The Finocchiaro CLP Government has announced a “Circuit Breaker Program” for Alice Springs in the wake of a surge of violent crimes in the troubled town that it says will address the “root causes” of crime, but the program as described is exactly what Labor announced in April.
CLP Education Minister Jo Hersey says she is now in the process of divesting her shares in telecommunications giant Telstra, despite pledges from the CLP in February amid Labor’s shares scandal that all its MLAs’ shares would be divested “to show Territorians that we are ready to take government”.
Chief Minister Lia Finocchiaro has committed to taking no action against five senior police officers who lied to the court about their involvement in the racist TRG awards, despite evidence the joint investigation by the ICAC and NT Police executive failed to properly review the officers’ criminal conduct.
The Territory’s politicians have quietly been given an early Christmas present in the form of an $8,200 annual pay rise as of January 1 – bringing their base salaries to $175,000, plus benefits and expense accounts – while ministers will see their pay packet increase by nearly $14,000 a year.
EXCLUSIVE: The man who organised five senior NT Police officers to sign sworn statements that the racist Nooguda awards were not racist has refused to answer questions about why those five officers were chosen and what was said to them before their misleading statements were tendered to the court, the NT Independent can reveal.
EXCLUSIVE: NT Police Commissioner Michael Murphy misled Coroner Elisabeth Armitage in two separate coronial inquests, first when he claimed at the inquest into domestic violence that a senior officer who shared a picture on social media of a half-naked domestic violence survivor could not be disciplined because it would affect his family and later when he claimed at another inquest that he would order a review into the matter.
CDU vice-chancellor Scott Bowman has told staff to expect sackings in the near future while the university’s “finances lie in ruins”, admitting it cannot afford to continue the way it is, then informing everyone in his “weekly musings” email that he is taking early and extended Christmas leave as of next week.
The Finocchiaro Government needs to restore the public’s confidence in the NT Police and the Office of the ICAC following a flawed investigation into racist awards handed out by the TRG and evidence that five senior officers committed perjury, says well-respected CLP elder and the Northern Territory’s first chief minister Paul Everingham.
The Centre for Public Integrity has called on former deputy chief minister Nicole Manison to resign from her new VP position with Tamboran Resources and for the CLP Finocchiaro Government to review all decisions the previous government made concerning the gas company, in what is becoming a major PR nightmare for Tamboran.
Former deputy chief minister Nicole Manison has announced she is the new vice-president of Tamboran Resources, a gas company her Labor government awarded a potential billion dollar government gas supply contract to earlier this year that it refused to divulge the cost of.
ANALYSIS: The latest ICAC investigation report into the TRG officers who swore false statements to the court provides us with perhaps the best example yet of how those in positions of power in the Territory set up a supposedly independent investigation to appear independent, while secretly ensuring its predetermined outcomes fall in their favour.
Under fire CDU vice-chancellor Scott Bowman’s daughter was hired this month by his direct subordinate for a role at the university, amid deep financial losses and expected sackings.
