Meanwhile NT Chief Minister Adam Giles is rubbishing the idea.

Giles, who is polling poorly and is likely to lose government, is painting the August poll as being about new jobs the shale gas industry could create, assuming the vast amounts of gas in the Greater Macarthur Basin are viable.

He said the hundreds of millions in proposed spending is one way the NT can boost a flagging economy.

The Country Liberals say fraccing is safe and will create up to 6300 jobs, while Labor has promised to institute a moratorium if it wins, which is likely to result in a blanket ban.

As a kind of compromise, Lawrie, now an independent who will depart parliament at the next election, called for both major parties to commit to holding a referendum at either the July federal election or the August territory poll, but Giles slapped down the notion.

"When we came to government there was Inpex and nothing else; Labor had killed the cattle industry, they hadn't supported water licences, the horticulture and agricultural industry wasn't expanding, they'd pretty much closed down Aboriginal communities and blown our budget," Giles said.

"We've fixed the budget, we've paid back debt, we've diversified our economy, we've supported the gas industry following on from what Labor was doing but expanded it, saw tougher environmental regulations, we've rebuilt the cattle industry and we've supported the horticulture industry among other things, such as rebuilding the tourism industry."

Lawrie said fraccing would damage existing industries such as tourism, horticulture and agriculture, and said mining jobs would go to fly-in-fly-out workers, not locals.

Giles pledged that would not happen.

Touring the NT this week for the anti-fraccing cause is Helen Bender, daughter of Darling Downs farmer George, who killed himself last year following years of battles over land access with UCG and CSG companies in Queensland.

"In Queensland we know the industry to be liars, cheats and thieves: they lie to come on to the land, they cheat landholders from reasonable compensation and then they thieve the underground water," she told reporters in Darwin yesterday.

The Bender farm has lost two water wells it blames on CSG drilling, and was allegedly impacted by pollution from Linc Energy’s UCG operation.

She is accompanying US cattle rancher and anti-fracking activist John Fenton, who is due to speak in Western Australia tonight.

Fenton warned Territorians that “if you do not think this will impact you, you are very … wrong”

He said his Wyoming ranch had seen a 60% reduction in property value and reduction of cattle stock by 75% on his property.

Both say unconventional gas has impacted their lives, the health of their animals and, in Fenton’s case, a Stanford University study of his home town found evidence that common fraccing practices might have widespread impacts on drinking water.

He said 24 wells were drilled and fracced on his property between 1998 and 2006 by EnCana and Tom Brown, which he had no legal right to reject, and he is convinced the industry is inherently dangerous.

He says his water was contaminated by the drilling, although EnCana, which did not undertake pre-drilling assessments, say the water was always contaminated.

Fenton states that was not the case.

Earlier in the week more than 200 residents of Kathrine gathered to hear Fenton speak at an event organised by Don’t Frack Katherine and Lock The Gate, part of a tour that is travelling Australia to warn of the dangers of fraccing.

Don’t Frack the Territory member Lauren Mellor pledged to fight “tooth and nail” to stop fraccing, saying the government had declared areas under licence “essentially sacrifice zones” for the oil and gas sector.

The NT mining department says fraccing has occurred in the NT’s Amadeus Basin conventional fields for more than 20 years without environmental damage and the oil and gas industry says shale gas extraction is even safer than the CSG extraction on the east coast.

A report by Allan Hawke last year said the practice could be undertaken safely in the NT if the regulatory framework was tightened, and Giles has already instituted a number of reforms, including banning fraccing at Kings Canyon.

Fraccing is now effectively banned in Tasmania, Victoria and New South Wales, but is allowed in Western Australia, Queensland and South Australia.

Giles may win the fraccing debate on simple economics, with Deloitte warning this week that once construction from the $US35 billion Ichthys project winds down.

The NT has an estimated 200 trillion cubic feet of shale gas.

Fenton is now in Western Australia. He will speak at the State Library in Perth tonight, before travelling to the Midwest towns of Moora, Geraldton and Dongara later this week.