NT government's populist agenda sparks concern
For 18 months, environment, First Nations, justice and family groups have been sounding the alarm with increasing urgency over the populist 'tough on crime' agenda of the Country Liberal party (CLP) led by Lia Finocchiaro, which swept to power in 2024. Those representing the territory's most vulnerable people, communities and ecosystems are worried.
Kirsty Howey, executive director of the Environment Centre NT, says: 'It feels like Australia’s first, and hopefully only, mini Trump-style experiment.' Her organisation is on the frontline of community opposition to a gas industry expansion of fracking across the Top End.
Child protection and climate plan under fire
Two moments this month underscore the change. First, submissions to a proposed update of the territory’s child protection laws revealed overwhelming opposition from experts, including the children’s commissioner, Shahleena Musk, who said she was given just a week to look at the draft laws. Second, the government released its Climate Resilience Plan that listed, as its first option, fracking the Beetaloo basin.
According to the Arid Lands Environment Centre, this demonstrated the 'extent of dystopian state capture' and government decision-making in favour of the gas industry. Hannah Ekin, the centre’s fracking campaign coordinator, says: 'It’s pretty devastating. I couldn’t believe seeing the accelerating of a new gas development as the number one priority in the Climate Resilience Plan.'
Child protection changes risk cultural harm
Warnings against proposed changes to the NT’s child protection laws, which include removing the decades-old protection of the Aboriginal child placement principle, were stark. In a submission, Musk said she was given 'only one week' to provide comprehensive advice. Opposition spokesperson for child protection, Chansey Paech, described the amendments as 'driven by ideology'.
'The CLP government has brought in a series of laws that I would say are absolutely directed at using the law as a way of taking control over Aboriginal families instead of investing in services that actually keep them safe,' says Paech, an Arrente, Arabana and Gurindji man.
'Slash and burn' approach to environment
The Top End experienced five overlapping natural disasters over the most recent wet season, including major floods that displaced some Aboriginal communities on the Daly River for months. But Howey says the response has been to 'double down on fossil fuels and dump environment and climate protections altogether'.
Since coming to power 22 months ago, the Finocchiaro government has scrapped the NT’s renewable energy target of 50% by 2030, abandoned a promise to implement an emissions reduction target of 43% by 2030, and scrapped the merits review process that allowed communities to challenge decisions related to petroleum projects and water licences. A policy requiring certain large emitters to develop greenhouse gas abatement plans was also scrapped.
Fast-tracking developments over community input
In 2025, Finocchiaro appointed Stuart Knowles, former NT general manager of Japanese gas giant Inpex, as territory coordinator, a powerful new position with authority to override 32 territory laws to fast-track developments of 'economic significance'. Then came the Climate Resilience Plan that listed accelerating 'the production of low emissions energy, including from the Beetaloo Subbasin' as its first action.
Ekin says the territory already had very weak climate and environment protections, but the change in government has seen 'a real slash and burn approach to the environment' with the CLP showing 'very little interest in any kind of regulatory safeguards or community participation'.
Anti-democratic and populist policies
Howey describes the Finocchiaro government’s approach as 'anti-democratic' and 'a constant stream of populist policies that have disproportionately affected First Nations communities but also have profited big business including gas companies'. She says the territory has previously been a 'vanguard jurisdiction' for different types of policy – some very punitive, such as the NT intervention in 2007, but others positive, such as land rights.
'It feels like with the state of Australia’s political trajectory and the rise of One Nation, the NT may be ahead of the curve sadly,' she says. 'Australia should be looking very closely at the anti-democratic, racist, climate change denying policies that have been implemented by the Northern Territory government to understand what’s happening here, but also as a harbinger of what could be rolled out elsewhere.'
Justice system changes 'tried and failed before'
The CLP government has shown 'a consistent pattern of not engaging' with Aboriginal organisations when introducing reforms that disproportionately affect First Nations people, says Ben Grimes, chief executive of the North Australian Aboriginal Justice Agency (Naaja). One of the first changes was to lower the age of criminal responsibility back to 10 years old, two years after it had been raised to 12. The government has also strengthened bail laws and introduced boot camps for young people on bail and armed public transport officers in Darwin.
'Naaja was not consulted before changes to child protection legislation, bail laws or housing legislation were introduced, despite each directly affecting thousands of Aboriginal Territorians that Naaja represents,' Grimes says. He says the government has focused on 'tough on crime' approaches that have 'been tried and failed before'. People are spending longer on remand due to court backlogs and cuts to legal aid mean courts are bracing for 'a wave of cases adjourned indefinitely or permanently stayed as a result of lack of legal representation'.
Land councils push back on sacred sites changes
Aboriginal land councils have also pushed back on policies they say wind back their rights to be involved in decision-making. In March 2025, land councils accused the NT government of 'treating them like children' in a 'tick-a-box' meeting on reforms to the Sacred Sites Act. Changes to the act, which passed last year, allow new developers to be added to decades-old authority certificates that set conditions for sacred sites, even where the proposed development differs vastly from that intended by the original certificate – effectively bypassing further consultation with traditional custodians. The first use of the new laws was for a proposed high-rise waterfront hotel in Darwin, which the Singapore-based developer has since scrapped.
Ekin says her overwhelming impression is that the territory government just 'bulldoze through, they don’t respect evidence and don’t care what communities think'. 'We are a small and often forgotten jurisdiction and life is only going to get harder here, particularly for First Nations people,' she says.
