What does Occupy Melbourne stand for: Motions passed at General Assemblies

Most of the above is fine as it stands, but it doe snot represent an actual policy platform as such. It can be broken into several parts, such as "motions of support," as well as one or two actual policy statements, such as endorsement of a Treaty and opposition to militarism, and a broad based statement of recognition of aboriginal sovereignty, which might be a sort of precursor to "the first declaration of Occupy Melbourne."

So, to clarify, the movement has the stated proclamation that:

Melbourne is occupied territory. Australia is stolen land. Sovereignty was never ceded. We have come together to occupy Melbourne. We cannot ignore that we do so in the context of another occupation: the violent colonisation of this continent. We are here because we want a genuine democracy, a humane economy, justice. We cannot achieve these goals while the crimes of colonisation continue. An end to colonial activity is central to our aims. A racist society has socialised us all into racism. We will strive to recognise and respond to racist behaviours in our occupation of Melbourne and we invite criticism of our actions; we want to be better.(1st GA)

It has a policy of:

That Occupy Melbourne recognise the custodianship and true sovereignty of the indigenous people and stand beside them in fighting for a treaty.(8th GA)

It has another policy that:

End to the wars, Australian troops out of Afghanistan. That occupy Melbourne take an official stance against Australian government’s military occupation anywhere in the world, and for our troops to be removed immediately (2nd GA)

Apart from these, it has some endorsements of actions by third parties, which do not represent the policy of Occupy Melbourne.

Some of us want to see the creation of a policy working group, open to everyone, where we can detail some more of our platform, and perhaps formalise some policies that promote the sorts of aims and objectives that are being worked through in the draft of "First Declaration of Occupy Melbourne."

Everyone is invited to be involved. I personally think we need to think carefully about policy positions that we adopt. We need to be very precise int he wording, and we need them to be what people will generally recognise as just. They ought not to be what we personally promote, they ought to be what can be successfully promoted in the broader community. That is what I think. Haphazardly promoting policy works to create chaos. Some amongst us believe in chaos. That's well and good. I'm heading towards my fifty third summer. I wouldn't mind trying to create a little order out of the chaos.

The "First Declaration" has not been adopted and is not a policy statement, it is a framework for policy. Some people argue that we should be without policy. That by determining policy we are only playing the game of the media more generally. But the Internet is also media. We can control the promotion of our own ideas. We don't have to let the general media hijack the things we believe in. But to stand for nothing except the right to stand for nothing just seems to not cut it, to my mind.

Re the Draft Declaration.

"across the globe" would be better "around the global". Across is just opposite point on a globe, around is all the way around the globe.

"In the name of freedom" etc would be better "Affirming freedom" etc.

In Our Vision

"We believe this requires fundamental" etc may read better as "We acknowledge this requires fundamental" etc

Re "We believe that there is nothing more powerful than engaged people .. etc"

I disagree with this wording. The Big Bang that created the universe would be "more powerful" and so would a solar flare or a rogue comet that could destroy all life on earth. The sentence is just badly formed.

Re Our Group

The word "all" should be replaced with the word "many" in the second sentence.

We DO NOT really "welcome, support and are comprised of all(sic) ethnicities, .. and faiths" do we? Eg. We currently have no eskimos or many other ethnicities in Occupy Melbourne and I doubt we'd welcome or support such faiths as "satanism" or the followers and worship of the god Kali which requires human sacrifice. The thuggee from which the modern word thug derives would not be welcome at Occupy Melbourne I suspect. And flat earthers might not have fullsome support either.

This language "all" is too inclusive.

Our Process

Similar problem with the word "all" being too inclusive and sweeping in second last sentence.

"We strive to live our values to the best of our ability, by reflecting our commitments to inclusive democracy, justice, community in *all* (sic) our actions and pursuits".

Better to just leave the word "all" out of the sentence. I am not committed to community for instance when I am simply going to the toilet. Some actions are legitimately solitary ones.

Further how possible is "inclusive democracy"? What of the catatonic? The seriously mentally disabled?

Until I understand what "inclusive democracy" is specificially, in practice as well as in theory, it seems a tad premature for me to just commit to it.

Final sentence. I prefer "stanch" to "unshakeable" in front of the word "conviction". An unshakeable conviction has connotations of close mindedness and a lack of openness to me that reaches beyond firm or staunch resolution.

