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Speaker 1: Now, if you're listening to the show on Friday, you

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Speaker 1: would have heard everybody pretty dismayed about the situation out

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Speaker 1: of Central Australia where a group of young people allegedly

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Speaker 1: stole the school bus that you bring your school. Joining

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Speaker 1: me on the line is the principal, Gavin Morris. Good

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Speaker 1: morning to you, Gavin.

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Speaker 2: Good morning, Katie, Good morning listeners.

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Speaker 1: Gavin. How have things gone over the weekend.

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Speaker 2: There's been a fair few development, Katie. I'm sad to

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Speaker 2: have to say since we last week on Friday morning,

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Speaker 2: so you know, just a quick recap. Thursday night, a

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Speaker 2: group of eight ten year olds broke into the school

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Speaker 2: and stole one of our school buses, drove it through

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Speaker 2: the front gate of the school and around our springs.

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Speaker 2: That chase was concluded by the tire spikes, you know,

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Speaker 2: following a police chase. Several of those students came to

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Speaker 2: school the following day and unfortunately decided to come back

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Speaker 2: that night on Friday night to break back into the

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Speaker 2: school again. So yeah, there's a fair bit of damage

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Speaker 2: done to the front. I'd been building as well with

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Speaker 2: a real focus in my office and you know, it's

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Speaker 2: absolutely clear Katie that this is a crime for help

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Speaker 2: from desperate ten year olds who want to feel like

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Speaker 2: that they're being heard. They've got something to say, and

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Speaker 2: this is their way to try to feel like that

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Speaker 2: they're being listened to.

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Speaker 1: Mate, I mean this being targeted again on Friday night

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Speaker 1: and ten year olds like, it's a terrible situation.

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Speaker 2: It is a terrible situation and it's taking as toll.

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Speaker 2: So you know, we're very wounded on Friday, and we're

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Speaker 2: wounded now and.

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Speaker 3: As a postumus teachers so too, fully registered teachers have

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Speaker 3: resigned across the weekends. They joined the team four weeks ago,

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Speaker 3: highly experienced teachers. It's just too much.

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Speaker 2: They're well being is already affected. They're worried about their

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Speaker 2: own safety and they were not mine. They were just

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Speaker 2: lying in bad sleepless worrying about what's coming next.

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Speaker 1: So they resigned those two teachers that started weeks ago.

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Speaker 2: Correct, So we lost two teachers in four weeks, absolutely

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Speaker 2: totally in relation to the events of the last seventy

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Speaker 2: two hours. And I was just wondering where the response is.

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Speaker 2: You know, I called a full staff many this morning

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Speaker 2: with our team, and we need to keep ourselves accountable

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Speaker 2: and looking inward. We need a response, We need a

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Speaker 2: cultural response, We need a response from the family. I mean,

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Speaker 2: just to show you where we're Okatie. I went around

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Speaker 2: to it to visit some families yesterday afternoon who were

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Speaker 2: involved with the incident. I mean, these kids are living

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Speaker 2: in tents on the Todd River long term. We're not

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Speaker 2: talking gramping. We're talking tense with old mattresses. It was

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Speaker 2: quite it was cold this morning here in our springs,

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Speaker 2: I mean, in abject poverty, with no security, no food security,

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Speaker 2: no financial security. And it's having an impact not just

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Speaker 2: on those kids and our buses and on the glass

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Speaker 2: windows and doors of their front Aid min office, but

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Speaker 2: it's having an impact across our teaching staff. And it's

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Speaker 2: it's really unfortunate that we've lost those those two teachers.

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Speaker 2: And I'm just wondering where where the health is going

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Speaker 2: to come from in terms of where you know, where

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Speaker 2: is territory family?

