We held our first member meeting of the year in Sydney on the 18 & 19 February. This was an excellent opportunity for our members to discuss our ongoing direction on a number of issues:
• Welfare to Work
• Income Support
• Social Inclusion/Policy
• Employment/Job Capacity Assessments
ACOSS presented on policy options and current government plans and gave us a great insight into their dealings with government particularly around the social Inclusion agenda.
I found the meeting extremely useful as not only did I get the opportunity to meet many of our members, but I got a real sense of the commitment and knowledge of our members and the willingness to move forward on a number of issues. After the meeting in Sydney, we traveled to Canberra and we were able to pass on straight away some of the concerns and issues raised at the members meeting.
Staff from HREOC were very generous with their time, venue and support. David Mason and Michael Small both gave us updated on issues from the HREOC perspective particularly around the UN Convention, DDA Standards and Health and Disability. Thanks go to HREOC for hosting our meeting and providing us with support throughout the two days.