Our union’s primary concern is that schools cannot currently meet either their legislative Work, Health and Safety (WHS) obligations or their duty of care to both their employees and students while the school term continues.

The COVID-19 crisis has highlighted the social inequality many young people have experienced for too long. While the world tries to manage an unfolding pandemic, this crisis has led to insecurity in housing, income, and study without action from our government. This crisis will affect all aspects of the lives of students and young people. Casual workers, most of whom are students, have no guarantee that they will get paid if their workplace is to shut down or they must self-isolate. Working people need to know they don’t have to make the decision between going to work sick, or self-isolating and not being able to pay their bills. At Universities, our campuses are closing and moving online, while ongoing fears about fees and future of study, especially for international students, remain unaddressed. So many questions remain unanswered, but what we know is that if this continues, bills will stack up, evictions will occur, and income support payments will be lost. In its silence, our government is finalising a generation of inequality for today’s young people. As they move towards announcing their second stimulus package, young workers and students are begging for support. The Morrison government is yet to respond to our concerns. Instead, focusing on lining the pockets of business and giving out one off welfare payments that will fail to bring students out of poverty. Students and young people cannot continue to be left behind. This statement is endorsed by dozens of student representatives from around the country, representing hundreds of thousands of students whose livelihoods and futures are under threat. We are demanding action. The government must finally take leadership during this crisis and support the Australians who have been forgotten. Workers, students, and young people need action to protect their income, housing, and study. To fail at this now will hurt this nation for years to come.

I created the petition based on the myriad of scandals the Morrison government is embroiled in. The prime minister isn’t honestly dealing with allegations of corruption and rorting. He isn’t taking climate action seriously and the political/financial interference of the fossil fuel industry is likely behind that. He’s hell bent on rolling out of the Indue card despite evidence of how it disadvantages the most vulnerable people. And there’s an overall lack of accountability, transparency and integrity. Where is a Federal ICAC? The list goes on. I could also include the unwillingness to implement recommendations from Royal Commissions, the poor response to the bushfire crisis, and the rise of right wing extremism, and claiming a surplus from the NDIS underspend while splashing money around dodgy contracts with Indue, Paladin and others with links to the LNP. I truly believe that if enough ordinary people stand up we can let politicians know that democracy belongs to us and not to them. They should serve the public good and not just be in it for themselves, and the power that comes with their elected positions. When they make bad decisions, they need to take responsibility and be answerable to us. I’m sure there’s enough of us who want to give the prime minister the message: Scotty from marketing - we’re not buying what you’re selling.

On Monday, the Gold Coast Young LNP posted a video that has been widely condemned as racist and offensive. The Empower team was shocked and horrified by the statements made in the video, and did not hesitate to condemn them unconditionally. No such condemnation, or comment, has been heard from Barclay's electoral group - Real for UQU. The attitudes promoted by this video and by Barclay are the kind of attitudes that keep racism against people of colour well and truly alive in Australia, and should be met with outrage, not silence. Unfortunately, Barcaly's behaviour in this video mirrors what many students reported witnessing from multiple Real campaigners during the 2019 UQU election: casual racism and discrimination. Empower stood up to this behaviour then, and we will stand up to it now. These beliefs have no place at our university, or in our student union. Barclay Mcgain must resign.

I joined Blockade IMARC alongside mob from across the country to stand in solidarity with one another to resist the same mining companies we are fighting on our traditional lands. The cops arrested and roughed me up behind the scenes: “I was snatched by the police when I was standing well back and dragged inside and they purposely slammed my head against walls and doors out of the public view with body cameras turned off.” In the aftermath, Dan Andrews has defended the actions of the police. Many arrestees at Blockade IMARC are now faced with huge legal bills. Please chip in to help a legal defence fund that has been setup to support over 80 arrestees like myself defend ourselves in court: https://www.gofundme.com/f/support-activists-arrested-at-mining-conference

The proposed redundancy of Tess comes at a time when she is more needed than ever. Recent changes, budget cuts and instability at Nura Gili Centre at the Kensington campus as well as the shockingly low employment of Indigenous (and, further CALD) staff at UNSW marks this as a part of a larger, ongoing issue at an institutional level that needs to be remedied rather than exacerbated. Diverse staff are crucial to not only the education of students but further, to their well-being. Tess remains one of the few staff members that Indigenous, CALD and other marginalised students feel they can turn to and rely on. As well as her role as a mentor, Tess is also professionally and pedagogically a boon to the institution. Her course Aboriginal Art Now has influenced countless students and has led many to pursue further and higher research - academically, curatorially and artistically - in a more considered and critically rigorous way. In addition, Aboriginal Art Now remains one of the few Indigenous art courses available at UNSW Art & Design. She has also been instrumentally involved in a vast number of exhibitions in the Indigenous arts community in the last 30 years. The volumes of academic, artistic and curatorial output of Tess evidences her prolific reach and influence in the arts sector. As Associate Professor David Garneau suggested, her contribution to the arts sector deserves an honorary doctorate. Her removal would constitute a massive loss to the UNSW community, and the wider ripple on effects of this would be unimaginable.

