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Speaker 1: Now we know the Northern Territories road deaths have reached

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Speaker 1: a terrible high this year. As of well as I

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Speaker 1: understand it, there's been fifty three lives lost on Northern

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Speaker 1: Territory roads and the Major Crash Unit has now released

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Speaker 1: the statistics concerning the first of those fifty two deaths.

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Speaker 1: And the cause. Now joining me in the studio right

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Speaker 1: now is Detective seeing your sergeant Richard Musgrave. Good morning

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Speaker 1: to you, Richard.

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Speaker 2: Morning, Katie morning, thank you so much.

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Speaker 1: For your time this morning. Now, Richard, the volume of

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Speaker 1: road deaths that we have seen this year has been

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Speaker 1: astronomical for all the wrong reasons. I understand that that

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Speaker 1: death toll has actually risen.

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Speaker 2: Yes, unfortunately, as of this morning we were holding some

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Speaker 2: of the information back to allah of the family that

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Speaker 2: deceased to deal with it. But as of this morning,

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Speaker 2: unfortunately we are in our reporting fifty four deaths for

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Speaker 2: the year.

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Speaker 1: Fifty four deaths And was that so that was a

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Speaker 1: female who'd passed away?

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Speaker 2: Yes, so Wednesday last week a female pedestrian stepped out

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Speaker 2: from entry on a bike path or a pedestrian path

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Speaker 2: and sadly, a youth who was riding down the road

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Speaker 2: just inadvertently or collided with her. She suffered unsurvivable injuries

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Speaker 2: and passed away as a result over the weekend.

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Speaker 1: How incredibly tragic for everybody involved in that situation is

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Speaker 1: there's no indication that that youth was doing anything wrong,

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Speaker 1: that person was just riding their bike.

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Speaker 2: No, it's one of these really really sad circumstances where

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Speaker 2: no one did anything wrong, and it's just a series

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Speaker 2: of unfortunate mishaps just jelt to will together to result

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Speaker 2: in this tragic circumstance.

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Speaker 1: Oh goodness, may I mean, my heart goes out to

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Speaker 1: everybody involved in that city situation. That sounds incredibly like

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Speaker 1: a terrible situation for everybody involved. And I guess the

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Speaker 1: rarity in that situation, though, Richard, is that a lot

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Speaker 1: of the time, you know, unfortunately in that situation it

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Speaker 1: wasn't avoidable. But a lot of the time, a lot

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Speaker 1: of these road deaths actually are avoidable. And I know

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Speaker 1: that you have indeed released some of the reasons or

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Speaker 1: some of the contributing factors I should say, in relation

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Speaker 1: to those deaths.

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Speaker 2: Yes, kay, oll Katie. So we're trying to get the

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Speaker 2: message out there to anyone who uses the road we

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Speaker 2: don't want to focus on drivers. It's everybody who is

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Speaker 2: on the road and is using the road. That can

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Speaker 2: be the drivers, it can be pedestrians, it can be cyclists,

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Speaker 2: passengers in a vehicle. Everybody has a responsibility to use

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Speaker 2: that road in a safe metal manner, not only for

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Speaker 2: themselves or their own families, but for other people too.

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Speaker 2: The stats that we've released, we're focusing on what has

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Speaker 2: colloquially we've been termed the fatal five, which are the

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Speaker 2: main five reasons that culminate in these fatal accidents, and

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Speaker 2: that's alcohol or drugs, speed, seat belts, in attention, or fatigue.

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Speaker 2: And the stats that we've released show that, sadly here

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Speaker 2: in the NTY, out of fifty four desks this year

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Speaker 2: or lives lost on the road this year, we're looking

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Speaker 2: at seventy percent of those are related to drugs or

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Speaker 2: alkohol on the road, which just blows my mind.

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Speaker 1: It blows mine too, like I can't believe that people

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Speaker 1: still get behind the wheel of a vehicle while they're

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Speaker 1: either intoxicated or impacted by drugs. And for me, I

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Speaker 1: sort of go back to it's one thing to put

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Speaker 1: your own life in danger, but to put the lives

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Speaker 1: of others that are on the road in danger as well,

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Speaker 1: or those in your own vehicle as well, I just

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Speaker 1: find quite astounding.

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Speaker 2: And that's exactly right. It's a decision that we all

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Speaker 2: make if we do climb behind the wheel or we

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Speaker 2: walk on the road while intoxicated. Because don't forget that

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Speaker 2: if out of those seventy percent of those fifty four deaths,

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Speaker 2: thirteen of those can be attributed to pedestrian deaths, and

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Speaker 2: out of eighty five percent of those thirteen pedestrian deaths,

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Speaker 2: alcohol and drugs are going are involved. And that goes

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Speaker 2: back to my core metal messaging. It doesn't matter whether

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Speaker 2: you're a driver or whether you're walking on the road.

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Speaker 2: If you're affected by alcohol and you stand a really

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Speaker 2: good chance of causing a fatal or collision, that's you,

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Speaker 2: that's your family, that's the other people's lives affected forever.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, that was what I was going to ask in

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Speaker 1: terms of those pedestrian deaths. And when you say that

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Speaker 1: alcohol is a contributing factor, is that both by drivers

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Speaker 1: but also the pedestrian.

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Speaker 2: That's right, Yeah, so that's all that's seventy percent figures

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Speaker 2: am algamated with pedestrians and drivers.

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Speaker 1: It must be. I mean, there's so there's so many

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Speaker 1: things that are concerning about these statistics. But when you

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Speaker 1: look at the drugs and alcohol, what does that say

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Speaker 1: to you? When I mean you are somebody, you and

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Speaker 1: your team have to go out to these terrible fatalities

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Speaker 1: and you then have to, I'm assuming, speak to the

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Speaker 1: families of people who have who've lost love once.

