Francine told us that the confusion about native title and the PBC was impacting on families’ understandings of traditional decision-making and causing disharmony. Francine said that confirming decisions had not been a problem yet because everyone knows who is responsible for decisions on particular country. However, the issue of succession planning had arisen in Tennant Creek regarding who would have what role in the future when it comes to traditional decision-making about Country. Francine herself had identified the need to address this brewing problem. She knew the community and was able to effectively consult with them because she had a personal role in the community as well as her professional role at the CLC. She also knew the right professionals to engage, and how to access grant funds to do so. Francine described the formal process that she and the CLC facilitated to address this source of disputes by providing knowledge and clarity around people’s identities and roles. It involved consultants working closely with the group, the group identifying together the process they would use, an anthropologist with experience in the area, and a long term CLC staff member who had worked with members of the previous generation through the Land Claim process. The outcome was that the process itself and the resulting chart gave people an understanding of where they fitted in and the ability to reference back to it when misunderstandings arise. Francine talked about the various initiatives that she is a part of at the CLC to educate native title holders and PBC members and directors as this need became apparent. She also discussed her efforts to try and engage with Government and other organisations, such as ORIC, who play a critical role for native title-holding communities. At the time of her interview, the CLC had just finished their second PBC Regional Forum at Ross River and had been speaking with ORIC about developing a training manual for people in central Australia. Francine drew particular attention to the fact that most of the work of PBC directors is unpaid, including the bulk of the work associated with the many ongoing projects and negotiations in Tennant Creek. This makes proper participation hard for many people trying to work, fulfill caring responsibilities, and fulfill other community responsibilities and governance roles in other community organisations or advisory bodies. In Francine’s experience, most PBCs have suffered from a severe lack of resources up until relatively recently. Francine saw a huge difference in the capacity of PBCs to get people to meetings and provide people with information when the Commonwealth Government started providing additional funding to PBCs in 2017. In the NT, it has enabled PBCs to access a lot more support from the CLC: ‘more legal support; have a PBC officer assigned to them so that they can actually have some regular meetings, not just the four meetings that are required per year under the rule book.’ 76 Women in Native Title: Native Title Report 2024