This episode is the third part of a three part series. If you haven't yet, start with Children of the Intervention and then listen to the Coppers. Also, it contains some strong language.
Most of us have lived in these camps all their life. I've moved out, I've come back, grew up in Charles Creek.
So you got some kids on your own, yep, what are your hopes and dreams for them?
They've got brains, they do go to school all the time. Yeah, I've got my eldest daughter and who's almost finished year twelve, and she's straight into her health worker's course straight after school holidays and the other ones in year ten and yeah, she's pursuing what she wants to do now through the VET courses through school.
I'm at Charles Creek Camp, just on the edge of Alice Springs. It's its own little community at the bottom of a hill. I'm talking to her in a while we talk. Her kids are playing nearby, still in their uniforms, just home from school. They're burning off that last bit of energy before dinner and settling in for the night.
I want to't know what it's been like to live here under the glaring spotlight of governments, but never to be seen, only monitored, to live a life within the ever tightening parameters decided by the state, the latest one being the curfews imposed earlier this year. Kids weren't allowed on the streets after six pm. It was horrible.
Like I've just finished the season being an under seventy's coach for the girl's side into Alice. It was a bit hard because we had to bring our training times earlier just so the kids could be home before the certain time, which was silly because none of my girls was involved with any of the rubbish that was going on around town and it really affected our training ways. So yeah, it was pretty stupid that we got affected from it, really bad.
It's kind of the typical thing that happens in the territory is that everyone gets tired with the same brush because you know, a certain number of people are playing up and then everyone has to suffer as a result. Is that the way you feel, Yep, exactly the way I feel. It's you know, it's not our problem.
It should be brought upon their guardians, their parents or whatever with whoever's doing wrong.
Yeah, and so no one's talking to each other. I mean, that's what it seems to me. No one's actually you can sort of like enforce the law. You can bring in curfews, you can bring in the interventions through the army and stuff, but actually no one's actually sitting down and talking with people to find out what the problem is and what the solution is.
Yeah, that'll be right if we could do that. But no one's game enough to get out and talk about it.
So, yeah, it must be pretty exhausting.
Yeah, it is being locals and liveding all our life, So yeah.
You see a long term future here for yourself and your family At the moment, no, So where would you go? Oh, somewhere out of Alice Springs. Hopefully it's not so much the crime wave that's driving Renee out of Alice Springs. It's been the response to it. People who are trying their best are looked on with suspicion. It's tiring having to prove yourself time and time again to do the little things, go to the shops, drive a car, raise
a family. Every Aboriginal person here is under the same pressure. The thing that needs fixing is not Renee or her family, but they continue trespassing on their lives by clerks and coppers. She's not alone wanting to leave Alice. Those who can afford it are packing up and leaving. There are for sale signs everywhere you go in town. There's a glut of homes in the market. So what are the people
that remain want. What's working or needs to happen to make things work, the little things that can make a big difference. I'm Daniel James from Schwartz Media and seven AM. This is Ella Springs Episode three in Bartway.
Thank you everyone. What an incredible group of dedicated, hard working Territorians. How good is it to be Territorians Tonight.
There's a new government in the territory and its leader has promised solutions. Earlier this year, Lea Finiguiaro became the new Chief Minister of the Northern Territory. She won on a landslide, almost completely wiping out the Labor Party from Parliament, reinstalling the Country Liberal Party to power.
As are born and Bred's second generation Territory Q the granddaughter of Italian migrants. I grew up living an iconic territory childhood, hunting, camping, fishing and playing outside. I always knew the territory was a special place and I was lucky to be a Territorian growing up here.
The new Chief Minister's just turned forty, but she's been in Parliament for thirteen years. She's clp through and through as much a part of the political establishment as you can get. Here. The dawn of this era looks strangely like the old one. It's another territory and looking back at this place as they remember to get back to those times. The new Chief Minister will be implementing her tough on crime agenda.
Territorians have stood up against nearly two decades of escalating crime and economy going backwards, and the erosion of our once iconic lifestyle. But tomorrow is the start of a new day and a new shutter.
She's promised to lower the age of criminal responsibility to ten, tightening already type bay all laws skills, will have truancy officers, and there's the threat to restrict government benefits for parents of kids who misbehave. Police will be given more powers to search kids as young as ten if they're considered suspicious.
The greyest of law enforcement criteria spit hoods banned after the Don Dale Ryal Commission, will be back the prison itself in the midst of a makeover, new and improve the house, all the incarcerated children to come.
CLP are proposing on the issue of you crime to reducing the age of criminal responsibility back to ten from twelve years of age. Yes, what experts have said that this is a good idea? And what have they said?
Well, the experts of the CLP listen to are the everyday Territorians who are out there sick and tired of being victims of crime.
