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Speaker 1: Three sixty with Katie Wolf thanks to Joyce Main, Darwin

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Speaker 1: hans On and Stuart Highway Burro mat joining us on

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Speaker 1: the line right now to tell us a little bit

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Speaker 1: more about a new course which is set to get

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Speaker 1: underway and aimed at attracting and retaining tour guides in

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Speaker 1: the Northern Territory. On the line is the cdu VET

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Speaker 1: team leader for Tourism, Tim Francis. Good morning to you.

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Speaker 2: Tim, Katie, how are you?

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Speaker 1: Yeah? Really well, great to have you on the show

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Speaker 1: and really pleasing to hear. I think that they're real.

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Speaker 1: There seems to be a real push from Charles Darwin

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Speaker 1: University at the moment to sort of grow our own

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Speaker 1: and retain territorians in the territory. And and that's what

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Speaker 1: this new tour Guide Ready course is all about, really,

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Speaker 1: isn't it.

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Speaker 2: It is we am VET VET training in particular, and

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Speaker 2: we've seen you which I be very reactive and work

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Speaker 2: their their industry and identify areas and things and needs

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Speaker 2: they have. And we met with the Tourism Central Australia

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Speaker 2: group a whole range of other tools guided in our

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Speaker 2: springs and asked them what they would want in a

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Speaker 2: tool guide and were designed a bespoke course around that

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Speaker 2: to basically try to fill that gap and so.

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Speaker 1: Tell us a bit more about this course and who

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Speaker 1: is maybe able to do it.

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Speaker 2: So it's really open to anyone. There are some underlying

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Speaker 2: conditions you have for meat which are mostly around the licensing.

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Speaker 2: But if you are physically fit, you love the outdoors,

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Speaker 2: you've got a bit of a bit of verb in

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Speaker 2: your personality and you love talking about the outdoors and

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Speaker 2: sharing sharing knowledge, then we would love to have anyone

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Speaker 2: come down to our springs and join the course. For

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Speaker 2: the five weeks we had we have been very lucky

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Speaker 2: to secure a large endorsement from Tourism and Tee especially

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Speaker 2: shout out to John d Maria and Nick Roe who

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Speaker 2: have basically made this course which will probably cost you

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Speaker 2: about seven thousand dollars if you walked off the street

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Speaker 2: to do it, and we're able to provide it free

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Speaker 2: to the applicantntil we get the limited number. We've got

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Speaker 2: about twelve spaces, so hopefully we can fill those seats.

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Speaker 1: And tell us I mean we've spoken to Tourism Central

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Speaker 1: Australia at different times. We know that this issue with

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Speaker 1: the worker shortage is acute. How are things going in

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Speaker 1: Central Australia right now though, when you talk about the

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Speaker 1: tourism sector and the shortage of workers.

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Speaker 2: So what we're really finding is that when the international

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Speaker 2: tourism sort of dropped off last year and between that

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Speaker 2: and the domestic market sort of firing up again, a

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Speaker 2: lot of their tool guides left the industry and we've

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Speaker 2: got other jobs and now there's really a very very

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Speaker 2: small pool for people to sort of come back and

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Speaker 2: refill those jobs. And the idea at the moment is

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Speaker 2: that by tracking people into to old Springs, if we

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Speaker 2: can do this and give them some training and give

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Speaker 2: them the skills and the licens thing and all the

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Speaker 2: things they need, they'll be read basically the end of

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Speaker 2: the call us to walk straight into jobs.

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Speaker 1: And tim How important is it really that you know

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Speaker 1: that you do have have like have people do this

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Speaker 1: course and actually get in there and fill those jobs.

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Speaker 2: Look, it's really important. Businesses are struggling to find find guides.

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Speaker 2: There are tool companies who are sharing tour guides because

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Speaker 2: there are just none on the ground. And we often

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Speaker 2: when before we had this course, a lot of the

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Speaker 2: companies had to hire people with no experience and then

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Speaker 2: to go through all the training themselves. And so this

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Speaker 2: is a way of us being able to sort of

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Speaker 2: get ahead of the curve. And we work very closely

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Speaker 2: with the tour operators. We're using their their itineries that

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Speaker 2: they we use, and we're putting it into the course itself.

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Speaker 2: They have come aboard and give it us sites stay

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Speaker 2: at and we will be doing tour tours through their

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Speaker 2: workshops and they'll get to almost have an interview prior

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Speaker 2: to the end of the course. That's how closely we're

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Speaker 2: sort of linking this in with the local industry.

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Speaker 1: It sounds like a really good thing to do and hopefully,

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Speaker 1: you know, really helps to fill that gap and that

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Speaker 1: shortage that we've got at the moment. How many people

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Speaker 1: can actually take part, Like what's the you know, what's

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Speaker 1: the size of the intake.

