Boss of muggy, croc-infested Northern Territory sledges SA weather

In a fresh border stoush, the leader of the weird, muggy, croc-infested NT has taken a dig at SA’s climate, a day after the Victorian Premier also took a swipe at the best state in Australia.

South Australia has copped a swipe from its northern neighbour just a day after the Victorian premier took aim at the state.

“Don’t go down south and freeze your arse off,” Northern Territory Chief Minister Michael Gunner urged Territorians today as he announced the NT’s borders would reopen on July 17.

The good-natured dig comes as states battle for tourism dollars to help revive their economies after COVID-19.

About $65 billion in tourism dollars are potentially up for grabs that Australians would normally spend on overseas travel.

Mr Gunner urged Territorians to “do the right thing” and help out the NT’s tourism operators by holidaying at home.

Premier Steven Marshall has sent the same message to South Australians, saying it could inject about $2 billion back into the local economy.

It comes after Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews copped a backlash yesterday for saying: “I don’t want to be offensive to South Australians but why would you want to go there?”

He was responding to a question about SA lifting its quarantine restrictions for Tasmania, the NT and Western Australia, but not the east coast states.

“Holiday here … go skiing, go to the wine country, go to the beach, whatever it might be,” he said.

“Don’t get too stressed they won’t let you into Adelaide, why would you want to stay there?”

Port Adelaide’s general manager of football, Chris Davies, also weighed into the cross-border rivalry on Thursday, saying it seemed Andrews had uncovered himself as “the best spinner to come out of Victoria since Shane Warne”.

“It’s always when someone starts what they’re saying with: ‘I don’t mean to be offensive, but…’ you know that what’s coming is most likely going to be offensive.

“I am a proud South Australian.

“I spoke to some people in Victoria yesterday who suggested to me that Daniel (Andrews) might be the best spinner to come out of Victoria since Shane Warne, minus the 700 Test wickets and the 300 one-day international wickets to his name.

“Maybe he’s got some things on his plate at the moment that he should worry about rather than potting South Australians and clearly last weekend, with what our government was able to do getting in 2000 people into the Adelaide Oval was a fantastic thing and let’s hope footy can continue to bring people back through the turnstiles and Victoria’s got to carry its weight at some point too.”

Meanwhile, Victorian-born captain of the Adelaide Football Club, Rory Sloane, said he had now lived in SA for more than a decade and was happy to call the place home.

“I heard the premier of Victoria give it a whack...I’ll put some footage up later of spots I’ve travelled to,” Sloane told Triple M radio.

“People can see why South Australia is such a great place.

“I love it here, I love the footy club, I love the fans, I love the town itself.”