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Speaker 1: Well, as we know, estimates began in the Northern Territory

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Speaker 1: yesterday and concerns were raised right off the bat about

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Speaker 1: the government's decision to cut funding to the anti corruption

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Speaker 1: watchdog and the impact that it's going to have on

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Speaker 1: its ability to perform its duties. Now, the IICAQ boss

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Speaker 1: Michael Riches has well. He was one of the first

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Speaker 1: up to answer questions during the process and said that

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Speaker 1: he was disappointed that the government rejected a bid to

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Speaker 1: increase funding. Now joining me on the line to talk

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Speaker 1: more about the situation and plenty of other things, is

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Speaker 1: the Independent Member for Ara Lewin, Robin Lamley. Good morning

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Speaker 1: to you, Robin, Good morning Katie, Robin. I know that

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Speaker 1: during last month's budget, obviously, the Office of the Independent

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Speaker 1: Commissioner against Corruption was allocated five point four million for

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Speaker 1: the upcoming financial year. That's apparently one point three million

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Speaker 1: less than previous well less than the previous year.

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Speaker 2: Robin. I know the AKAK.

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Speaker 1: Commissioner appeared obviously yesterday and raised some concerns about this.

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Speaker 2: What exactly did he say, Well.

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Speaker 3: He was upfront. He zoomed into budget estimates, which is

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Speaker 3: a little bit unusual. He was very very sick, and

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Speaker 3: you could tell that the way he looked and the

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Speaker 3: way he spoke that he was very upfront at the start,

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Speaker 3: saying that he was bitterly disappointed that the government had

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Speaker 3: decided to cut twenty percent of his budget and implied

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Speaker 3: that this had an enormous bearing on what he was

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Speaker 3: capable of doing, what the Office of the Independent Commission

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Speaker 3: against Corruption can do going forward, And if he needs

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Speaker 3: more money, apparently he's been told that he has to

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Speaker 3: go and beg for a treasurer a treasurer's advance, which

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Speaker 3: in itself is quite interesting. Does he have to go

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Speaker 3: and present to the treasurer a particular case and say

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Speaker 3: I need more money to undertake this highly confidential, possible yeah,

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Speaker 3: that corruption case. That what I just beg his belief.

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Speaker 1: That's something that I'd wandered as well, Robert, because I

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Speaker 1: thought to myself, if he's now got to go to

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Speaker 1: Treasury to request more money, does detail need to be

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Speaker 1: provided about why it's a case where he requires that

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Speaker 1: additional funding.

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Speaker 3: Well, normally, when you ask for a treasurer's advance, you

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Speaker 3: have to present a fairly comprehensive case as to why

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Speaker 3: you need it. Look, he just couldn't breach confidentiality and

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Speaker 3: provide that sort of detailed a treasury, but it is

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Speaker 3: quite absurd. I mean, this is a news service offered

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Speaker 3: by the Northern Territory government, and all credit to this

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Speaker 3: Labor government. They've got it up and running. But what

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Speaker 3: really presented to me yesterday was an office in crisis.

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Speaker 3: I think this office is really at a crisis point.

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Speaker 3: It's he said that there's a fifty percent turnover in staff.

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Speaker 3: They have difficulty getting staff. They've got I think he said,

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Speaker 3: five legal cases underway in which they're defending them, so

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Speaker 3: they're spending an enormous amount of money on legal costs payouts,

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Speaker 3: and on top of that, they're trying to investigate. I

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Speaker 3: think he said that they've got about thirteen or fourteen

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Speaker 3: current investigations, yeah, which I can only assume are the

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Speaker 3: sort of of the most serious nature, because he's not

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Speaker 3: choosing to investigate the bulk of referrals made to his

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Speaker 3: often from what I determined, So you know, it's just

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Speaker 3: not working, Katie. And what came through loud and clearly

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Speaker 3: to me yesterday.

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Speaker 2: It makes you question as well.

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Speaker 1: I mean, yes, my understanding is that there are fourteen

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Speaker 1: significant investigations. In addition to three other preliminary inquiries. There

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Speaker 1: are those serious issues with staffing and indeed the issues

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Speaker 1: with funding which he has pointed out. So it really

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Speaker 1: makes you question how serious I guess the Northern Territory

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Speaker 1: government is at this point in terms of the IKAC

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Speaker 1: being able to operate the level that is required. And

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Speaker 1: let's not forget as well that some of the other

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Speaker 1: issues or some of the other bits of information that

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Speaker 1: were gleaned yesterday is the likes of the Home Improvement scheme.