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Speaker 2: That's right, Katie. I mean, obviously, my team and I

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Speaker 2: have to deal with the mess and the trauma left

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Speaker 2: on the road by these incidents. But what a lot

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Speaker 2: of people don't realize is we have to also deal

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Speaker 2: with the affected people's or families, which takes its toll

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Speaker 2: on the team more than just as much as having

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Speaker 2: to deal with the trauma on the on the road.

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Speaker 2: You know, when we look at these figures, and again,

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Speaker 2: unfortunately we're focusing on alcohol and drugs because it's by

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Speaker 2: far the greatest cause of our fatalities or lives lost

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Speaker 2: on the road, But we mustn't forget about speed and

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Speaker 2: seat belts, which again the figures are way too high.

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Speaker 2: That's you know, thirty three percent of our fatal crashes

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Speaker 2: are caused by speed and seventeen percent of people not

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Speaker 2: wearing their seat belts. We've got to look at that alcohol.

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Speaker 2: We know that it's that al correlated harm is a

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Speaker 2: huge set of social issue in the Northern territory that

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Speaker 2: impacts everybody, not only the drivers, but it folters through

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Speaker 2: to all sorts of other incidents.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and look, just having a close look as well

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Speaker 1: at some of these further detail, Le's understand it. Men

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Speaker 1: made up sixty seven percent of those of the deaths.

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Speaker 2: Yes, that's right. And I think if you look at

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Speaker 2: the other incidental stats of male female, how many occur

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Speaker 2: at night, the people that are involved, it just goes

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Speaker 2: to it builds you a picture of who is using

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Speaker 2: the road and in what.

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Speaker 1: Capacity, and the other part of that. From what I

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Speaker 1: can see that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders have also

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Speaker 1: dominated those numbers by the look of it, fifty eight

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Speaker 1: percent of those who died being First Nations people.

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Speaker 2: Yes, that is a very sad reality that these stats

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Speaker 2: show that a lot of work needs to be done

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Speaker 2: in that in that realm, and the police, together with DIPPLE,

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Speaker 2: together with MACCA and a range of other non government

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Speaker 2: and government organizations are working quite actively in that space.

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Speaker 2: We're trying to address ways of getting the messaging out

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Speaker 2: there using media, using personal visits, because obviously some of

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Speaker 2: the areas that we get to media isn't a big

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Speaker 2: thing out there. So we're working with community leaders and elders.

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Speaker 2: As I said, a number of these government agencies or

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Speaker 2: non government agencies are releasing media campaigns but were spoken

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Speaker 2: in different languages. And we're trying to get that messaging

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Speaker 2: out there as much as we possibly can.

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Speaker 1: And this is the thing we've got to try and

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Speaker 1: do something, got to try and do. I don't know

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Speaker 1: what the answer is. I don't know how we do

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Speaker 1: things slightly differently or how we get that message through.

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Speaker 1: But the number of lives lost is terrible. It is

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Speaker 1: much higher than last year as well as Nash, Yes.

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Speaker 2: Sir, I mean at this time we're sitting at fifty

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Speaker 2: four lives lost on the road at the stage and

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Speaker 2: the stage last year. I should have looked at the figure,

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Speaker 2: but I think we were looking at about thirty three

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Speaker 2: this time last year.

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Speaker 1: Yep. And I know it is. I mean, the thing is,

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Speaker 1: however many lives lost, it is, we still do not

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Speaker 1: want it to happen. And that's somebody's family member, that

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Speaker 1: somebody's loved on, that's someone who's been in their footy team.

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Speaker 1: You know, it's a it's a it's a valued person

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Speaker 1: in the community. And it's such a sad, sad, you know,

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Speaker 1: way to lose a loved one as well. It's such

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Speaker 1: a sudden and tragic thing to have happened. And I

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Speaker 1: don't know how we make it, how we how we

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Speaker 1: try to lower the rate of death that we are

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Speaker 1: seeing on our roads. I know there's a lot that

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Speaker 1: the police do, but if there's different ways that we

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Speaker 1: in the media can help as well, because something's got to.

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Speaker 2: Change, Yes, definitely, and we are trying to put as

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Speaker 2: much out there on the media as we possibly can.

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Speaker 2: We the as the police on our step were stepping

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Speaker 2: up our presence on the on the roads because these

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Speaker 2: figures speak for themselves. So we've had extra resourcing allocated

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Speaker 2: to our traffic will command and for those that live

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Speaker 2: in the in the city set were centers, I'm pretty

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Speaker 2: sure you would have seen an increased prootal presence on

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Speaker 2: the road in the last few few months. Our traffic

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Speaker 2: guys and girls are out there there were working really

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Speaker 2: hard day or night we've got increased ibts. You're going

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Speaker 2: to see us. It's a fair warning for everyone. You're

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Speaker 2: going to see us out there for the Christmas people period.

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Speaker 2: We've got a special operation going for the Christmas Track

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Speaker 2: with traffic and yet we just want to get that

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Speaker 2: message out there. Whether you're a driver, whether it's your fault,

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Speaker 2: whether it's not your fault, whether you're a pedestrian, you

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Speaker 2: need to walk or drive to the conditions. You need

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Speaker 2: to feel safe behind the wheel, you need to feel

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Speaker 2: safe if you're walking on the road, and if you

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Speaker 2: don't adjust the way that you're using the road.

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Speaker 1: Well, Detective seeingor Sergeant Richard Musgrave from the Major Crash

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Speaker 1: Investigation Unit, I really appreciate your time this morning. Thanks

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Speaker 1: so much for joining me.

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Speaker 2: Thank you very much.

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Speaker 1: Thank you