The Northern Territory's Ship of State?

Here at the The Northern Myth (Darwin bureau) we have, since the arrival of Country Liberal Party’s Chief Minister Terry Mills and his crew at the new NT Government, been so overwhelmed by the flood of leaks, tips, rumours, innuendo and salacious gossip that we’ve had to put on a few temps, rent out new offices and storage space, engage security officers and open a new email account to deal with the influx.

Strategy meetings have been held long into the night, budgets have been re-jigged, staff re-tasked (always wanted to turn that pesky noun into a verb) and we’ve rushed a new corporate and inter-web structure (LeakOfTheWeek.com.au) into place to deal with the tips, leaks, boxes falling off the back of trucks and over-flowing dead-letter drops.

We’ll be announcing a new set of dead-letter drops soon but for now your best bet is to slip a buff envelope (government issue preferably) under the counter of Darwin’s notorious den-of-communist-sympathisers, the Roma Bar in downtown Cavenagh Street addressed to “Leak of The Week” competition, c/- Crikey.com.au.

Darwin is very much a public service town and the sense of dread of the arrival of the long white envelope is palpable – particularly among those who (a) may have had the temerity to vote for that other mob at some time, or (b) may be married to; was married to; is thinking about getting married to … you get the drift … someone who has voted for that other mob at some time.

It seems that disloyalty – imagined, justified, past, present or future – to the one true cause will not be tolerated.

Crikey’s northern operatives can’t enjoy a quiet walk down Darwin’s Smith Street Mall at lunchtime without have a hot tip or ten thrust into our sweaty hands and the phones are running as hot as a Troopie without air-con in the build-up.

It looks like there is no shortage of fat-and not-so-fat-cats – in the brave new world that is the CLP’s Northern Territory – that includes anyone earning more than $110k or so – brave enough to kick against the pricks and share those small, and not so small, instances of adminsitrative and institutional madness and bloody-mindedness that accompany regime change.

So after much thought we’ve decided to start a little competition. We’ve been as busy as the 5th floor shredders on the 26th of August 2012 setting out the comprehensive rules and judging criteria in order to allow us to vet the best of the best of your contributions.

We know that our panel of expert judges (a couple of blokes in the pub on a Friday night) will be hard-pressed to sort and assess the deluge of entries but we’ll be announcing the first winners soon.

We have no ideas about prizes for this wonderful competition – maybe a few reams of “Department of Children and Families” letterhead? Your thoughts are welcome.

Seriously though, there are a number of ways you can - anonymously or otherwise - proffer your thoughts and tips for wider exposure.

You can use Crikey’s guaranteed anonymous form, send an email to boss@crikey.com.au or contact our dedicated team at The Northern Myth’s “Leak of the Week” competition at leakoftheweek@gmail.com.

You can also contribute to the World Online Whistleblowing Survey being run by Griffith University and the University of Melbourne. The project is funded by the Australian Research Council and has been approved by the University of Melbourne research ethics committee.