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Speaker 1: As I understand it, the Order to General had said

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Speaker 1: that that had been referred.

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Speaker 2: To the IKAC.

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Speaker 1: So in some cases we're actually talking about without knowing

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Speaker 1: the detail of what those fourteen investigations are. But in

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Speaker 1: some cases you are talking about questions being raised about

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Speaker 1: whether the government itself should be investigated over different issues.

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Speaker 1: And then the government itself is determining whether the IKAK

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Speaker 1: receives additional funding.

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Speaker 3: Layers and layers of conflicts of interest, Katie, and you're right,

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Speaker 3: the government is effectively determining how much influence the KAK

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Speaker 3: Commissioner can have by restricting his budget. Of course, there

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Speaker 3: has to be limits put on budgets, but there is

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Speaker 3: a conflict of interest there which which needs to be addressed.

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Speaker 3: Look up my view all along, even when the discussions

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Speaker 3: were taking place planning an ICAC commission for the Northern Territory,

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Speaker 3: My view is that the whole thing should be completely

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Speaker 3: outsourced to interstate icas. But the territory is just too

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Speaker 3: small and too incestuous to be able to carry a

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Speaker 3: fully independent ICAC commission. And I think we're at that

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Speaker 3: point now, to the point Katie where a review was

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Speaker 3: initiated by the now Chief Minister, then Attorney General. A

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Speaker 3: reviewer was initiated into IQAQ over twelve months ago, and

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Speaker 3: no one's even seen that report. We've had a discussion

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Speaker 3: paper put out on parts of the report. But Freig

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Speaker 3: SHANAHANQ see he undertook a complete review of IQAQ and

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Speaker 3: the government's with holding that from the public, and.

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Speaker 1: My understanding was that they were going to make that public.

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Speaker 2: I was of that. I was certainly on that understanding.

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Speaker 3: Well, they should be making it public. And the question

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Speaker 3: rich has been put to the Chief Minister, now why

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Speaker 3: isn't it being made public? And you don't seem to

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Speaker 3: get a clear answer to that. So there's all sorts

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Speaker 3: of problems within IKAQ, including scandals. We heard last week

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Speaker 3: that a young woman who was employed as the executive

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Speaker 3: assistant for the IKAK Commissioner has been referred to the

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Speaker 3: police for alleged breach of confidentiality or something like that.

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Speaker 3: She's contravened something very serious in terms of the information

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Speaker 3: that's come to her. You know, the whole of this

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Speaker 3: office of Akak in the Northern Territory is in a

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Speaker 3: state of crisis from what I could glean from estimates yesterday,

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Speaker 3: and I think some serious decisions need to be made

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Speaker 3: about the future going for just looking at mister Richards,

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Speaker 3: I know he was sick, but he's only been in

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Speaker 3: the job a year and I have to wonder if

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Speaker 3: he really wondered it, really knew what he was walking

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Speaker 3: into when he took on this job.

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Speaker 1: So, Robin, do you think that the time has now come?

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Speaker 2: I mean, it's a it's a it's a pretty you know,

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Speaker 2: big call.

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Speaker 1: Do you think that the time has come for the

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Speaker 1: ika to be outsourced to another state completely?

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Speaker 3: And I think the model that you use is you

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Speaker 3: have a four or five year contract with say for example,

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Speaker 3: way then youw South Wales, then Queensland. You rotate it.

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Speaker 3: So at no point can can these sort of conflicts

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Speaker 3: of interest built up. You're you've got a strict contract.

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Speaker 3: They come in, they do the investigations. These days, you've

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Speaker 3: got you've got you know, telephones and zoom and all

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Speaker 3: sorts of mechanisms. They don't necessarily have to spend a

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Speaker 3: huge amount of time here. I think that that would

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Speaker 3: safeguard us from a lot of the problems that we've

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Speaker 3: seen in Ikak in such a short space of time.

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Speaker 3: But how we're doing it at the moment is clearly

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Speaker 3: clearly not working. And the sooner the Chief Minister recognizes

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Speaker 3: that and looks at a different model, the better.

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Speaker 2: Robin.