We had holy promises, so they're her solutions. But what about the locals. Before we came to Waller Springs, we called a lot of people, elders, lawyers, health workers, a lot of people who have been fighting over decades to try and improve the plight of people living here. Blair McFarland's name kept on coming up, so we set up a meeting with him. We meet him at the Olive Pink Botanical Gardens, the desert gardens, nestled at the base of one of the hills of the Eastern McDonald Rangers.
The sky is blue and the morning sun is warm a blaze game. After decades of work on the front line, he's approaching retirement. And is at the point where he can tell it like it is, call out anyone or any agency that needs to be called out.
Yes, I'm Blair McFarland. One of my things is that I'm twenty twenty four empty Australian. Every year I say that, so you know, I've got a little bit of generally sort of acknowledged cred in case you've never heard of me, which, of course the past majority we'll never have.
Blair arrived here in the mid eighties from Melbourne and fell in love with the place and the people. Petrol sniffing was a sporadic problem when he arrived, but by the start of the New millennium the problem became more and more prevalent, until it turned into an unrelenting wave with no sign of stopping.
It's an issue that's played remote indigenous communities for decades and its effects are devastating.
Petrol sniffing is on the rise.
In the top of two thousand and two, Blair established the Central Australian Youth Linkup Service KALOS to support young people sniffing petrol. Blair himself had first hand encounters with people he'd attempted suicide as a result of sniffing. One man he saved went on to save another from a similar attempt.
Blair McFarland is the manager of Kayalus. He's speaking with Kathy van Extell.
And so the youth are rumming around with a real feeling as like nobody cares about us. It's definitely contributed to a feeling of unease on the street in our springs, like a lot of people are really concerned about it, like they're nice kids around.
Through Kalus, he advocated for the Low Aromatic Fuel Act in twenty thirteen, which resulted in a ninety five percent drop in petrol sniffing. It was as close as you could get to ever solving a complex problem in this part of the world. But this is different, This crisis as much worse.
It's really quite different because basically a petrol snipper is like a zombie, you know, they sort of they stumble around, they've got a can against their face, they don't seem to see anything. So that's what it was like then,
and they're doing themselves serious damage. But now it's really contrasting to that, And the now is a bunch of kids with ADHD fas D global developmental delay they're hungry, they're wired, they're sort of their traditional authority systems have been undermined by colonization for generations, and this is what Alice Springs is now facing, the karma that we're facing because of policy decisions made a generation ago.
But no one in politics is talking about that. It seems like they're only thinking as far ahead as the next electoral cycle will allow.
I think that there are so many players here operating in their own on their own agendas, that it's actually what a mathematician will call a chaos field, a field where there are so many decisions being made that it's really unpredictable in which direction things will go. And that's I think what you're feeling here. There is no plan,
like you know, the crime stuff. They're saying, oh, we'll put everybody in jail, So like, is that the plan that everybody in the Northern Church wy will either be a prisoner or a warden by the year twenty fifty.
Lowering the age of criminal responsibility back to ten?
I know what, lecg to six?
That'll be more fun.
This is crazy.
What do you got to say about it? Oh?
It just it's a crazy, desperate foolish thing that in no way affects you know, what's making those kids criminal. If they wanted to do something about that whole scene, you'd put a lot more resources into diagnosing and treating all of those things.
His view echoes experts who say, not only does tough on crime not work, it's a potential breach of human rights when it comes to kids in prison or detention or whatever you want to call it. What the state's doing is swapping one culture for another one where the cycle of crime and punishment becomes the norm. Throwing children in detention and placing them in previously banned spit hoods can and will have psychological and cognitive impacts on kids development.
Even though the strategies won't work, people have lost hope to fight against them. This is the mandate the government has. Despite less than forty five percent of enrolled voters in Bush electorates casting a ballot, Blair says the low voter turnout is linked to the outcome of the Voice referendum as well.
Yeah, I think the referendum made Aboriginal people even more cynical than before. For about what's the point, Because I think a whole lot of Aboriginal people became really enheartened, but the whole voting thing and didn't vote. Like in the electric I ran and there were six and a half thousand people registered to vote and two and a half thousand voted.
Blair ran as a Greens candidate in the recent election and lost. Greens threw a rare breed in the territory, perhaps his last attempt to force change in our springs and beyond. So Blair, what needs to be done?
I don't know what, I don't know. I've tried everything, nothing nothing works.
Blair contributed a lot more than most, but ultimately change here is going to come from somewhere else. After the break. One man in his family in the middle of the desert, trying their best to help the children of him Bantua break the cycle. It means Ruby and I are going on country.
These are the biggest spurces you've ever seen.
So have we seen Amia? The other day?
Just over there around we just picked up a baby printing about that big.
His head was stuck in a can.
So we surrounded. Can you describe where we are? I mean we're surrounded by rocky escarments with McDonald Range.
East of McDonald Rangers.
