The deaths of three Department of Corporate and Digital Development employees, including the suicide of Shaun Joyce that all occurred within a 12-month period, are currently under investigation by the Territory’s workplace regulator because of the alleged “psychosocial hazards” that may have contributed to the deaths, NT WorkSafe said.
The Building Compliance Taskforce established by the previous Labor government in 2022 to urgently inspect uncertified government buildings and bring them up to code did not carry out its objectives, the NT Independent can reveal, which follows bricks falling from a wall during last month’s cyclone at Royal Darwin Hospital, which was identified three years ago as one of the key public buildings not meeting compliance standards.
The troubled Darwin Basketball Association’s financial situation worsened this year, with proposed income streams possibly breaching the sport’s national integrity rules, Basketball Australia has said, leaving the NT basketball fraternity to now vote on whether to dissolve the association.
A 44-year-old man has been arrested in Victoria and extradited to Darwin to face one count of murder in relation to the 2020 death of his nurse partner, NT Police said.
The developer behind the proposed 11-storey hotel at the Darwin Convention Centre has announced it will not proceed with the project following strong opposition from Larrakia elders, but the CLP Government has committed to proceeding with a “high-level concept” at the same site anyway.
Some health workers at every major Northern Territory hospital will walk off the job in protected action tomorrow, seeking better pay and safer conditions under their next enterprise bargaining agreement, their unions have said.
Charles Darwin University vice-chancellor Scott Bowman’s contract has been renewed for another five years, but the university council will not say on what basis the decision was made, while the announcement was made two days before Mr Bowman revealed he had hired a friend and her wedding singer husband to run the university’s London campus without publicly advertising the roles.
Two Larrakia elders have filed an application to the Federal Government calling on the Environment and Water Minister to protect the Stokes Hill sacred site against the “damage and desecration” they say the proposed hotel at the Darwin Convention Centre will have on the site, which follows controversial changes the CLP Finocchiaro Government made to the NT Sacred Sites Act that the NLC says has “put all sacred sites in the NT at risk”.
The man Charles Darwin University vice-chancellor Scott Bowman unilaterally picked to run the uni’s new London campus, Andy Bridges, has inexplicably left the role after less than a year, with Mr Bowman now hiring another mate from Far North Queensland and her wedding singer husband with public funds to lead the university’s development of the same campus, raising conflict of interest concerns.
NT childcare centres have been warned to “fix their act fast” by the government as part of a four-pillar plan to enhance accountability in the industry, following the tragic death of a toddler at an early learning centre in Humpty Doo in 2023.
The terms of reference for an internal government investigation into the death of Acacia health IT system developer Shaun Joyce have been kept secret by the government, with the Department of Corporate and Digital Development refusing to say whether it is examining the issue of identified departmental bullying more broadly or looking into further possible suicides connected to the project.
The Territory’s politicians have once again been gifted a pay rise amid record debt, with their salaries now increased by $5,000 – which follows last year’s generous $8,200 pay rise – which works out to an eight per cent increase, while the government is currently offering public servants an annual three per cent pay increase.