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Speaker 1: Well, mate, that's the question that I certainly asked the

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Speaker 1: Chief Minister this morning. You know what exactly is the

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Speaker 1: response from this point? And she said that, you know,

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Speaker 1: she sort of went through the what will you know

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Speaker 1: what goes on and that territory families would respond and

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Speaker 1: and you know, I spoke about the the the back

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Speaker 1: on Track program, but to me, and I actually raised

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Speaker 1: that point with her that you'd told me on Friday

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Speaker 1: that you know, in one case, you've got a child

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Speaker 1: being taken back to a tent in the Todd River,

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Speaker 1: and and you know, I guess people are starting to question,

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Speaker 1: at what point does the government sort of try to

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Speaker 1: intervene further or to try to help this family further

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Speaker 1: so that this doesn't continue to happen. They talk about

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Speaker 1: early intervention all the time, they talk about stopping things

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Speaker 1: before they actually take place. But here we've got a

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Speaker 1: group of ten year olds and it like it's a

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Speaker 1: terribly sad situation.

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Speaker 2: It is, and we know for a fact that there

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Speaker 2: was one of the ten year olds who was involved

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Speaker 2: with several incidents across the last ten days. We still

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Speaker 2: does not have an open case of territory family. When

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Speaker 2: I went to visit the students in the families that

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Speaker 2: are living in those tenths I'm on the Todd River

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Speaker 2: who were involved with the damage at Yprina, none of

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Speaker 2: them knew anything about it. They had no visit from anyone,

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Speaker 2: including the police. I spake to multiple family members Aunties, mom, Grandma.

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Speaker 2: None of them had any idea what had happened on

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Speaker 2: Thursday and Friday night. And it's this absolute crisis point

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Speaker 2: and I just don't know where the he was coming from.

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Speaker 2: You know, we've been calling now for you know, it's

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Speaker 2: been fantastic to go your support, Katie. It's been eighteen months.

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Speaker 2: I've becoming a program talking about the absolute crisis around

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Speaker 2: safe and secure accommodation. We've come up with a model,

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Speaker 2: a solution to it. We're not just coming up, you know,

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Speaker 2: in the community forums and ranting. We've actually come up

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Speaker 2: with a community based solution to our problem by just

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Speaker 2: getting roadblocked.

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Speaker 1: Well, Gavin and I asked, I asked the Chief Minister

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Speaker 1: about this this morning because you're spot on, like right

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Speaker 1: from the first time that you and I spoke, I

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Speaker 1: thought to myself, do you know what you know? Like

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Speaker 1: if this, if this costs, I can't remember exactly how

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Speaker 1: much he said it was going to cost, but I thought,

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Speaker 1: if this means that kids have a good start and

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Speaker 1: that they are getting an education and that they've got

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Speaker 1: somewhere safe to be, then in my opinion, having that

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Speaker 1: boarding facility is the right move. We asked the Chief

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Speaker 1: Minister again about this this morning and she said that

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Speaker 1: there is already a boarding facility in Central Australia where

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Speaker 1: the kids could stay, but it's not the same school. Like,

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Speaker 1: I don't understand really why this roadblock continues to pop

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Speaker 1: up and why the government is not sort of coming

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Speaker 1: forward with this as a solution.

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Speaker 2: That's a really disappointing comment because you know, boarding school

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Speaker 2: facilities both there's a boarding school at the Phillips, there's

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Speaker 2: boarding school facilities at certain Phillips. Yes, absolutely to be

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Speaker 2: inappropriate to say, well, why don't we this drop fifty

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Speaker 2: of our kids in there, like boarding schools are for

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Speaker 2: kids who go to that school. Yeah, and you know,

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Speaker 2: we add our we add to our community's always to

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Speaker 2: the calls from the Northern Territory Children's Commissioner as late

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Speaker 2: as as Friday, who suggested that the number of homeless

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Speaker 2: youthes somewhere around one hundred and fifty and wondering where

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Speaker 2: federal labors promised accommodation is around this youth foryer models,

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Speaker 2: which you know, which is a community based model. We're

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Speaker 2: happy to be pragmatic. We've got our solutions. Which we

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Speaker 2: think a combination at your prenea is our number one option.

