Territory Alliance backflips and pledges to ban fracking if elected

TERRITORY Alliance leader Terry Mills has backflipped his position on fracking, pledging that his party would now ban fracking in the Northern Territory if elected in August

Territory Alliance leader Terry Mills has backflipped his position on fracking, pledging that his party would now ban fracking in the Northern Territory if elected in August. Picture: Glenn Campbell

TERRITORY Alliance leader Terry Mills has backflipped his position on fracking, pledging that his party would now ban fracking in the Northern Territory if elected in August.

Mr Mills released the Territory Alliance’s Fracking in the NT policy position paper this morning after he was blocked from tabling the report in parliament.

“Under Territory Alliance there will be no more fracking in the Northern Territory,” the report says.

“Existing exploration licences will not be renewed, and no more production permits will be issued.”

This is a backflip from what Mr Mills said in January this year, when he said Territory Alliance would back fracking in the NT for the foreseeable future.

In a column written for the Sunday Territorian on January 26, Mr Mills had said he supported fracking for the “medium-term”.

“To do otherwise would send a message of uncertainty and governmental incompetence to all businesses right at the time when the NT is most in need of additional business investment,” he said.

Mr Mills also previously said he thought the risks associated with fracking were “not as dire as some portray” and could be managed to an acceptable level, in a Facebook post from 2018.

But today the Territory Alliance leader said his party was now opposed fracking due to “widespread community concern and the unviable economic case of the controversial practice”.

It comes as new polling from Lock the Gate shows 86 per cent of the residents they surveyed opposed fracking.

“There is no social licence for fracking in the Northern Territory, with very real environmental concerns about its impact upon groundwater supplies and an oversupplied international gas market,” he said.

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“With continuing environmental concerns, unviable economics and sustained community

concerns about fracking, under a Territory Alliance Government no more production permits

will be issued, existing exploration licences will not be renewed and current operations subject

to tough community and environmental safeguards.

“Territory Alliance will undertake urgent regulatory reform to ensure there is independent

oversight of existing operations and that the decommissioning and rehabilitation of wells meets the highest standard.”

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Chief Minister Michael Gunner said he stood by his government’s position on fracking.