Minutes/NSW/2013-02-23

Meeting Minutes This document is a record of a meeting. Do not edit this document without contacting the relevant group first.

Attendance

• 10 members.
• 3 guests.

Agenda

• Formation of NSW Party
• Freedom of Information discussion
• National Security Inquiry petition in Senate

Minutes

Formation of NSW Party

• Simon Frew (state coordinator) requested a mandate from the National Council to form the NSW branch. It was granted.
• Constitution working group required.
• Constitution draft must be presented to National Council for approval.
• Motion: to form NSW state branch.
  • All in favour
  • Motion passes.
• Brendan Molloy, Rodney Serkowski and Simon Frew to form Constitution working group.
• NSW gov't has made poor decisions in the past 12 months.
  • Mass corruption.
  • Replaced corruption with more corruption.
  • Ideal place for PPAU to get in and oppose corruption
  • Focus on state issues and go beyond federal issues.
  • Transport, etc, state issues for NSW branch to work on.

Direction of NSW Party

• Mirror federal party congress?
• NSW will be the largest party for a long time – 750 members required
• Federal election builds up popularity and visibility
• $2,000 fee and paper forms, written entirely by hand.
• Register for local elections first perhaps, gives a formal structure to start from.
• Currently no requirement for federal members to also be state members.
  • General agreement that this should be changed.
  • Removes conflict of interest effectively
• Issues in NSW for the Party are about restoring things to a good situation
  • De-politicisation of the police force
  • Making FOI Act more accessible
• Look at changing deputy positions to more specific positions.
  • Warrants further discussions
• Coal seam gas – debated issue

FOI

• Sometime last year an FOI request was submitted RE: TPP.
  • DFAT not going to give you a treaty
• Offered to assist in changing the scope
  • No deadline for such redefinition
• PPQs and Senate Estimates offered.
  • PPQs = prepared questions
• Going to cost nearly $400 to get this info
  • No definition for public interest
  • Last FOI took over three months
• FOI request for details of FOI request regarding ludicrous data retrieval quote.
• One request got rejected nearly outright:
  • MAFTA, JAFTA, etc.
  • All not permitted to be retrieved.
  • Absolute transparency would be nice
• Data retention documents
  • Indicates active want to not consult with public unless absolutely necessary
  • Analysis of documents ongoing
  • Government not concerned with privacy
  • Picked up by Bernard Keane
  • SMH can't figure out an angle

TANGENT: Candidates

• Two Senate candidates from each state funded by Party
• House of Representatives can self-fund
• Territories can run self-funded
• Preselection nomination form needs to be filled
• Must nominate at preselection meeting.

NatSec petition in Senate

• NatSec petition got about 1400 signatures
• Trying to get other people involved met with factional resistance
• Ugly petition didn't do too badly
• Ludlam presenting it in the Senate on Wednesday
• Joint press release with Greens and PPAU
• Should be good publicity for us if it happens
• House of Reps not sitting at the same time as Senate, so it might get some interest from journalists.

State policy development

• States push up to federal level, federal pushes down
• Take federal policy and rework it so that it's good for state level.

Name and policies

• Principles are set out in constitution of party.
• Policies must be in line with those policies.
• We can't dictate what policies can't be adopted.
• More policies will turn people away for sure, but we can't stop members from proposing and voting upon them.
• Evidence vs opinions
• Disinformation and propaganda is not appropriate.