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Speaker 2: But this crisis around youth to commodation, it's been on

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Speaker 2: the table for some time. Every other jurisdiction in the

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Speaker 2: country has one of these youthfuoys or accommodation in community

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Speaker 2: apart from the Northern Territory, and there's an absolute crisis here.

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Speaker 2: And for anyone to say that there's no length between

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Speaker 2: youth homelessness and any social behavior needs to come and

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Speaker 2: spend a week at your Preenio school on the front line.

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Speaker 1: Gavin, mate, I always appreciate your time. I particularly appreciate

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Speaker 1: the fact that you'd already spoken to us on Friday

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Speaker 1: and you're back again today. Look, we'll continue to talk

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Speaker 1: about this. I know that you're pushing so hard to

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Speaker 1: try to give these kids, you know, a better education

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Speaker 1: and to make sure that they've got opportunity. And part

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Speaker 1: of that to me does seem as though if there

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Speaker 1: is able to be a facility where kids can stay,

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Speaker 1: it seems like a no brainer to me. I can't

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Speaker 1: understand why there is the resistance from the government of

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Speaker 1: both levels.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and look, just before I go, you know, we're

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Speaker 2: pretty much reached to reach our own decision here that

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Speaker 2: we can't wait Olympic cycles for potential government response or not.

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Speaker 2: We've had we've had support on the table, We've had

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Speaker 2: it pulled off the table. It's back on the table,

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Speaker 2: it's back off. We're not sure where we stand. We've

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Speaker 2: got we've got no communication, you know, our Yaprini, your

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Speaker 2: board still waiting for a response from the Federal Minister

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Speaker 2: for Lniari around comments that she made referring you know,

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Speaker 2: basically calling out our board for Yaprin's a dumping ground

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Speaker 2: for kids that can't go anywhere else. So we're basically

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Speaker 2: going to take autonomy and ownership of this project ourselves.

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Speaker 1: Yep.

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Speaker 2: We've come up with with an accommodation model which we

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Speaker 2: can afford to fund ourselves, which is around eighty to

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Speaker 2: eighty five beds which we can get up before the

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Speaker 2: end of the summer period with twenty twenty three twenty

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Speaker 2: twenty four, because we can't wait.

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Speaker 1: Good on you, You.

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Speaker 2: Not wait, jev.

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Speaker 1: Where are you going to get this money from? How

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Speaker 1: are you going to do it?

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Speaker 4: Well, we've moved from money from one bucket to another bucket.

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Speaker 4: We've got from friends who have been listening to the

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Speaker 4: story from Afar and happy to support. It's certainly not

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Speaker 4: the fifteen million dollars for twelve million dollars that you know,

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Speaker 4: which is the brand new building which is going to

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Speaker 4: take however long to build with government support.

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Speaker 2: We can't wait. So we've been able to attract some funding,

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Speaker 2: We've been able to move the money around internally within

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Speaker 2: the school and where we you know, it's basically right

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Speaker 2: at the point now where we're going to press the

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Speaker 2: green light and we're going to go with ourselves, and

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Speaker 2: you know, we just can't be let down. And you know,

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Speaker 2: as a non Indigenous person working in a space like

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Speaker 2: there's a real tension here that I'm offering solutions on

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Speaker 2: behalf of our community, but then can't get the support

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Speaker 2: and the funding to get those solutions supported. And that's

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Speaker 2: just once again another program an aboritional community that was

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Speaker 2: all promised and they follow through. I don't want to

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Speaker 2: replicate that important to our kids.

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Speaker 1: Gavin Morris, I always appreciate your time, mate. We'll talk

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Speaker 1: again very soon, and yeah, I'll be keen to hear

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Speaker 1: how things are progressing when it comes to being able

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Speaker 1: to get that boarding house up and running.

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Speaker 2: Thanks so much for having me on, Katie, Thank

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Speaker 1: You, Thanks Gavin,