florey Students Prize, and also headed the list of the Top Twenty 2007 Final Year Students. She was also named the Most Outstanding Stage 2 NTCE Student for 2007. Well done, Kelly!
Helen Dockrell, also among the Top Twenty Final Year Students, won the Dennis Thompson Estate and the Australian Veterinary Association (NT Division) Science Award, as well as the Royal Australian Chemical Institute and Northern Territory Environmental Laboratories Chemistry Award.
Eliza Bott and Stevie Shehan were presented with the International Association of Hydrogeologists (NT) Geography Awards, and Sita Rodgers was awarded the International Association of Hydrogeologists (NT) Geology Award.
Carmen Chau was presented with the Lord Florey Students Prize, as well as placing third in the Top Twenty Final Year Students.
Thomas Cowie was presented with the Northern Territory School Music Award, and Michael Jones, Debra Fox, Paul Lyons and Brendin Lacco were presented with the NT Board of Studies Vocational Education and Training School awards. Michael was awarded for Building and Construction; Debra for Community Services, Health and Education, Paul for Engineering, and Brendin for Business, Clerical and Information Technology.
Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, once again I ask that this list of other Top Twenty 2007 Final Year Students from Casuarina Senior College be incorporated into the Parliamentary Record.
Leave granted.
Danmei Lin Raphaela Thynne
Venu D’Souza Bonnie McGregor
John Kandiah Ciella Williams
Daniel Ellen-Barwell Hannah Williams
Susan Glencross Grace Ness
Jennifer Wilson Joshua Miles
Stevie Shehan Leonard Quong
Dr BURNS: Last, but not least, while talking about the fantastic young kids in my electorate, I would like to make special mention of an up-and-coming baseball player, Michael Garton of Jingili, who represented the Northern Territory at the National Youth Baseball Championships held in Kempsey, New South Wales last month. Michael and his team won silver medals, but Michael is only 10 years of age and was only one of two that age in the competition who were given approval to play at that level based on outstanding skills for age. What a fantastic achievement. I will be keeping an eye on Michael and wish him all the best in his baseball career.
I attended the Australia Day Citizenship Ceremony held at the Darwin Entertainment Centre on 26 January. I congratulate all of our newest Australian citizens. In particular, I welcome in my electorate, Mr Ajout Ajout of Alawa, my good friend Peter Jones’ wife, Tita Jones of Jingili, and Mrs Celia Lee, Mr Salim Mohamed, and Mrs Laura Smithers of Moil. Darwin is such a culturally diverse place to live in and I hope our newest citizens will be even happier living here at the top of Australia as Australian citizens.
Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, I am very proud to be the local member for the Johnston electorate. There is a lot going on there, many fantastic people, and I look forward to speaking in future adjournments on their achievements.
Motion agreed to; the Assembly adjourned.
Last updated: 04 Aug 2016