I think this is the Ondulia side of the Baranta country, and over here there's a great significance of connection to this country.
That's the three caterpillars.
And Gelco is my great great great grandfather, and.
He's not too far from him.
We've come here at a cracking time of day, late afternoon, the sun low over the McDonald ranges on the horizon. I'm with Damien the Fellow. He's been our unofficial to a guide. We're out at his favorite place, the place where he tries to make a difference to what's happening here. His generosity helped us a great deal for this series. But now we're at his outstation, the spot that made us want to speak with him in the first place.
All what you see is what I've accumulated out of my own pocket. This machiney, I've only bought that cheap, but it's done in me some some world of greatness.
There's caravans for smokeo and to shelter from the weather. There's fences, gates and pens, and there's horses. What's this fellow's name.
There's a malon. She's a mayor.
How much I know about horses.
That's emma melon, chopsticks.
This is my my big ouse.
He's a big fire many as.
Sixteen sixteen nuns and the other one other side of him, DJ and groom up the back.
That's the biggest source of ever scene in my life.
He's a most gentlest one. Yeah right, he's raised all.
The Emma melon and chopsticks. I looked after by kids who come here from town, kids who spent time in detention, or kids with substance issues. Damien calls the program all rounder.
I got a young black that I'm training justin and he's getting ready to race again, so he's probably going to raise chopstick or this big follow you.
So we'd get kids out of here.
Numbers of thirty twenty nine different different young fellows, different ages. We could either be doing identifying bush medicine or trees to make bush tools out of we do what do you call it a cultural conversation. Half of the group might want to do the horses, like brush them down, and we'll get the other half prepared to saddle and then we'll switch so they both get two learning sessions
out of the one day. And that could be the mechanics or that could be the fencing, or that could be the cooking, or the artwork or the fitness side of things. So we break it down for the one day, but split it in twos.
So by the time the kids have come through the program, what will I know how to do that they didn't know how to do before they got eat.
Well, here's the thing.
When you talk about pioneering days, everything was built on how much skills you had and how useful you could be on country.
So we tried to give them all those skills. So I for job presented itself.
They'll be trained in stable ways, so our job wouldn't sort of cause them any fear to apply for one or But we normally aim to explore their talents and expose out of talent and push them into that sort of workforce because then they'll stick at it because they love doing it. So we do, you know, all sorts of stuff worlding, fencing, mechanics, cooking, artwork, horsemanship. I believe from what I've seen, I've seen a lot of change. I've seen a chemical here that actually works.
What's that chemical?
The chemical is back on country and just being that peace with country and animals. It gives a different approach. When you're trying to educate someone or talk to someone, they have the time to take it in.
All round, it is a working work in progress, and Damien's reasons for starting the program are deep.
From the origin behind it is.
My dad is a cattleman and a person before him grew up in a home starting generation, very resilient. Yeah, took on different skill set because that's what was required back in the day.
As a kid, Damien's dad, Dennis, was forcibly removed from his family and sent to Darwin. Somehow he escaped and returned to his country, where he became a ringer on a cattle station. Through years of skilled and hard toil, he went on to become one of the first Aboriginal owners of a cattle station. I've seen footage of Jennis. Damien looks and sounds just like him.
I was raised in bush on cattle stations, seeing my dad doing it.
But to be creative was the key for.
Me in life. Damien, like many of us do, worked a series of jobs, many of them a long way from his true passion, but in aid of his people. Nonetheless, what were we doing before you started the program?
I was an officer at a Bailey facility called Sodwish and we were trying to keep him from not getting locked up and keep him from coming back. And then I heard about his other programs that's been delivered, but his kids were still reoffending. But that was receiving so much funding every year. And I come to think about it, what where's all his money going? Because there's a lot
of money getting chucked around, but there's no change. So I created an idea for my program that was based on my dad's upbringing, from his pioneering days.
To find the path forward, not only for himself but his community. Damien would be guided from within. He could look to his own flesh and blood for the trail out of the mess. He would look to his own father. Dennis passed away a couple of years ago, but his name and memory live on. Damien has called the land We're on r DK Outstation after his old man, Roy Dennis Kunos. That means that every kid that gets a helping hand here will have Dennis to think as much
as Damien. He believes that small, black run and own programs like this can help kids heal, reorientate their lives and help them in a way that locking them up never will.
I don't think there's too many programs like mine. I think it's pretty unique how it's designed and where the origin comes from. I've done a little bit of work. Most of my work has been pretty good. I'd like to expand. I like to have young people out here full time, just caretaken for the animals and getting a wage. At some point in time, eventually I'll run a little
bit of cattle. I can introduce that cattle industry back in to these young people's lives, given them an opportunity to chase call in the yard brandom and mark them and just teach them a bunch of skill to be self sufficient back on their own country. And I've seen a lot of programs like I was saying, they get a lot of funding, but there's no real outcome. I'd like to be the first that could create outcomes before I receive any type of funding.
