Lambley calls for heads to roll after latest blackout in Alice

Heads should be rolling at the Board of Territory Generation after the third blackout in Central Australia in less than two months, with Independent Member for Araluen, Robyn Lambley, calling for their immediate sacking.

“These blackouts are affecting the health and wellbeing of residents and it needs to be fixed,” Member for Araluen, Robyn Lambley (pictured), said. Photo: EMMA MURRAY

Heads should be rolling at the Board of Territory Generation after the third blackout in Central Australia in less than two months, with Independent Member for Araluen, Robyn Lambley, calling for their immediate sacking.

Ms Lambley accused Territory Generation, the primary electricity generator in the Northern Territory, of failing their customers in Central Australia after the region was hit with a 45 minute power outage in 41 degree heat mid last week.

Power was also interrupted across town on Saturday afternoon.

“The management of Territory Generation are failing to provide a reliable source of electricity for Alice Springs and should be sacked,” Ms Lambley said.

“Two years ago – December, 2017 – the Share Holding Minister for Territory Generation, Nicole Manison, sacked the Board of Territory Generation for blowing their budget by $20 million. She put old Labor apparatchik onto the very well-paid board, placing Dennis Bree as Chair, a former senior Labor Political Adviser.”

“The Territory Generation budget has continued to blow out and power supply to Central Australia has never been more unreliable.”

Ms Lambley described a nine hour blackout that occurred in the region in October of this year as “horrendous,” with many businesses forced to close and communities as far as Haasts Bluff affected.

“These blackouts are affecting the health and wellbeing of residents and it needs to be fixed,” Ms Lambley said.

“Alice Springs people have had a gut full of this incompetence and degradation of their lifestyle. Minister Manison, Treasurer and Deputy Chief Minister, must sack the Territory Generation board and appoint real experts who are actually capable of managing and providing electricity to Territorians.”

Minister for Renewables, Energy and Essential Services, Dale Wakefield, represented the Territory at the Council of Australian Governments Energy Council in Perth on Friday, discussing both solar and hydrogen energy reforms and the creation of the Office of Sustainable Energy.

“The office is already working on electricity market reforms, developing strategies for advancing the Territory’s target of 50 per cent renewables by 2030, and seizing opportunities for the creation of cheap, reliable, and clean energy,” a statement from the Minister’s office said.