“Do you think ignoring a media outlet fosters freedom of reporting by the media?”

So asked Chief Minister Lia Finocchiaro when in opposition at an Estimates hearing in June 2020 of then chief minister Michael Gunner.

Gunner had two months earlier fled an arranged press conference at the wharf after his staff notified him the NT Independent was there. He then spouted nonsense in Parliament – after telling security not to let our reporters in – that he did not recognise the NT Independent as a media organisation.

He offered different reasons over the years for why he would not answer questions from this masthead, chief among them that the owner is conservative businessman Owen Pike. The joke in the office at the time was, ‘wait til he finds out who owns the NT News’.

But everybody kn

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