Firey-face off erupts at the Alice Springs council meeting over councillor’s ‘low blow’
A war of words erupted over a councillors ‘low blow’ at the latest Alice Springs council meeting – with councillor asked to withdraw a comment made about the newly elected Mayor. Find out what happened.
One councillors umbrage with how the previous meeting minutes were recorded in Alice Springs has resulted in the new Mayor asking him to withdraw his comments, during a firey-face off at the latest council meeting.
Tuesday night’s Alice Springs Town Council ordinary meeting was business as usual, until former mayor-now councillor Damien Ryan did not vote when the previous meeting’s minutes were being moved.
Asked by Mayor Asta Hill if there were matters arising from the minutes, the former CLP Lingiari candidate told the meeting he didn’t believe they were an accurate recollection of the previous meeting as they were missing a key detail: “That councillor (Aia) Newport brought up the discussion about readjusting the history of the Americans who lived in Central Australia”.
At the last meeting in October, Ms Newport attempted to move a motion relating to the history blurb of the council’s latest annual report, specifically seeking to either include mention of “peace activists” coming to Alice Springs when Pine Gap opened, or to have the paragraph mentioning the outback spy base “removed entirely”.
This proposal fired up Mr Ryan and fellow councillor Darren Burton, who labelled the proposal “offensive”.
The roughly 10 minute discussion about the mention of the joint Australian and US defence facility in the annual report ended with council it was “the final historic document of the former council,” Ms Hill said.
She also added the newly sworn in council should make “a commitment to one another to have some important and at times difficult conversations about how we talk about our town’s history in our future meetings”.
At the latest meeting on Tuesday, Mr Ryan raised how the meeting minutes only recorded that “general discussion ensued around the content of the ‘Our History’ page included in the document”.
Ms Hill defended that it was recorded accurately.
“This was a general discussion in relation to an annual report where there was no action taken at the end of it” she said.
In response, Mr Ryan tersely fired back he now “understands” where the Greens-aligned Mayor stands: “You don’t support the Americans in our town”.
Ms Hill asked him to withdraw the comments, calling them a “complete misrepresentation of what I have just said” – to which Mr Ryan fired back: “No, but you won’t take up issue that councillor Newport named the Americans”.
“So I’ll take away the other point but I’ll make it very clear now, that was a very low blow from a new councillor about trying to rewrite our history,” he said.
Ms Newport made her election pitch outside the Pine Gap restricted zone earlier this year, telling those gathered she “can’t wait to work with you all to explore how we can make councils as progressive and revolutionary as possible”.
They also proposed to audit the Alice Springs Town Council for any ties to Israel or “the military industrial complex” as well as proposing to ban Pine Gap from being involved in council run events.
So far, neither of the proposals have been put to an open council meeting since Mx Newport was elected.
More Coverage
Originally published as Firey-face off erupts at the Alice Springs council meeting over councillor’s ‘low blow’
Bail bid for man accused of NT nurse’s overdose murder
