Make Melbourne Green

A chance to see the first feature film by the Academy Award winning director Adam Elliot, and hear both the director and producer speak and answer questions.

Mary and Max is a claymated feature film from the creators of the Academy Award winning short animation Harvie Krumpet. It is a simple tale of pen-friendship between two very different people; Mary Dinkle, a chubby lonely eight year old girl living in the suburbs of Melbourne, and Max Horovitz, a 44 year old, severely obese, Jewish man with Aspergers Syndrome living in the chaos of New York. Spanning 20 years and 2 continents, Mary and Max’s friendship survives much more than the average diet of life’s ups and downs. Like Harvie Krumpet, Mary and Max is innocent but not naïve, as it takes us on a journey that explores friendship, autism, taxidermy, psychiatry, alcoholism, where babies come from, obesity, kleptomania, sexual difference, trust, copulating dogs, religious difference, agoraphobia and much much more.

Tickets are available through the Melbourne City Greens, for $25 ($20 concession).

Following The Greens’ great election result, Dr Cathy Oke is now your local Greens Councillor on Melbourne City Council.
Cathy is a partner in a West Melbourne based award winning environmental communication and education consultancy business established with the aim of getting the community, in particular young people, involved in the environment. She has worked or studied in the environment field, specialising in marine and fisheries conservation and communication, for over 15 years. She has a PhD in Genetics.

Cathy has lived in the City of Melbourne for over thirty years. She went to Errol Street Primary School and University High School and her family has a long history of being active community members of North Melbourne, including being passionate North Melbourne Football club members.

Community, a sense of place for all and getting more representation for residents within Melbourne City Council projects are important priorities for Cathy, as is ensuring Melbourne is developed using the best available sustainable design practices.

To get in touch with Cathy, you can email her or call her on (03) 9658 9086.

The Age has today called on other parties to follow The Greens’ lead by openly declaring their affiliations when running in Council elections:

If candidates other than Mr Doyle did not have strong recognition among voters, it is in large part a consequence of the major political parties not openly engaging in local-government elections. Yet the Liberal and Labor parties were certainly involved in the campaigns for Melbourne and other councils, negotiating complex preferencing deals between supposed independents, some of whom were “dummies” running to ensure the preferred candidate’s success. If candidates ran openly under Liberal or Labor banners dummies could not do their work, and the major parties should follow the example of the Greens in publicly declaring their involvement.

The paper also makes the point that:

In the City of Melbourne, Greens mayoral candidate Adam Bandt doubled the party’s share of the primary vote in this election, indicating continued growth in support for the Greens among inner-urban residents — a trend that may explain why a state Labor government did not change the law to remove the disproportionate clout of business votes, and why a newly elected Liberal lord mayor is confident he can work with the Government. 

It’s a sign of the times that Labor finds a closer ally in the Liberals than in The Greens. But as the issues of climate change, transport and Melbourne’s liveability become ever more pressing, we’re proud to offer a real alternative to the old parties. Read The Age’s editorial here.

Less than 24 hours into the job, new Lord Mayor, Robert Doyle, has already caused a furore by announcing he’ll open Swanston Street to traffic. If you oppose this plan and want to see Swanston St turned into Swanston Walk, leave a comment on our site and join this facebook group. Watch this space for further campaign events to make Swanston St bike and pedestrian friendly.

Thank you to everyone who voted Green or helped us with our camapign.

Overall, we effectively doubled our vote since the last Council election.

We are delighted that Dr Cathy Oke has been elected to Council. She will be a fantastic representative for Melbourne locals.

On the leadership ticket, Adam Bandt and Kathleen Maltzahn got the second highest vote behind Robert Doyle. It is a great result that shows the growing strength of the Greens in Melbourne.

Some big decisions will need to be made over the next few years about climate change, transport and the future of the city. The strong Green vote this election sends a clear message to the new Town Hall to make Melbourne Australia’s most sustainable capital city.

Voting for Melbourne City Council has closed.

For other councils voting on Saturday 29 November, follow this link.

You will get (or already have) two ballot papers in the Melbourne City Council elections: one for Council and one for the Leadership Ticket (Lord Mayor and Deputy Lord Mayor).

For Council, just mark ‘1′ above the line in the box marked ‘The Greens’.

For the Leadership ballot, our suggested How to Vote can be found by clicking ‘Read more’ below. The order you put your preferences is up to you, but YOU MUST NUMBER FROM 1 TO 11 OR YOUR VOTE WON’T COUNT.

(more…)

In a detailed analysis by the Public Transport Users Association of the various teams’ transport policies, The Greens have scored an ‘A’ and topped the field in the Melbourne City Council elections. Here’s how everyone fared:

You can find our polices by following the links on the right, or read the PTUA’s assessment here and The Age’s article here.

Watch and listen to video of Adam Bandt, our candidate for Lord Mayor, explain his vision for a green Melbourne in less than 90 seconds. Click on the picture below.

The Greens today released their final policy, Community and Services, with Greens Senator for South Australia, Sarah Hanson-Young.

AAP has a good summary of the highlights of this policy. The highlights include:

• Council offering to buy the East Melbourne and Melbourne Central ABC Learning Centres;
• Fast-tracking the development of community hubs, including libraries, at Southbank’s Boyd High School site and Carlton’s Kathleen Syme Building;
• Defending all open space and parks used by local sporting groups from bad development (particularly the proposed east-west tunnel); and
• Advocating for the reduction of electronic gaming machines within the City of Melbourne.

You can find The Greens’ full Community and Services policy, along with all of their other policies, here.

Regarding the ABC centres, Greens Lord Mayor candidate Adam Bandt said that centres should be run by council, and not for profit.

“It’s a basic social service that should be community managed,” he said.

AAP’s report continues:

ABC Learning, which provides care to 120,000 children, placed itself in voluntary administration last week and its banks have appointed receivers to the company.

Mr Bandt said ABC’s position showed “the appalling things that happen when looking after our kids becomes a money making business”.

Mr Bandt said he hoped other councils would follow his lead.

He said ABC childcare workers would have the opportunity to move to the new structure, guaranteeing all their entitlements.