I was mesmerized by the setting and what Damian was doing, but there was one question I was dreading.
Would you like to go for iron?
Not a chance. I mean, it's not that I'm not a fan of horses, It's that I fear that they won't be a fan of me. Damien Son Bison is of a similar mindset. He's been with us all day, but he's quiet and shy, especially around the animals. Do you ride the do you want any even Bison?
I don't know for anymals.
Yeah, he'm hered my big one that was last year. Yeah.
This plug lives up and down. Yeah, but he occasionally come down and visit.
Check out. I'm doing check out the program doing.
Sof Bison's eighteen, but he's a young eighteen. Despite his shyness, he's been warm and friendly with us and has a dry sense of humor, well aware of his surroundings and mindful of what he has to say. What's it? What's it like living in Al Springs? Slipper messed up there? You're eighteen? Yeah, and what do you want to do with your life from here?
I haven't got to that point yid.
It's a big question, isn't it. What about what your old man does? Nah?
I don't know, to ode horses and stuff.
You feel lucky that you've got someone like your dad as a as a role model. That's kind of, you know, been a bit of a bacon for you and your siblings. Yeah, pretty much. In my mind, Bison wasn't example of a kid on the right path. If he played his cards right, he could stay at arms distance from the system, avoid becoming hoovered up by it, and part of the cycle. He has a loving family. His dad's a local leader
and a role model. The outstation is an oasis in a desert of disarray, somewhere where you can point to the chaos elsewhere and know from where you stand you can keep it at bay. I thought he was one of the lucky ones. But it's wrong to assume any think about this place. Ruby Bison and I were sitting in the car when we started chatting. At first, just small talk about life at the station.
One time I came here when my dad was forcing me to come live water for the horses and you yep, but I took the wrong track.
And others got stuck upset on the other road.
But as we drove on, Bison started telling me something complicated all path.
So when were you up in Darlin?
I was coming back. When's there?
Oh really?
And so why were you up there?
Court issues?
Yeah?
As a youth?
So wait were you You weren't in Dondale or anything.
Wait, oh you were oh shit for nine months? What was that like?
It was a little bit scary at the first part of it.
It took a while that to sink in. This young fella that we're getting to know a gentle soul had just spent nine months, fifteen hours up the road in the infamous don Dale, US detention facility. He says he felt pressured into crimes that landed him there.
There's people period, like people they don't like the they'll be with that forcing stuff like forcing you to do this, forcing you to do that.
That'll bring down like be weird onto you.
Oh you little female log you know, like you're scared, you know, like that, and they make it more tempting.
But that's all behind me now.
Yep. In don Dale, Bison quickly learned to keep his head down. They gonna get rough with.
You first times, but a little bit like I claim to them now, you know, because I'm a long away from home and that's what I was thinking.
I had a spring with them a long way for now. Yeah, it's.
Yes, right, small town like different.
Bison story is a reminder of the importance of programs like All Rounder, and perhaps it wasn't a coincidence that Damien started the program around the same time Bison was sent to don Dale. Three generations of arunder man Dennis Damien and Bison, somehow working together. The giant caterpillars that formed the McDonald Rangers in Urunda culture can be seen in the distance. The dreamtime stories are as beautiful as
the landscape itself. But in twenty twenty four, the thought of what could happen to kids like Bison and the ten year olds that could serve time in the facility in which he just come from makes the beauty of the landscape and the people here ache that little bit more.
Hello, Hello, Hello, Later, as the sun fell lower and the dust became redder, I was drawn by the side of Trimeria, Damien's youngest, just thirteen months old, blonde hair, olive skin, and.
A cheeky smile. We would have dubbed a creamy back on order order country, But this is her land and it's where she's meant to be.
How long has she been looking for?
Just started a couple of days now.
As she todds her way through the same dust her ancestors played in through the millennia, it reminds me of what we've seen during our time here. Are more her problems than anyone else's. Even though she's born into a loving family with strong role models and big hearts, the fact that she's born and will be raised on her land means she will face a battle to become whatever she desires, a problem that children the same age but
born elsewhere will never have. That is the great injustice of it all, and that's the heart of the problem, at the heart.
Of this country. This is in Bartois.
This Is Alice Springs has written, reported, and hosted by Me Daniel James Ruby Jones co reported and executive produced the series. Shane Anderson is our senior producer. Sarah McVeigh is our editor. Chris Dgate is our associate editor. Original compositions by Zolton Fetcho, mixing by Travis Evans. We have production support from Atticus Bastow and Zaia Tangrau. Additional recording by Lloyd Barrett. This Is Ala Springs was made on
Arranda were Agerie wre Andrei and Dara will Land. Thanks to everyone who spoke to me on and off the record and welcomed me into their lives.
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