00:00Valentine's Day in Darwin, but no love lost between police and the Territory Government
00:08over a perceived broken promise.
00:10There was immediate angst between our membership.
00:12We were contacted by, I'd hate to say, probably in excess of about 50 members.
00:17The Government's pre-election pledge to give cash retention bonuses to police, described
00:23yesterday as just a proposal.
00:25We put out a proposal prior to the election around some amounts of pay for per years of
00:31service remembering that this attrition, this bonus is designed to keep people in the force
00:36for longer.
00:37And so many drafts have been talked about.
00:40Labor quick to leap on the back pedal.
00:43Our police and their families deserve better here in the Northern Territory and they should
00:48be backed in by the Government.
00:50Behind the scenes, the police union says bonuses for police who'd worked for 20 years
00:56were set to be cut from a promised $20,000 down to $5,000.
01:01Telling its members in a statement last night, this will divide the membership and fail to
01:06recognise long-standing officers who have dedicated their careers to the police force
01:11and serving the NT community.
01:14We were concerned for our entire membership to make sure that the respect for them is
01:19there and to make sure that our hard working and dedicated frontline police officers are
01:23maintained and their election commitments, their election commitments paid by that party.
01:27The CLP denied it was walking back its promise and was deep in negotiations with the union
01:32for most of Friday, before re-promising they would stick to the original pledge.
01:38Police bonuses not the only public service pay packets on the Government's radar today,
01:43with the CLP locking in an annual 3% pay rise for all public sector workers.
01:49We've got great people, we've got a lot of public servants and we want to make sure that
01:53they know that their jobs are secure and that there will be no job cuts.
01:58A Government staring down billions of dollars debt, but spending millions more to try to
02:03keep people in the Territory.
Comments