Climate change is recognised as one of the greatest threats facing us now and into the future. By taking time off school and work together around the world, we're showing our politicians that people everywhere want climate justice and solid commitments from governments to rapidly curb emissions and stop the expansion of fossil fuel projects. We’re striking in solidarity with everyone who’s already being impacted by the climate crisis and everyone who will be impacted if we don’t act now: workers, students, First Nations people, young people, and more. In Australia, the climate strike movement is gaining ever-increasing support from educational institutions and a host of other organisations who recognise the severity of the climate crisis we’re in and the need to act with appropriate urgency, in accordance with the best scientific advice available. Universities, in publicly supporting the right of students and staff to attend the September 20 climate strike, are indeed taking a position that is consistent with the values of academic rigour and scientific integrity held in such high regard by our institutions. The school strikers state on their website: “In Australia, education is viewed as immensely important, and a key way to make a difference in the world. But simply going to school isn’t doing anything about climate change. And it doesn’t seem that our politicians are doing anything, or at least not enough, about climate change either. So, as our contribution to the changes we want to see, we are striking from school.” They, as do we the undersigned students and staff, recognise the need for a rapid transition away from polluting industries, such as coal, oil and gas, and for much stronger political commitments to curbing our emissions and our fossil fuel exports. We call on the University of Adelaide to support students and staff, by providing assurance that we will not be penalised for our attendance at the September 20 Climate Strike.

For a lot of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians, the commemoration of the arrival of the first fleet promotes the highest degree of negativity. The arrival of the first fleet marks the beginning of the oppression of our mob - the continued disadvantage and structural violence perpetrated towards First Nations people began on this day. I am an Aboriginal man whose mob is from the NT, and I am cut up inside whenever I see anything to do with Captain Cook or the First Fleet, because these things represent the suffering that my family have historically faced and continue to face. We do not think this is an appropriate use of tax payers funds, working people earned these funds, including our Mob, and this is a shocking misuse of government money. We want this funding redacted from the government, and you should too! Sign our petition and share with the hashtag #cookisacrook! Like our Facebook page to support our campaign: www.facebook.com/cookisacrook

• The number of Indigenous children taken from their families has doubled in the decade since the 2008 apology to the Stolen Generations. Less than 35 per cent of these children are placed with their Aboriginal family. • Funding continues to be directed to removing children. There is no serious investment in early intervention that help keep families together, or to meet the unmet needs for housing, employment and other basic services, the root cause of the “neglect” that leads many children to be removed. • Once kids are removed families struggle to get them back, with little support provided and a system biased against return. Current reforms are placing children in foster care until they are 18 years old almost immediately and there is a further push to ease restrictions on adoption.

Dylan Voller suffered horrible torture in NT youth prisons from 11 years of age. Incredibly, he has come out of prison and played an inspiring role advocating for justice and positive alternatives for Aboriginal youth caught in the system. His family, particularly his mother Joanne, and sister Kirra, campaigned prominently for Dylan’s release and have played a continuing, prominent role in the campaign to close youth prisons that has taken place through the NT Royal Commission process. Through all of this, the family has been persecuted by the NT police. They are attacking what the Voller’s represent - resilience and power in the face of extreme state violence and a growing movement for change. On Friday September 29, NT police targeted both Joanne and Dylan for arrest at a peaceful demonstration calling to shut youth prisons and for justice for victims of Aboriginal deaths in custody. This was a provocation that led to further arrests, including of black youth simply participating in the rally. The protesters broke no laws and police were unable to lay criminal charges, instead they issued fines for “disorderly conduct”. This arrest of Dylan is being used by NT Corrections to argue that he has breached his suspended sentence conditions, just three days out from him finishing supervision. He must not be allowed to return to prison as a result of participation in a protest, a basic democratic right. Meanwhile, on three separate occasions over a two week period, large numbers of police have come to Joanne’s house, each time in response to a small fire being used to cook kangaroo tails in the backyard. Joanne has broken no law - this is blatant harassment and intimidation. We the undersigned stand with the Voller family. We call for an end to the persecution of the family by the NT Police and other authorities. We call for all fines resulting from the recent protest to be dropped and for NT Corrections to stop any further action against Dylan. We are extremely concerned that there has been no action taken by the NT government to bring the perpetrators of torture on Aboriginal youth in NT prisons to justice, or make any fundamental changes in the way the system is operating. We will stand with all families suffering as a result of this system and fight for Aboriginal self determination in youth justice issues - build communities not prisons! Supporters can contact the office of NT Justice Minister Natasha Kate Fyles on (08) 8999 6743.

Literacy and Numeracy Test for Initial Education Students [LANTITE] and the administration of LANTITE. We can understand your frustration given Education and the COVID-19 pandemic; We believe you can understand and appreciate our frustration in regard to the LANTITE and our inability to graduate. As a result, we implore you for your support in removing the Literacy and Numeracy Test for Initial Education Students (LANTITE) administered by ACER as a graduate requirement. These students have successfully completed the units in their degrees, as well as professional practise in the form of placements. Throughout degrees and placements, the importance of literacy and numeracy is highlighted. We implore you to support the removal of LANTITE as a graduation requirement. In doing so, you will be contributing and assisting Australia’s economic return through this pandemic.

Because TISM