Jacques Chester for Solomon

I realise I’ve got things a bit backwards, posting a Day 19 remark and then following up with a Day 18 report. I’m sure you’ll all forgive me.

Last night I was at a candidate forum organised by the Women’s Network NT (in particular Susan Penfold), a networking and social group for NT women. The Forum supplied 5 questions they wanted candidates to look at with a request that we answer at least three. The topics were childcare, industrial relations, nuclear power, the intervention and statehood for the NT.

The speaking order was drawn at random — I drew 5 of 5.

First was Deborah Hudson from the Greens. She spoke mostly about childcare and was focused on women’s issues. Speaking to some of my supporters later on, they noted that she was smart to pitch her policy focus to the audience. Curiously enough for a Green, she didn’t say anything substantial about environment. There was a bit of making the sign of the cross in the direction of nuclear power, but that was about it.

Next up was Damien Hale, standing for the ALP. He put in a textbook performance. There was some chat about his history, a few “as a Territorians” and “as a fathers” sprinkled in early on to give him some emphathy with the audience. His speech was well paced, smooth and relaxed with a good dose of anecdotes and jokes. He had a wealth of figures and was clearly well briefed and well prepared. Whoever the ALP have given him for management and speechwriting are excellent.

Third was Trudy Campbell from the CEC. Before she began to speak the ABC turned off their camera, which I thought was a bit rude. They could at least pretend to give a damn. Actually I have been extremely unimpressed by the “professionalism” of ABC journalists so far, compared to journalists in the private sector.

Trudy struggled mightily to be heard, but to the ears of most folk the policies of the CEC sounds bananas. Towards the end people in the audience were giggling. I think her policies are horribly confused and dangerous, but at least she had the guts to stand up for them.

Fourth came David Tollner, for whom the ABC bestowed the blessing of filming. Unfortunately it was not his best performance. Just a few days ago Paul Cowdy, who was at one time David’s speechwriter, passed away. It showed in David’s performance, which was bland by anyone’s standard, a real “Straight off the Fax” speech. It had few figures or forward looking policy remarks and was mostly composed of who-do-you-trust and future-of-our-kids fluff.

He also focused on attacking Clare Martin. This seems to be the strategy that David will take and it’s not without precedent. The problem for David is that most voters know the difference between Federal and NT politics. It will probably come across as desperation, and people tend to dump on the desperate.

I should probably mention that during the speeches I drew up a little bingo card of catchphrases. A horribly disrespectful thing to do, but it gave me an incentive to listen to what the others were saying. Late in David’s speech I got a “bingo”.

Then it was my turn. This was the cue for the ABC to nick off. I was put out at the time but in retrospect it worked well. In speaking to journalists you can bang away for 10 minutes, and for 9 minutes 55 seconds be flawlessly on-message. Then you forget something, get a number wrong or swear and that’s all they show on the telly. As it turned out my speech was very much a diamond in the rough.

Before I arrived I had sketched out some notes on what I wanted to talk about. In particular I planned to discuss statehood and how it tied closely together with both the intervention and the nuclear waste storage issues. I had about a page of notes, enough to spin out to 10 or 12 minutes if I took my time.

However, as often happens when I am nervous, I spoke fast. Much too fast. I raced through my topics in probably 5-7 minutes. At which point I looked down at my notes, saw the admonition “TAKE YOUR TIME, SPEAK SLOWLY” and read it out to the audience. That broke the ice and people lightened up and allowed me to relax a bit, so that I could address my points more from the heart; rather than a “shopping list” approach.

Mostly I expanded on statehood, since that was what the audience reacted best to. I even got heckled by some of the people from the Your Rights At Work rentacrowd. My point was that the NT should be a state and have equal representation in the Senate — 12 senators or bust. In the course of talking about why I explained how the status quo suits the major parties just fine, and that there will always be one CLP and one ALP senator returned from the NT.

That was my first heckling. “That’s not true”, somebody interjected. I turned it back on her: could she think of a counter-example? She couldn’t. “The Territory’s population doesn’t justify 12 senators”, came the next interjection. I pointed out that representation on a per-capita basis happens in the House of Representatives; the Senate is meant to equalise the states. “But Tasmania doesn’t have 12 senators”, she followed. Which I was happy to correct, with the added observation that Tassie had a comparable population to the NT’s when it joined up at Federation.

After that the interjections stopped. I spoke about my love of Darwin and how I felt about statehood. The audience got quite energised and when they applauded I seized the moment. “They say you should quit while you’re ahead”, I said. “So I will”. And I did.

Afterwards lots of people said nice things about the speech, and reflecting on it later I guess what worked best is that I was not a super-polished speaker reciting a laundry list of spending promises. I spoke frankly about the nuclear fuel cycle, bluntly about what I saw as the causes of the intervention and from the heart about the need for statehood. It was great to get that feedback and to see that people are still passionate about real and local representation. I hope the word spreads before election day.