OPINION: Wasteful and scandal ridden Darwin projects such as the Ship Lift and the Waterfront give politicians in the Top End city the ability to claim credit for such developments and enable mates and political supporters to be paid off by an inappropriate and extravagant use of tax-payer funding, while tourism in Central Australia declines, Dr Don Fuller writes.
Central Australia is the Northern Territory’s largest region, covering over 40 per cent of the total land area. There are a number of major natural attractions in the region, which impress and fascinate both Australians and foreigners who are all potential visitors.
These include Uluru, Kata Tjuta, Kings Canyon and the wonders of the East and West MacDonnell Ranges.
Despite these world class natural attractions which symbolize what many believe make Australia a special destination, and characterise what is known as ‘the heart of Australia’, tourism numbers to Central Australia continue to decline in a worrying pattern.
As pointed out by the Alice Springs News, the annual number of visitor nights in Alice Springs has dropped by more than one third since 2011.
Statistics from the Australian Trade and Investment Commission show that 1.27 million nights were spent in Alice by tourists in 2011. By 2024 (the latest figures available) the number was down to 792,000. The industry is not optimistic that there will be major improvement during 2026.
This concerning downward trend is largely due to a lack of major tourism projects in Central Australia aimed at improving access and visitor stays to important attractions.
This includes the obvious need for accommodation of an international standard in the East and West MacDonnell ranges which could, and should be, a main focus of visitors given their beauty and diversity.
To support such natural and outstanding attractions, high quality roads are also necessary and an upgrade is urgently required for the Mereenie Loop Tourist Drive.
This key road is an unsealed section of the Red Centre Way. It connects three amazing destinations; Alice Springs, Kings Canyon and Uluru. Beside this, it traverses a number of wonderful locations in the West MacDonnell ranges, such as the Ellery Creek Big Hole.
Currently the road is recommended for 4WD vehicles only. It is often corrugated and subject to wash-aways. The road has no facilities or fuel stops. As this road crosses Aboriginal land, a permit is also required for travel.
It could be further benefited by increased sealing of the Outback Way. This is a 2,700km iconic route linking Laverton in Western Australia to Winton in Queensland, via Alice Springs. It too would provide vastly improved access to iconic natural tourist attractions in the centre of Australia.
It is clear the NT Government does not prioritise taking advantage of the outstanding natural tourism attractions in the region, considering the lack of funding.
It is hard for many to understand how such internationally recognised sites can be virtually ignored and underfunded by the NT Government.
Rather, it seems that available funds have been diverted to questionable and scandal-ridden projects in Darwin, such as the Darwin Waterfront and the Darwin Ship Lift.
While there are likely to be additional examples, space dictates that just two are mentioned.
According to the NT Independent, Chief Minister Lia Finocchiaro’s husband Sam Burke was given a made-up, part-time government job while general manager of the Darwin Waterfront Corporation, internal government documents showed, that boosted his already substantial salary by $60,000 a year through a ‘higher duties allowance’ that continued for years after he left the department role.
The ministerial briefings, as pointed out by the NT Independent, show Mr Burke was eventually awarded a massive $300,000 executive contract in late 2023 to continue his three-day-a-week role as deputy chief executive officer of the Waterfront by CEO Alastair Shields that also appears to have breached several public service employment processes.
While the Finocchiaro Government was forced to call an inquiry into the DWC by the government dominated Public Accounts Committee, it was regarded by many as particularly inadequate.
The latest annual report for the Darwin Waterfront Corporation (2023-24) shows that this organisation received over $25 million in grants and subsidies from the NT Government to operate and still ran at an operating loss.
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The development of the Darwin Waterfront Precinct has historically been criticised for not taking advantage of the natural environmental surroundings of Darwin, but rather constructing a series of ‘concrete and plastic’ surrounds completely out of character with a tropical port, Darwin’s interesting and complex historical past, and the harbour.
It is the sort of artificial development that could have been constructed anywhere in the world.
It has now also been made evident that it will be an important focus of future tourism developments in the NT to focus on ‘cruise tourism’, while it has been floated that northern coastal regions could also be a major destination and attraction.
It will be necessary, it is argued, to spend substantial sums on infrastructure on other areas to attract tourists such as berthing, bunkering, water and waste, while also meeting the growing expectations of passengers through the provision of comfortable terminals, for example.
However, to think that the coastal locations of Darwin and Arnhem Land and Nhulunbuy for example, can compete with the coastal destinations of Asia seems to be drawing a very long bow.
Worse still, such ‘pie in the sky’ and wasteful developments result in the diversion of major government funding from proven and iconic natural attractions that characterise Australia, and which are found in the Red Centre.
Compounding such a serious misallocation of scarce resources by the NT Government is the Darwin Ship Lift, currently under development.
It has been argued in NT Government reports regarding tourism that the ship lift, which was originally due to become operational in 2024, will have the capacity to take ships up to 5,000 tonnes out of the water.
This is apparently large enough to facilitate ships such as the smaller cruise ships like Island Sky and Caledonian Sky, and offers an opportunity for the NT to increase its competitive advantages as a port.
However, the ship lift project has been cursed with massive cost blowouts. The project’s cost increased from an initial estimate of $100 million in 2015 to approximately $820 million by late 2025, with potential for further increases. This massive escalation has been described as one of Australia’s largest proportional cost blowouts for an infrastructure project.
This has major implications for funding available for proven and unquestionable natural tourism attractions already existing in Central Australia.
In an additional case of an apparent serious lack of government accountability and transparency, the NT Government has been heavily criticised for failing to produce a public business case or cost-benefit analysis for the ship lift project.
In addition, it has been pointed out that while the project is wholly publicly funded, there will be no direct revenue stream for the NT once operational.
Instead, the private Paspaley Group will operate the facility for profit under a long-term agreement, leading to accusations of a “toxic deal” that benefits private entities at taxpayer expense.
READ: The Darwin Ship Lift is a toxic deal for the Northern Territory
While this is a major and unexplained benefit to business interests in the Top End, once again, no such arrangements are in place to benefit business development for tourism in Central Australia.
It is noticeable that such questionable and scandal-ridden projects are often located in the Top End.
Critics have argued that this allows senior politicians who are in power in Darwin, the ability to claim credit for such developments where a number of parliamentary seats are located. It also enables mates and political supporters to be paid off, by an inappropriate and extravagant use of taxpayer funding.
Such network control and political influence is not available in Alice Springs, which suffers as a result.
There is also an obvious need for the NT Government and associated tourism organisations to be far more pro-active in negotiating with Aboriginal land councils to facilitate the wider use of Aboriginal land for the benefit of Aboriginal people as well as non-Indigenous Australians and international visitors in Central Australia.
Comments with regard to barriers to tourism development in the Centre, were sought from Tourism Central Australia chief executive officer Danial Rochford. However, no reply was received by the time of publication.
Dr Don Fuller holds a first class Honours degree and PhD in economics from the University of Adelaide. He has worked as a senior public servant in the Territory and as Professor of Governance and Head of the Schools of Law and Business at Charles Darwin University. He grew up in Darwin and attended Darwin High School.
He was also an adviser to the former CLP MLA Maralampuwi Francis Xavier, was briefly the senior private secretary to Chief Minister Paul Everingham, and is a former member of the CLP and the ALP
Everyone knows of the 2015-25 DWC Corruption, especially the Toga apartment owners being extorted. All NTG ALP & CLP MLA’s & City of Darwin councillors know yet most are to gutless to talk, or even support whistleblowers, or they have their snout in trough. Australians are becoming weak, apathetic & perpetual victims who lack a moral compass. What did our families die for during WWII? Vote ONE NATION for change.