FEDERAL Labor MP Damian Hale must be feeling very uncomfortable.

He finds himself playing the same role as Dave Tollner, the CLP politician he unseated at the last election.

Liberal advisers ruthlessly used Mr Tollner to try to soften up the Territory to accept a nuclear waste dump. 

It didn't work - the town crier lost his seat.

Labor promised to repeal the law being used to force the NT to house the dump.

It seems Kevin Rudd's Government will repeal the law - but will still expect the dump to be built in the Territory. 

Mr Hale fought against the dump while campaigning for the election but is now softening his stance.

An emphatic "not over my dead body" during the election campaign has suddenly become "I don't particularly want it". 

Labor advisers in Canberra are clearly working his strings.

Mr Hale and Labor are finding that Opposition is a life of self-indulgence. Governments, on the other hand, have to make decisions - often hard, unpopular decisions - for the national good.

Australia produces nuclear waste and, therefore, should make arrangements to store it. We should clean up our own mess.

A $30 million waste dump on Muckaty station would provide royalties for Aboriginal people and an income stream for Tennant Creek.

The waste has to be stored somewhere. And it might as well be in the NT.