Australian Politics and Policy - Senior, 2019a

Australian Politics and Policy
Thissituation,however,isfluid.TheNT’sRights of the Terminally Ill Act 1995
(NT) (ROTI), passed by the Legislative Assembly in May 1995, was overturned by
the federal parliament’s Euthanasia Laws Act 1997 (Cth), 14 which amended the Self-
Government Act by inserting section 51A to prohibit laws in relation to voluntary
euthanasia.ROTIhasneverbeenrepealedbytheLegislativeAssemblyandremains
an impotent instrument in the statutes of the NT. Statehood was first mooted for the
NT during the 1975 federal election, but this amendment to the Self-Government
Act resulted in a grievance to the Australian parliament and an invigorated debate
about the NT’s inequality within the federation.
Similarly, the federal parliament’s Northern Territory National Emergency
Response Act 2007 (Cth) (the Intervention) allowed for a federal ‘invasion’ of the
NT and the suspension of some NT and federal laws. The $587 million emergency
response followed publicity arising from the Little children are sacred report,
commissioned by Chief Minister Clare Martin in 2006, and was an initiative of
the Howard government in the lead-up to the 2007 election, at which it was
defeated. The Intervention suspended federal laws in relation to discrimination,
social security, taxation and Aboriginal land, and NT laws in relation to alcohol
and pornography, removed customary law and cultural practice considerations
from bail applications and sentencing in criminal trials, and introduced mandatory
health checks for children. Directed at Aboriginal communities, the haste with
which it was introduced allowed ‘little time for consultation with Indigenous
communities’ and it included ‘army troops being deployed to Indigenous
communities in the Northern Territory’. 15
Neither action could happen in a state because state constitutions provide
entrenched powers and legislative independence from the federal government. The
NT is without a constitution; in its absence, the Self-Government Act is effectively
the constitution.
Financial arrangements and economy
The NT has been funded as a state by the federal government since 1988. 16 Funding
arrangements apply:
on the principle of ‘horizontal fiscal equalisation’ meaning that funding is provided
on the basis of what it costs to deliver a service per person in the NT. Distance
is factored in to the Commonwealth’s formula, often to the chagrin of the more
populous states. 17
14 Also known as ‘the Andrews Bill’ because it was sponsored by the Member for Menzies
(Victoria) Kevin Andrews MHR.
15 Castan Centre, Monash University n.d.
16 Smith 2013, 25.
17 Smith 2013, 93.
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