Enderby's Tape-A 'Q'

For Grief On Norfolk

Norfolk Island’s new boss, Aust ralian Minister for Capital Territory Keppel Enderby, spent two days on the island and after returning to Canberra, taped a message of thanks for the “marvellous hospitality ex tended to my wife and I” and had it played several times over the is land’s radio station.

Many of the islanders wished he’d stayed at home and off the tape.

His chummy message, they fear, was the sugar coating around a pill designed to regurgitate the question of the animal quarantine station which Australia wants to establish on Norfolk, The island was split down the middle over the station. The Norfolk Island Council supported it, and, as a referendum proved, the people didn’t. (Dec PIM, p 121). But it looks, reading between the lines of Mr Enderby’s tape, as if an attempt will be made to resurrect the whole thing and refer it back to the council.

Applying the thick coating of sugar, Mr Enderby said, “In the broad sense community involvement of decision making can only be for the good but—let me strike a warning—wider involvement should not be allowed to mean the breaking down of effective decision-making. A strong, coherent and representative Norfolk Island Council is, of course, basically es sential, It needs to remain clearly at the apex of the process, whatever the other avenue for public debate and discussion, before decisions are finally made.

“But, to put it bluntly, I think that the Referendums Ordinance in its pre sent form is a constant threat to the authority and effective operation of the council. . . From the conversations I had with many people on Norfolk Island, the case of the proposed quarantine station seemed to exem plify some of the problems I am thinking about. The Australian Government’s proposal was strongly supported by the council. It was nar rowly defeated in a referendum and now it would seem that the general feeling has swung back to one of support for the proposition and yet, because of the referendum law, the issue cannot be opened at this time through the Norfolk Island Council.

“Whether it can be re-opened through an initiative from Canberra is something that has to be thought about but at the moment, and at the same time, I am also having

a close look at the operation of the Referendum Ordinance. Whatever eventuates I will, of course, want to have the fullest consultation with the elected representatives of the people of Norfolk Island.”

Opponents of the quarantine station can be forgiven for suspecting that that is something more than the thin end of the wedge. One corre spondent in the local newspaper, The Norfolk Islander, signing him self A. H. Giuseppi, described Mr Enderby’s comments as “irresponsible” and attacked his statement that the majority in the referendum opposing the station was “only small”.

“The actual figures”, he wrote, “were 452 against and 384 for —an actual majority against of 68; to win the referendum those for the station needed 10 per cent more than those against and 10 per cent of 452 is 45. So the votes actually required to win the referendum were 497 compared with 384. Does Mr Enderby seriously think that a failure by 113 votes or over 22 per cent is only a small number? I feel sure his party won the last Australian election by an even smaller majority.”

Mr Giuseppi also pointed out, anent the minister’s comments on the role of the referendum, that it has only been used twice in nine years.

Another correspondent, W. N.

Selby Newbald, wrote, “ ‘Let me strike a warning’ is the significant remark in our first tape-lesson we have re ceived from our wished-upon-us schoolmaster in Canberra. Apart from seeking a way with the aid of our council to remove the last traditional land rights of Norfolk Islanders it is clear our ‘so called’ representatives are hand-in-glove with Canberra’s to make this island Australia’s ‘Q’ station our ‘representatives’ are still refusing (behind the scenes) to heed the wish of the majority of their electors—namely 452.”

And there the matter rests —until the next tape.

Mr K. Enderby