A few months ago I asked around for a tip or ten when you may have something juicy that you’d like to share with me and a few thousand others. Well, I’ve had quite a few dropped off over the past few months but this latest is a cracker!

My informants shall of course remain anonymous (but thanks anyway Johnno and Jacko!!) and I’ve sworn on a carton of VB not to reveal the identity of the CLP member (she will also remain anonymous) who came up with the ingenious strategy to protect the secrecy of all CLP party meetings. A hopeful and honest effort perhaps, but as we all know CLP meetings leak like the proverbial. Long may the CLP maintain that noble tradition!

Following on from my previous post of Northern Territory Chief Minister Adam Giles’ spray to the the post-failed-coup meeting of the Alice Springs branch of the CLP, word on the street has it that at a meeting held in the Top End last week the geniuses in the CLP management committee implemented a new strategy to circumvent those not-so-loyal members who might wish to repeat the now infamous “Alice Tapes” episode and record the meeting.

The Alice Tapes are so popular around the NT right now that I hear that a local band–maybe local bodgie-boys Horsetrank–are going to release a single titled “Gettin’ hammered with the Chief.”

The new CLP strategy centres on the humble esky, that icon of Top End culture. I’m not sure of the brand, size or colour but word has it that immediately before the meeting said party stalwart grabbed an esky–without the ice or beer of course–and went around the meeting demanding each member present deposit their mobile phones into it for the duration of the meeting.

Word has it that the 50 (?) or so phones that landed in the esky had all sorts of fun during their confinement and took all the opportunities available to swap information via “near-field communication,” a set-up that allows the phones to talk to each other and swap information when in close proximity. Who knows what information was swapped?

Perhaps a few of the attendees went away with a new batch of phone numbers, emails, letter and saucy pix … watch this space.

It speaks volumes about the levels of trust and confidence between the members of a political party when they have to resort to measures like this. Anyway, a little sparrow has told me that this strategy may not have worked to overcome the more inventive members at the meeting.

Apparently the “Alice Tapes” weren’t recorded on a mobile phone after all but on a recorder disguised as a ball-point pen …

Word is that they’ll be getting another Esky just for all the pens in the room.

If you’ve got a Leak of the Week feel free to drop me a line below, send me a DM on Twitter to @bgosford or a message at my Facebook page.

Go on, you know you want to.

I’m waiting for the transcript of last week’s Darwin meeting to land in my Inbox soon.