Canberra prides itself as being a diverse and welcoming city. But growing up in the national capital was at times traumatising for Mills, whose mother is Aboriginal and whose father is a Torres Strait Islander. “I’ve been called black … everything under the sun,” he told the Spurs website. “As well as abo, darky, blackie, petrol sniffer, n*****, monkey, chimp. But for whatever reason, the worst one out of the lot for me was being called a black c***. Unfortunately it was a constant for me and I just had to get used to it.”