Former chief minister Terry Mills set to establish new NT political party

FORMER chief minister Terry Mills wants to start a new political party, saying the current system is flawed and fails Territorians

Terry Mills wants to change the way politics works, saying the current system does nothing to help citizens. He believes a new political party for the Territory is what we need

FORMER chief minister Terry Mills wants to start a new political party, saying the current system is flawed and fails Territorians.

But he won’t have his old ally, independent Member for Araluen Robyn Lambley on his team this time around.

Ms Lambley, who served as Mr Mills’ deputy chief minister when the pair was in power with the Country Liberal Party, said she wasn’t tempted to join the new outfit, tentatively named the Territory Alliance.

“The Labor Government has failed Territorians and while a new minor party may get voter support I am happy to remain an independent,” Ms Lambley said.

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Mr Mills, as revealed on ntnews.com.au on Monday, hopes his new party will “change the paradigm” of party politics. The Member for Blain said the major parties had become obsessed with winning government at the expense of good governance.

His new conservative-leaning party would seek to give disaffected voters an “alternative approach”. “I want to change the paradigm so politics is no longer a spectator sport,” Mr Mills said.

Independent MLAs Terry Mills, Robyn Lambley and Yingiya (Mark) Guyula at Parliament House earlier this year. Picture: Justin Kennedy

He said the Territory Alliance would be guided by regular meetings with “authentic” community groups.

He acknowledged that might be difficult where interests were in direct conflict but said leaders should be expected to try. Mr Mills said he expected to encounter some criticism for establishing a new political party as a reaction against the party system but that the only way to fix those flaws was from within.

“The political parties have written the rule book so we have to actually enter that same arena in order to change the way things operate,” he said. The new party would lean centre-right but would not be guided by ideology, he said.

Twenty years in politics gave him a “fair sense of what people want”, he said.

Terry Mills with Robyn Lambley when they were elected in 2012

“They want personal responsibility, they want increased freedoms and they want the actual problems dealt with. But I would not be foisting those views on people, I would be seeking their support and carrying their views.”

Mr Mills was chief minister for seven months before he was rolled by his then-CLP colleague Adam Giles in 2013.

He re-entered parliament in 2016 as an independent and has flirted with a number of political parties since.

Last October, he announced his intention to establish a North Australia party alongside Ms Lambley.

The pair later confirmed they were in talks to establish a branch of the Nationals in the NT. When that was kiboshed by the Nationals’ federal leadership, Mr Mills, Ms Lambley and Nhulunbuy independent Yingiya Guyula in February formed an alliance of independents and mounted an unsuccessful bid to seize opposition from the CLP.

Mr Mills is yet to begin the process of registering the political party and said he first wants to hear the community.