Statehood and regionalisation


An issue I feel passionate about is Statehood and the possibility of designing a modern constitution for a new State. Constitutional law was an interest during law school. The potential we have during this important time in history is, in my view, often overlooked, and to our detriment. With such a complex issue many Territorians are asking questions. In one sense there is simply too much information – many questions cannot be answered because we aren’t in a point of time in our history to provide an answer. What can follow is uncertainty masked as confusion. Whilst this happens there is the chance for leadership and for those showing leadership to coalesce around some core principles that define us.

Dave Richards from Alice Online kindly posted this piece about Statehood and regionalisation – a speech I recently delivered to the LGANT general meeting. The Alice Springs News printed a modified version. The NT News (online copy unavailable) printed a modified version over two pages in the most recent Saturday edition.

This direction builds on a previous motion passed by Council, posted here. There are many constitutional models for devolving infrastructure decisions closer to the regions, to the bottom-up, and many constitutional models for the distribution of infrastructure resources equitably across the regions – our call is to enshrine these principles in the new constitution and discuss various models in the convention that will decide a new constitution. More to come on this topic.

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