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Speaker 1: Let's move along, because I know that it was revealed,

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Speaker 1: as I understand it, by the Order to General that

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Speaker 1: they had referred the Home Improvement Scheme, the Northern Territory

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Speaker 1: Government's Home Improvement Scheme to the IKAK. Was there much

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Speaker 1: further insight provided in that space.

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Speaker 3: No, not particularly. I'm a member of the Public Accounts

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Speaker 3: Committee and the Order to General raise this with us

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Speaker 3: about a year ago, and it was made public that

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Speaker 3: it kind of slipped under the radar and it was

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Speaker 3: raised again yesterday in estimates. What she found through her

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Speaker 3: general auditing and analysis of the home improvement scheme was

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Speaker 3: widespread conflicts of interest and fraud within the home improvement scheme.

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Speaker 3: People just did the wrong thing intentionally or unintentionally. And

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Speaker 3: what she also found was that even the staff that

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Speaker 3: were employed to assess the applications the flood of applications

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Speaker 3: that came through often did not suitably or adequately declare

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Speaker 3: their conflicts of interest. So some of them or a

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Speaker 3: lot of them were processing applications for family and friends.

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Speaker 3: So the whole of the home improvement scheme was referred

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Speaker 3: to IKAX for investigation because the order to General Julie Chris,

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Speaker 3: who was an incredibly professional woman with the highest level

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Speaker 3: of integrity, just said she really just opened a can

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Speaker 3: of worms and the whole scheme was flawed from top

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Speaker 3: to bottom.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, right, So I mean looking at that and taking

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Speaker 1: that into accounts, I guess we don't know whether it

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Speaker 1: is something that the Eyekak is looking into or continuing

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Speaker 1: to look into. But Robin, do you think that they're

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Speaker 1: sort of at the very least some lessons learned. Should

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Speaker 1: we go through another process like that again, or what

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Speaker 1: do you think could happen in that space.

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Speaker 3: Well, the interesting thing about the Order to General is

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Speaker 3: she undertakes constant reviews and analysis analyzes of every part

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Speaker 3: of government, and she tables these incredible reports, I think

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Speaker 3: three a year, and they are so intense and thorough,

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Speaker 3: very heavy reading. But I don't the government is under

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Speaker 3: no obligation to do anything based on what she uncovers,

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Speaker 3: and to the point where they ignore a lot of

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Speaker 3: what she finds. There's no repercussions. She uncovered this home

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Speaker 3: improvement scheme scammed door of enormous magnitudes, and yet the

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Speaker 3: government has I don't recall ever spoken about it. Just

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Speaker 3: it just is ignored and pushed under the carpet. And

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Speaker 3: successive governments have done that. But you know that we've

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Speaker 3: had this labor government for the last six years, so

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Speaker 3: I can comfortably talk about that. But it's it's quite

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Speaker 3: unbelievable really that this woman and her very small team

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Speaker 3: of staff, only four people, uncover countless anomalies and inconsistencies

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Speaker 3: and examples of how the government has not delivered on

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Speaker 3: their promises or not spent money according to what, how

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Speaker 3: and when they said they would spend it and yet

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Speaker 3: there's no consequence.

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Speaker 2: Well, I'll tell you what.

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Speaker 1: She would certainly be well worth having a chat to.

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Speaker 1: I don't know how easy it is for me to

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Speaker 1: try and get her on, but I think she'd were

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Speaker 1: worth having a chat to, particularly about that home improvement scheme. Hey,

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Speaker 1: before I let you go, I know your press for time,

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Speaker 1: as are we. But the health portfolio was obviously looked

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Speaker 1: over yesterday as well, Robin. Any key bits of info

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Speaker 1: that you sort of uncovered yesterday.

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Speaker 3: A lot of talk about the cost of COVID and

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Speaker 3: the implications of interest to me. Fifty six people within

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Speaker 3: the Department of Health lost their jobs or were sacked

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Speaker 3: because they didn't comply with the vaccination mandate. There is

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Speaker 3: an enormous amount of money has been spent by Health

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Speaker 3: on overtime the hospital, particularly within the Alice Springs Hospital

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Speaker 3: and the Royal Darwin Hospital, twenty twelve million in overtime

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Speaker 3: in just the last nine months.

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Speaker 2: Wow.

