By ERWIN CHLANDA
You’re a journalist in Alice Springs and you get a media handout from the Chief Minister, Eva Lawler (pictured), the supposed paragon of transparent government.
The release doesn’t provide a phone number. You can get a list of minders but there is a brisk turnover of spin doctors and updated lists are not automatically provided.
A further irritation is that if you send questions to a minder who has been replaced, instead the message – which is usually urgent – being forwarded to the current minder you get it flicked back and told it has to be sent to such and such.
These are tricks to make the system of getting information the public deserves to know in a democracy slow and irritating, no doubt in the hope of the journalist giving up asking. For example:
The Chief Minister, in her handout, invites you to reply:
You do, to the address given newsroom@nt.gov.au:
But then you get this:
That’s what it says:
It’s the same with the handouts from most Ministers.