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Speaker 1: Yesterday in local news, we told you about a man

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Speaker 1: being hospitalized and a youth arrested following a major brawl

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Speaker 1: at the Darwin Waterfront. Police were called to the scene

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Speaker 1: just before three o'clock on Sunday. Reports that around twenty

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Speaker 1: people were involved in this fight. Authorities will say that

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Speaker 1: some of the youths run with pitchforks, machetes, even tomahawks. Now,

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Speaker 1: anyone who's been to the waterfront on a Sunday will

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Speaker 1: know that it's usually filled with families, with teenagers, people

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Speaker 1: just down there eating, having a swim. No doubt it

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Speaker 1: would have been pretty frightening for anybody who was there.

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Speaker 1: The Deputy CEO of the Waterfront, Sam Burke, joins me

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Speaker 1: on the line. Good morning, Sam.

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Speaker 2: Morning Katie. Thanks for having me.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm good to speak to you. What happened on

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Speaker 1: Sunday from your perspective, Well.

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Speaker 2: Look, I won't go into too many details because obviously

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Speaker 2: there's the active police investigation. I don't want to prejudice

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Speaker 2: the charges and the ultimate prosecution of the teenager that

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Speaker 2: has apparently been arrested. But what I can say is

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Speaker 2: we're extremely disappointed and shocked that this type of behavior

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Speaker 2: occurred at the waterfront. It is our absolute objective to

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Speaker 2: make this the safest place in Darwin to visit and

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Speaker 2: work and live, and it's just totally unacceptable and we've

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Speaker 2: responded as rapidly and actively as we can so that

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Speaker 2: it doesn't happen again.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, so I suppose first off, on the Sunday, how

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Speaker 1: did you know, how did staff from the waterfront? How

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Speaker 1: was it responded to on Sunday?

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Speaker 2: First off? Yeah, so we have twenty four to seven

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Speaker 2: security and rangers actively patrolling the waterfront. They quickly became

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Speaker 2: aware of various groups that were both intoxicated and aggressive

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Speaker 2: to various degrees. The matter was complicated for us because

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Speaker 2: some members of the grid were residing at the waterfront

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Speaker 2: in commercial accommodations. As our usual course is to immediately

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Speaker 2: remove and trespass people that are not behaving to the

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Speaker 2: standard that we expect here, and so the matter sort

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Speaker 2: of continued further than we would have liked, and it

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Speaker 2: ultimately resulted in that shocking altercation.

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Speaker 1: Now what happened, Like what happens next? Because we know

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Speaker 1: that the waterfront is somewhere where like I know for myself,

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Speaker 1: I let my teenage kids go down there without an

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Speaker 1: adult because I feel like it's a safe place for

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Speaker 1: them to go. I know that there's security down there,

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Speaker 1: but what happens next? Sam? You know, how do you

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Speaker 1: give that assurance to people that the kids are going

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Speaker 1: to be safe and that everybody's safe down there?

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Speaker 2: Yeah? I think we. I mean, obviously this is shocking

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Speaker 2: and extremely disappointing, but what I will say is our

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Speaker 2: security teams and the Northern Territary Police responded in real

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Speaker 2: time to this incident. They were onto. What made it

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Speaker 2: complicated was that it was sort of flaring up in

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Speaker 2: multiple locations at once, which was very difficult. But I

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Speaker 2: can hand on heart say that the waterfront remains the

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Speaker 2: safest place for people to come, and I hope people

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Speaker 2: will continue to trust us as the place to come

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Speaker 2: and enjoy and trust their kids will be safe and

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Speaker 2: have a great time here. We've sort of quadrupled our

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Speaker 2: efforts in terms of resourcing for security, so we will

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Speaker 2: now have more security. They'll be more visible over the

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Speaker 2: coming weeks as sort of a public reassurance campaign. I

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Speaker 2: want to thank the Non Territory Police who continuing to

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Speaker 2: work with us to provide that reassurance and look I've

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Speaker 2: been here for quite some time. This is an extraordinarily

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Speaker 2: rare incident. And additionally, apart from obviously how horrifying it was,

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Speaker 2: there's no evidence that the general public were in any

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Speaker 2: specific risk. Helse people were all known to each other,

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Speaker 2: and this is clearly a type of behavior that we're

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Speaker 2: seeing pop up. Totally unacceptable. But it wasn't sort of

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Speaker 2: random violence. It was quite targeted within this group.

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Speaker 1: Still bloody scary for everybody down there, nonetheless, so obviously

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Speaker 1: additional security from the waterfront's perspective. Do you know where

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Speaker 1: the police have caught the people involved. I'm assuming they have.

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Speaker 2: I've heard about the one arrest. What I can also

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Speaker 2: say is that our team have been actively going around

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Speaker 2: to identify members of this group. We are continuing to

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Speaker 2: trespast people that were involved. I can say, to our

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Speaker 2: knowledge or members of the group that we're staying here

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Speaker 2: have left are no longer within the waterfront municipality, and

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Speaker 2: everything here is calm and beautiful and it feels like

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Speaker 2: a tropical resort, which is exactly how we like to

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Speaker 2: present both to your family, visitors, and everyone else.

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Speaker 1: Burke, I appreciate your time this morning. Thank you very

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Speaker 1: much for having a chat with us. Much appreciated.

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Speaker 2: Thanks Kattie. And if I can just briefly give a

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Speaker 2: shout out to our teams, the security personnel that acted

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Speaker 2: in really distressing circumstances with police to provide first aid

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Speaker 2: and diffuse the situation. They did a great job and

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Speaker 2: that's the stuff that keeps us safe.

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Speaker 1: Good on them, absolutely, Thanks Sam, Thanks Kattie,