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Speaker 3: That had an enormous amount of resignations within Health. I

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Speaker 3: think they said something like fourteen hundred staff of resign

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Speaker 3: over the last twelve months or thereabouts. It's incredibly hard

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Speaker 3: to do business in the Northern Territory as it is,

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Speaker 3: but when you're requiring professional people to come to the

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Speaker 3: Northern Territory in these strange and strained circumstances, it's obviously

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Speaker 3: very difficult and the impact on health is enormous. The

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Speaker 3: other thing that was disappointing is that people might remember

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Speaker 3: about eighteen months ago the government decided to centralize control

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Speaker 3: of health back to Tawin. They took away the local

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Speaker 3: health service boards health services and it's all centralized back

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Speaker 3: in Darwin, which of course I'm not particularly in favor of.

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Speaker 3: Coming from Alice Springs. It also came to light that

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Speaker 3: a number of critical positions in the Berkley have been

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Speaker 3: cut in part because of the centralization process. So that's

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Speaker 3: disappointing that the reasons not getting a fair deal when they.

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Speaker 2: Should absolutely well.

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Speaker 1: Robin, one last thing, I did hear you asking a

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Speaker 1: number of questions yesterday as well about staffing levels on

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Speaker 1: the fifth floor and how much money is spent on

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Speaker 1: communications and also social media staff.

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Speaker 2: Did you get any info?

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Speaker 3: No? OK, strangely enough, I didn't get any information. This

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Speaker 3: is something that people should know about sixteen million dollars

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Speaker 3: of our money, our public money, is spent on employing

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Speaker 3: staff on Level five of Parliament House, and the Chief

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Speaker 3: Minister was unable to tell me how many staff are

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Speaker 3: employed up there, what are the position titles and what

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Speaker 3: levels they're paid at. She fronted budget estimates and did

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Speaker 3: not have that information available to me. It's been put

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Speaker 3: on notice that that really says a lot about just

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Speaker 3: how much is hidden from the public. Now they are

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Speaker 3: they accounting for sixteen million dollars per year of territory

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Speaker 3: money being spent on Level five if did beg it

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Speaker 3: believe Really, I.

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Speaker 1: Think it's a fair enough question to ask and hopefully

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Speaker 1: they'll provide you some level of detail.

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Speaker 2: I mean, I think that people.

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Speaker 3: Should not holding my bread I.

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Speaker 1: Or Robin Lamley actually before I let you go, just

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Speaker 1: very quickly, I have had a couple of listeners who

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Speaker 1: live in the Fanny Bay electorate just raised with me

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Speaker 1: that apparently the former Chief Minister Michael Gunner has posted

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Speaker 1: on his Facebook that he's injured himself and that he's

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Speaker 1: going to have to have an operation in Queensland, and

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Speaker 1: just some of those people in the electorate asking what

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Speaker 1: period of time or what you know, how many weeks

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Speaker 1: of leave is a local member entitled to. I guess

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Speaker 1: what they're getting at is you know when's he coming back,

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Speaker 1: which you obviously won't know the answer to, but you're

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Speaker 1: able to give us a bit of info in terms

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Speaker 1: of that leave for MLAs.

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Speaker 3: You know, Katie, this is a really interesting question and

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Speaker 3: those people away to know that we as members of

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Speaker 3: Parliament don't get leave. We don't get any leave at all,

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Speaker 3: which means that we can either take none or take

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Speaker 3: as much as we want. Yeah.

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Speaker 2: Right, when he.

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Speaker 3: Declared a few months ago that he had taken eternity leave,

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Speaker 3: I thought, well, why would you even do that because

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Speaker 3: we don't need to account for where we go and

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Speaker 3: what we do. The assumption is you work when you work,

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Speaker 3: and if you go away, you go away. So in

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Speaker 3: answer to their question, he can be out of his

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Speaker 3: office for as long as he likes, but you know,

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Speaker 3: when voting comes around, just remember it.

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Speaker 2: There you go.

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Speaker 1: Well, that is really interesting because I think a lot

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Speaker 1: of people will be surprised by that, and look.

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Speaker 3: There will be no leave of any sort. No, and

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Speaker 3: on top of that, we don't get leave loading Yeah

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Speaker 3: you know.

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Speaker 2: Well, Robin Lanley, very interesting stuff. Always good to catch

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Speaker 2: up with you. Thanks, So much for your time this.

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Speaker 3: Morning, my pleasure, Katie.

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Speaker 1: Thank you.