Northern Territory alcohol bans stir emotions in federal parliament
Jacinta Price is among the senators to have delivered emotional speeches in parliament about the Alice Springs crisis.
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Coalition senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price has cried in parliament after introducing legislation to impose further alcohol restrictions in the Northern Territory.
Her private member’s Bill would allow for greater federal oversight of grog bans in the NT, akin to the powers granted to the commonwealth by the now expired Howard-era intervention laws.
Senator Price told the upper house about her family members whom she said had suffered and in some cases died because of alcohol abuse in her home town of Alice Springs.
The Country Liberal Party senator cried as she recalled having to identify her cousin’s body in a morgue after she was killed in a car accident caused by a drunk person.
“We are hurting and it is disingenuous to provide ad-hoc approaches and not take full responsibility for the sake of every Territorian,” she said on Wednesday.
“The Australian government has a responsibility to ensure that the NT has consistency in law and order.”
As it stands, the NT government will be responsible for legislating new alcohol bans for some remote communities in a bid to address an increase in alcohol-related harm in Central Australia.
Any dry zone communities wanting to opt out of the bans will need to develop their own community alcohol plans and have 60 per cent or more of local residents vote in support of them.
Senator Price has said the plans do not go far enough. Her Bill would require alcohol management plans to be approved by the “relevant” federal minister.
The Albanese government will also provide $250m in extra funding for a range of initiatives in the region, including in employment, health and youth engagement programs.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced the measures earlier this week after flying to Alice Springs in the wake of media coverage of a marked increase in alcohol-fuelled violence and crime in the outback town.
The grog bans imposed in 2007 under the Howard government’s Stronger Futures legislation lapsed when the laws expired in July last year, meaning previously dry communities and town camps were permitted to bring alcohol home.
NT Chief Minister Natasha Fyles has been reluctant to reintroduce alcohol bans and called them a “race-based” policy.
Ms Fyles reportedly wrote to Senator Price on Tuesday to raise concerns she hadn’t consulted with the Territory Labor government or the community when preparing her NT Safe Measures Bill.
Senator Price, who has been an outspoken advocate for the reintroduction of alcohol bans, disputed this on Wednesday.
She said she had written to Ms Fyles in October to outline her proposal and had consulted widely with stakeholders and residents across the NT.
Other Indigenous senators delivered emotional speeches in the upper house in response to the introduction of Senator Price’s legislation.
Dorinda Cox, a Greens senator for Western Australia, said intervention had been proved not to work and Indigenous people were “self-medicating” with alcohol to deal with trauma.
“It’s about coping, which many First Nations people have turned to because they in fact had no other option,” she said.
“They either live remotely, (with) no services or lack of services that are available to them. And it’s very long wait lists even then.”
Labor senator Malarndirri McCarthy said she had urged the Territory government in August last year to introduce its own legislation to ensure alcohol bans were in place following the sunsetting of the Stronger Futures laws.
She said the past few months had been a “traumatic time for the people of Alice Springs”, but the issues there were “not just about alcohol” and would require investment in health and education to address.
“As senator for the Northern Territory, there is a better way here and we are doing the best that we can with that way,” she said.
“And I know you’ll keep me accountable if that way does not work.”
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Originally published as Northern Territory alcohol bans stir emotions in federal parliament
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