"Unshakeable conviction" and "humbly" sit poorly together when separated only by a colon.

In conclusion - this is a decent draft guys but it is not yet ready in my opinion, in its current form, to get the endorsement of the General Assembly.

The problem with a wealth tax is that people use such things as negative gearing and trusts to minimise their income. You can't tax something that is not there. For instance, Steve Jobs for the 2010 Financial Year in the US earned $1. He did not pay tax.

So saying there should be a wealth tax needs a lot of work to explain what you mean by it and how it is to be achieved.

I have suggested some measures that would effectively see the rich taxed, you could have, for instance, a luxury goods tax, you need to abolish negative gearing, which allows the rich to buy properties with paying for them and writing off losses against their income, you need to introduce death duties, so that a person's wealth at the time of their death is taxed, therefore if they have accumulated wealth that has not been taxed it will be taxed when they have died and their total estate is measured, and you can tax companies with marginal tax rates, increasing the rate of tax for higher earning companies, effectively taxing super corporate profits.

There are some other policies I would pursue. Such as increasing the dole for 18 - 21 year olds, who effectively have to live off $200 per week. If they have full voting rights as adults they should have full rights in other ways.

No uranium mining seems like a damn good policy to me.

But I think if we are to embrace the intent of the "declaration," whatever form it finally takes, we ought to pursue policies that solidify and extend social justice, and to counter injustices. There should be a policy that the disparity between rich and poor be reduced, rather than seeing it increase as it has over the past twenty years. And the suggestions to do with tax would form part of this policy.

Austudy ought to be in line with the adult rate of the dole, each of which is calculated based on one's personal income. The problem is the disparity between 18-20 year olds and those over the age of 21, who are treated differently by the authorities.

On Uranium, a spokesperson for the right of the labor party was speaking more broadly, not just on the export of uranium to India, but on opening up new mines in Queensland and WA. And his reasoning was equivalent to Gillard's, "good for jobs, good for Australia."

Uranium is dangerous. If we want to know how dangerous just look at Fukushima. And it's waste cannot be safely disposed of, it remains dangerous for half a billion years. We do not profit from uranium. Only the corporations profit. Mining is not a big employer. We need investment in manufacturing and the service industries, not in uranium mines. This should be a no-brainer, but maybe it's just that I grew up in the 70's, where it was simply rational to be anti nuclear.

If anyone from the media team is around can you tell me why I can no longer post a message here http://occupymelbourne.org/how-to-get-involved/discussions-forum/ , I mainly wanted to say how nice it is that we can finally see every post, even those critical of the Occupy movement, and it would be great if we could all have an explanation for why it was previously censored and controlled so that our freedom of expression was denied.  It boggle my mind that this was the case.  But now it will not allow me to post anything.  The OM website feels like a lost child, it is really badly neglected and some of this debate happening here should be happening there, but it is so badly run that we couldn't expect that it would work, or that our posts would even get published.  Surely there is someone on the ground in the Occupy movement with the wherewithal to organise this website a little better.  Indeed, on that very page that I have linked, there is a message from someone who wants to be involved and knows all about web design.  I'm bereft to know why his offer of help has not been acted upon.

Bill, there is no such sentiment. Only the two of us have been discussing this and I certainly don't agree with you on some of what you have proposed. On uranium I strongly object to being associated with your proposal.

And policy is for the GA to decide upon, this is only a place for discussion (if it is even that).

Bill the way to get policy debate happening is to have a discussion group. You and I do not represent a discussion group.

Also, our policies should represent what we believe, not what we think everyone is going to agree to. Certainly we should consider what the GA will agree to, but we don't have to be responsible for what government and the mining industry are going to agree to. We already know what they stand for, that is why OM exists, as a counterpoint to them.

To say that the anti nuke movement has "achieved nothing" is a huge generalisation to make. Labor has had a three mine uranium policy for many decades because of the anti nuke movement. That is why it is an actual debate within Australian society when nuclear power or uranium mining is discussed, because of the achievements of the anti nuclear lobby. We ought to be acclaiming their achievements, not deriding them for their failures.

Odd that the "anti-Nuke" fraction always remains silent on the issue of Iran acquiring nukes. Kind of the same silence one came across during the Cold War when discussing nuclear disarmament from the Soviet perspective. Hmm? Motivated by world peace, or motivated by radical brainwashed communist anti-American nihilism?