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Speaker 2: So we've got twelve spots to this next course, which

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Speaker 2: starts in the ninth of August, runs through to the

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Speaker 2: tenth of September, and we will be taking them for

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Speaker 2: a couple of weeks out into Ularu Parta Judah and

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Speaker 2: we do a couple of weeks of classroom stuff. We

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Speaker 2: do a lot of tools around the greater Our Springs

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Speaker 2: region looking at all the other types of tour attractions

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Speaker 2: as well, because these guys almost become little embassadors on

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Speaker 2: these tours and they need to be able to sort

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Speaker 2: of value add, you know, to the broader tourism economy

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Speaker 2: when they're on these tours and explain how they can

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Speaker 2: do other things post the tour. So there's twelve people

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Speaker 2: and we we've got a few people already in the course,

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Speaker 2: so they still bring for some more people. There's a

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Speaker 2: combination available in our Springs for the duration of the

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Speaker 2: course as well. So people are in DA one, we're

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Speaker 2: thinking they'd love to make a change and head down

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Speaker 2: to Our Springs become a tool guide down there. We

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Speaker 2: can actually house them throughout the at no cost throughout

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Speaker 2: the whole course as well. And as I said, you know,

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Speaker 2: thanks to tourism in Tea, they've really come to the

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Speaker 2: pay here and making this course an amazing opportunity for

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Speaker 2: people to change, change the life. So I'll get out

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Speaker 2: of boring one to five job and getting it get

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Speaker 2: in out doors.

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Speaker 1: Tim, do you reckon it's going to go far enough?

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Speaker 1: I mean, twelve doesn't sound like a huge number. I

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Speaker 1: know it's a start, but it doesn't sound like a

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Speaker 1: huge number, you know, is it going to go far enough?

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Speaker 2: Look at what we've been doing is we're running a

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Speaker 2: number of these courses, so we're trying to keep the

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Speaker 2: numbers low because we want to make these are intensive

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Speaker 2: courses five weeks and if we blow those numbers out

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Speaker 2: too big and you don't get the the you know,

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Speaker 2: the one on one train, which we really need to

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Speaker 2: make sure that this intensive courses is designed to sort

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Speaker 2: of provide with another one the other courses and will

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Speaker 2: be rolled out in Darwin hopefully if this is successful

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Speaker 2: in the in the s in Central Australia, and then

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Speaker 2: we'll be doing them repeating him again early next year.

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Speaker 1: Well, we know that, as I said, we've heard on

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Speaker 1: so many occasions from the tourism sector that that workforce

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Speaker 1: shortage is a real issue at the moment. And I

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Speaker 1: reckon if we're able to grow our own here in

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Speaker 1: the territory, we're able to develop territorians to get into

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Speaker 1: those jobs, hopefully, you know, hopefully it means that we're

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Speaker 1: not in this situation.

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Speaker 2: Again, that's right, And you know, if we can start

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Speaker 2: a program where we're constantly sort of feeding these new guys,

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Speaker 2: fully accredited, ready to rock and roll into these in

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Speaker 2: these businesses, it should hopefully really make it have a

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Speaker 2: big impact.

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Speaker 1: Well, Tim Francis, the cdu Vet team leader for tourism,

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Speaker 1: I appreciate you having a chat with us this morning. Mate.

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Speaker 1: Just very quickly though, if there is anyone out there

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Speaker 1: listening who's maybe keen to find out more, where should

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Speaker 1: they go to look?

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Speaker 2: And Martin Bowl my coordinator in our springs and his

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Speaker 2: mobile number is here for we.

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Speaker 1: Can either well we might even grab it from you

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Speaker 1: offare and if anybody calls through we can pass it.

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Speaker 2: On fantastic here, that'd be great.

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Speaker 1: Thank good on you, Tim, thanks mate of your time,

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Speaker 1: no worries, thank you. And that was cdu Vet team

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Speaker 1: leader there for tourism, Tim Francis, And yeah, I reckon

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Speaker 1: it's a really good idea if we can grow our

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Speaker 1: own here in the territory. We know that we've seen

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Speaker 1: a real issue over the last few months or over

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Speaker 1: the last eighteen months, no, not that far back, maybe

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Speaker 1: the last twelve months since COVID initially struck, and then

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Speaker 1: when things sort of got restarted and we saw that

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Speaker 1: we had tourists still here in the territory or coming

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Speaker 1: to the territory from interstate, but we really haven't had

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Speaker 1: the workforce in the tourism industry. So hopefully this can

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Speaker 1: go part of the way in terms of making sure

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Speaker 1: that we can grow our own ensuring that we do

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Speaker 1: have tour operators and guides and people in that sector

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Speaker 1: to be able to keep it moving, because as I said,

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Speaker 1: it's been something that has been raised with us with

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Speaker 1: both Tourism Top End also Tourism Central Australia. Daniel Rochford

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Speaker 1: has told us quite some time back about the acute

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Speaker 1: issue it was and said that you know, they were

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Speaker 1: having a real problem in terms of filling some of

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Speaker 1: those jobs. So with these tour guides, let's hope that

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Speaker 1: it makes a difference