These are the minutes of the meeting we had in Sydney. It was well attended by a number of relatively new members and volunteers. 

Attendees 

Peter Xing
Gavin Hawke
Prue Fischer
Joshua Baldi
Mick Fitzpatrick
James Coffey
Joffrey Bolche
Jonathan Woods
James Jansson

Introductions and cross over with online meeting

In person volunteers introduced themselves and their skills which included:

• Tax specialist,
• Electrical engineer,
• Mining engineer
• Telecoms (NBN)
• Tech start up founder in low level computer system security
• Salesforce working in IT,
• PhD in economics on sovereign debt restructure
• Supplier risk project management     

Membership growth

Membership growth as a source of funds and volunteers is one of the most important elements of succeeding in the upcoming campaign.

James Coffey outlined the progress so far.

• 30% conversion rate for old members converting to paying members
• Trying to increase conversion of existing members, but need a process for growing membership base
• James Coffey to work with Dylan on memberships weekly

How to grow:

• Volunteers “To do list”
  • Social
  • Contact people they know
• Material for distribution to volunteers
• Video

Potential additional candidates

• Mick Fitzpatrick has a contact in Canberra who could be interested in running.

Online advertising

• Joshua has a contact that can help us manage online advertising campaigns

Other to dos

• Guide to corporate photos - Peter
• Video transcription - Gavin

Policy issues

• TPP: Joffrey will get TPP analysts on board
• Commercial in confidence on closed government tenders: Michael Fitzpatrick thinks this will be a big winner among highly skilled government contractors and good for transparency of government spending
• Panama papers: Peter Xing suggested we do something. Resolved to continue to have open government as an ongoing issue.
• Drugs
  • What about marijuana legalisation - Jonathan
  • Reconsider the rules on personal supply - James Coffey
  • Reconsideration of active ingredients in marijuana for medication - James Jansson
  • Implement the government giving drugs to legit users - Joshua

• Technological unemployment - Mick Fitzpatrick
  • Convince blue collars that they are not going to keep losing their jobs to automations and offshoring
  • Retraining, adult education
  • Change focus to what jobs will be like in 10 years
  • Talk more about skills
• Turing
  • Value chain industries
  • Call out an area of investment - JC
    • Next gen computer manufacturer - JJ
    • Shipping
    • Not cars - personal transport - JJ
    • Ask for bids/industry input for the last couple