Don Farrell (SA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

You laugh, Senator, but we are making progress up there, and we are making it in a way that involves the Northern Territory government and the people of the Northern Territory. That was the very thing you failed to do with this issue. You waited and you waited until the very end of your government to do anything about this issue. It is just like the way you treated the Murray River: you waited and you waited. Your program looks more like a script of The Hollowmen than a serious attempt to deal with the issues of the Northern Territory. But the federal Labor Party and the re-elected Henderson government in the Northern Territory are going to fix this problem.

We are going to go there. We have started the process, and the process involves conciliation, discussion and consultation with the people of the Northern Territory. This is where the previous government made their mistake. They did not consult with the people of the Northern Territory. This bill will fix that problem. We are going to solve the mistakes that the previous government made in relation to this issue.