"The devil is in the detail" says Dr Webster and she's absolutely right. We don't have a huge amount of details but we do know that because of the work of Dr Webster, Ali Cupper, Nathan Hancock CEO of Citrus Australia and our cross border commissioners , that seasonal workers with visas now qualify for border zone residents permits, allowing the citrus industry in particular to get back to work.

Our $1.4 Billion dollar industry has been in turmoil since NSW closed it's borders to Victoria and we finally have a solution as far as our labour workforce goes.

Dr Webster also has some news on the ACCC inquiry into the water market, including four large investors in the Murray-Darling Basin who are named in the report, including Kilter Rural, Duxton Water, Argyle Capital Partners & Aware Water.

You can read the entire interim report here.

This week we have two podcast debutantes, not that we haven't tried to have Mr Smith on twice before. He's alluded us until now, but he's in to give us an update on the situation facing the Robinvale Golf Club right now. He also let's us in on a little secret about golf lessons with Shane McHenry who is the Club Professional at Murray Downs Golf & Country Club, down the road.

Jack also gives an update 0n Network House and Seasonal Workers border permits from worker that have been crossing the river this week. He has the details, and he has the sewing machine out.

Finally we'd like to welcome brand new podcast sponsor Fisher Developments who are responsible for the beautiful new Irymple hub and we discuss the possibility of a new development in Robinvale which is more exciting that Tay Tay's new album, which also get's discussed, as does Charlie's birthday and the beautiful blue R-Spec Mustang which is looking for it's forever home at Pioneer Ford.

Support your local podcast by becoming a VIP (Very Important Patron) at patreon.com/thevalepodcast

It's important to us that we don't just keep the English speaking community up to date with the rapidly changing situation right now, but as many different language speaking community members as possible.

Thankfully for the 'Tongan community in Robinvale, we have Kato who is more than willing and able to help out with news in language.

Topics covered in this quick update;

• Masks are now mandatory for Victoria from Sunday

• Seasonal worker permits

• Active Covid-19 updates

Support this podcast by becoming a Patron patreon.com/thevalepodcast

Oh how we laughed. We had to. What else is there left to do?

A politician, a paramedic, a Naval officer and a farmer sat down for a chat...

Sound like the beginning of a joke doesn't it? It's not, it's this week's podcast! And just a word of warning, the language is a little loose in this one so parental guidance is recommended for those under the age of 15.

This is our 50th weekly episode! Hooray and given that 80% of Australian podcasts don't go over 10 episodes, we're incredibly proud to reach 50 already!

However, community broadcasting is more critical than ever, as is fact finding and conversations, so we will keep pushing onward and upward from here.

We had to catch up with Ali to answer some more questions about the border closures and use of the Sturt Highway and Donny gets all fired up about his ol' mate Daniel Andrews!

Jason Hicks, Colin's eldest child and if you ask Tracey or Sam they will say the favourite child, has been deployed to Dubai on a 6 month mission so we wanted to find out what on earth is going on in the Middle East to warrant calling a Warrant officer back OS. He wouldn't tell us and that's fine. I don't think we need anything else to worry about, but we did have a good catch up with Jason and will do again before he gets home.

Anita from RDHS is in again to let us know that face masks are now mandatory within RDHS and we're more than happy to live with that.

Then we talk about taking some mental health leave and coming for a run with us this weekend.

It's full! FULL I tells ya, but we did have a laugh and that is all we can ask for at the moment.

You can hear the full 30 min+ interview with Ali & see the Zoom chat with Jason if you're a VIP now on your Patreon feed. If you're not a VIP, you can become one here: patreon.com/thevalepodcast

Getting messages out in as many languages as we can is important to us given we live in such a diverse community and Kato is kind enough to donate her lunch hour to update her community in language.

If you would like to offer your services to broadcast important messages in language, please feel free to contact us.

Keeping up with the rule changes regarding our border communities is a battlefield, but we're trying to keep you up to date the best way we can.

Here is Dr Anne Webster, Federal Member for Mallee on the reopening of the Sturt Highway.

Did you know there's a mini series being filmed in Robinvale right now?

Gerard Veltre from Phunktional Arts is on the phone, because he's directing the whole thing via Zoom! The things we do during iso!

Aunty Rose also came in for a chat, although Charlie may not have quite explained what a podcast exactly is, but it was well worth it.

Yes, it's a long episode, but seriously, what else have you got to do?

Become a Patron patreon.com/thevalepodcast

We've all heard about the plight of parents whilst trying to juggle the pressures of home schooling, but it's taken a while to get hold of any young people to give us their perspective.

Maybe it's fear of embarrassment, but that's not what we're about here. It's just having a conversation that everyone gets to hear, so Miss Scarlett came in to give us her perspective and to show up her Uncle, and tell some stories out of school about her parents! Sorry Lucy! :-) But your daughter is hilarious!

Leanne Adcock, Director of Clinical Services at RDHS is in for a Covid update for us also and we always love catching up with Leanne who has been at RDHS now for almost 25 years!

Recorded and streamed live to our Facebook feed & YouTube channel at 1pm Wednesday 8th July 2020.

The audio didn't work the way we wanted it too in the live stream with Ali Cupper MP - Independent for Mildura this morning, in fact, I'd give myself a fail when it comes to driving the desk today.

I feel like Deano from Nova 100's Chrissie, Sam & Browny!

However, I did record the conversation which is available in your podcast feed now, but if you still haven't figured out podcast feeds, we have this fancy little waveform video for you.