THE AFL has vowed to pay out the Kangaroos' $4.25 million debt and spend a further $3 million buying out its shareholders as part of the Gold Coast relocation package to be laid out today in further detail to the club.

Having set a deadline of December 1 to decide the future of the North Melbourne Football Club, negotiations between the league and the Kangaroos Gold Coast subcommittee were scheduled to begin in earnest today.

With Kangaroos directors virtually split 50-50 regarding the move north, board members Andrew Carter and Stephen Head scheduled talks today at AFL headquarters with the AFL's Gill McLachlan and his Gold Coast team.

Not only has the AFL vowed to plough millions of dollars to underwrite the Kangaroos' potential move, its package, while still not completed, is also expected to include:

■A written guarantee of between seven and eight home-and-away games in Melbourne.

■A special deal for the club's Melbourne members.

■A promise to ensure the club's on-field success in the short-term via priority picks, further potential to pick up uncontracted players and a Gold Coast zone.

■Continuing support of Arden Street as a permanent Melbourne training base for the club and the wider community.

■State-of-the art training facilities and an AFL-funded marketing team to promote the team in the increasingly tough Gold Coast market.

The multimillion-dollar investment in establishing a team on the Gold Coast also includes the redevelopment of Carrara — still the AFL's preferred venue — with more than $300 million and a stadium deal based on Geelong's Skilled Stadium model, in which the Cats profit to the tune of $30 a spectator.

With the board still divided and apparently controlled by maverick shareholders, the AFL Commission also is considering a series of legal options in the event the club's private ownership structure stands in the way of a decision to move north.

One concern is shareholder Peter de Rauch's repeated claim to stakeholders that he has a major controlling influence despite strict rules of governance preventing any one shareholder from controlling more than 10 per cent of the shares.

However, the Gold Coast advisory group has reiterated its warning to the league that any decision to transport an unwilling or divided club would be fraught with risk. While Kangaroos directors yesterday were pointing fingers at the AFL, accusing it of failing to provide key financial details of the proposed relocation, McLachlan said the club was fully aware of its options. "We've presented a package to them and we've provided them with the broad outline of what's involved," said McLachlan, who travelled to the Gold Coast for meetings last week. "The details are not really the issue. The issue is whether or not they decide to establish a home on the Gold Coast and those talks are continuing.

"We want the Kangaroos to be positive and willing about moving. We certainly don't want to push them if they don't want to go."

With member-elected director James Brayshaw likely to preside over the club from December in the event of a "no" vote to relocation, Brayshaw's board colleague Ron Joseph has continued to muster support for the status quo, calling on former coach Denis Pagan and retired champion Glenn Archer to join the board.

However, even Archer and Pagan have conceded in interviews this week that the club's survival in Melbourne is not certain and have called for more time. Archer said the decision should be put off for two years while the Kangaroos tried to make a fist of it from their traditional home.

But the AFL will reiterate to Carter and Head today that it needs a decision before the end of the year, and while it did not rule out extending the 30-day deadline agreed to by both parties, it seems clear a 17th club is a real possibility.

Key AFL administrators and directors past and present have tentatively put up their hands to play a role in the establishment of a new team should the Kangaroos knock back the AFL's package.

Today's talks come as de Rauch continued to accuse the AFL of bluffing in its stated intent to establish a 17th team on the Gold Coast should the Kangaroos knock back the AFL's package. He also attacked club chief executive Rick Aylett — whom he had supported strongly at the start of the season.

De Rauch, despite being removed from the North Melbourne board, remains closely aligned with his former opponent in member-elected director Joseph and has vowed to use his shares to retain the club in Melbourne.

Another key shareholder, Bob Ansett, who favoured the fly-in-fly-out model, also has refused to sell his shares and yet, like de Rauch, has not contributed money to the club since the original float.

While the AFL has not directly threatened to withdraw its funding from the club, the Kangaroos would lose their Gold Coast match revenue — $1.6 million in 2008 — and have no guarantee that the special assistance from the AFL would continue.