NT Chief Minister backs Police Minister Brent Potter over ‘dickhead’ social media posts

Brent Potter is an ‘idiot’, and it’s ‘really difficult’ to know if I would’ve picked him as a Labor candidate, Chief Minister admits amid defence of her Cabinet minister.

Chief Minister Eva Lawler has prevaricated on whether she would have hired Brent Potter had she known about his social media activity, after revealing she first learned about her Police Minister’s damaging posts last week.

Natasha Fyles was in the top job in 2022 when she hand-picked Mr Potter to run for Fannie Bay.

He said his Facebook activity, which included sharing links to anti-Labor, racist, homophobic and sexist content, was discussed with Ms Fyles at the time and deleted ahead of his preselection.

Now deleted social media posts from NT Police Minister Brent Potter included links to derogatory content.

On Monday Ms Lawler said it was “difficult” to know whether she would have endorsed Mr Potter had she been Chief at the time.

“That’s a really difficult one,” she said, facing the media for the first time since the scandal broke mid-last week.

“You can’t condemn somebody for the rest of their life to something that was done 10 years ago, all of us need to be able to get a fresh start.

“He’s proven himself to be a really good local member.

“The people of Fannie Bay will be able to make the decision on whether they agree with that, so it is about moving forward with Brent Potter.”

New Chief Minister Eva Lawler says ‘it is about moving forward with Brent Potter’ when asked if she would’ve support his Labor preselection had she known about his social media posts. Picture: Pema Tamang Pakhrin

Ms Lawler repeated her assessment that Mr Potter was “an idiot”, but that she believed he had “absolutely” changed since the posts were shared between 2013 and 2019.

“His personal life has changed considerably … Brent has been embarrassed by this and he has given an undertaking to me that he has not since August 2022 reposted things such as this,” she said.

Mark Turner wrote an open letter to the Chief Minister over her handling of the scandal. Picture Glenn Campbell

On Thursday former cop and Labor-turned-Independent MLA Mark Turner wrote an open letter to the Chief Minister criticising what he said was a double standard in disciplinary action taken against police and public servants.

He called for a review of past actions taken “for actions deemed less heinous” than Mr Potter’s, highlighting the case of former Sergeant Mark Casey who was stood down after penning an open letter criticising the commissioner’s handling of Zach Rolfe’s case.

Mr Turner called for disciplinary records in such cases to be expunged “to avoid the perception of hypocrisy and to maintain the integrity of our public institutions”.

Apologising for the “dickhead” posts last week, Mr Potter said his 15 years serving in the Defence force contributed to his “narrow view” of the world.

“There is no place within Defence for behaviour or content that is inconsistent with Defence values,” a Defence spokeswoman said.

“Personnel who use social media in the personal capacity, do so knowing that they are bound to do so in accordance with Defence’s values and policies.”

The ADF in 2019 introduced a social media policy which extends to member’s personal accounts.