Developing a contemporary Constitution that clearly reflects auDA’s purpose, obligations and role in a rapidly changing digital environment is a top priority. 

To ensure members are at the heart of the reform process, the Board is calling for expressions of interest in a new Member Constitutional Reform Committee.

The six-member committee will comprise a Chair, Deputy Chair and four members. Membership will be evenly split between demand and supply, with three representatives from each group.

The Committee will:

• Consider and review auDA’s Constitution and make recommendations to improve and reform, incorporating detailed consideration of the Objects of auDA and the values of the organisation;
• Evaluate the Constitution to ensure it complies with relevant legislation including the Corporations Act 2001 and other appropriate legislation;
• Be informed by the recommendations of the Cameron Ralph Khoury review and auDA’s strategic priorities, and incorporate such recommendations into any proposed reforms;
• Assess auDA’s Constitution against ICANN’s expectations of ccTLDs and ensure that the Constitution is compatible with current and proposed sponsorship arrangements, and;
• Prepare a draft member Code of Conduct through a process of enquiry and stakeholder feedback.

The Committee will consult with the broader membership and relevant stakeholders. Secretariat and administrative support provided by auDA, and the Committee is expected to report by the end of February, 2018.

Expressions of Interest may be sent to engagement@auda.org.au until 5pm, Thursday 12 October 2017.

The Policy Review Panel is now underway, meeting for the first time in Melbourne last week. The first phase of the Panel’s work program is developing an implementation policy for the registration of second level domain names, otherwise known as Direct Registration.

The Panel has released a Direct Registration issues paper for public consideration and invites submissions on the issues and options presented in the paper.

The Panel invites written submissions by close of business on Friday 10 November, 2017. Submissions can be emailed to policy.review@auda.org.au or by post to: 

Policy Review Panel
C/O .au Domain Administration
PO Box 18315
Melbourne VIC 3001

The minutes from the inaugural meeting are now available to view online, with the next meeting scheduled for Friday 13 October, 2017.

11am AEDT on Tuesday marked the close of the Registry Transformation Project’s request for tender submissions. In all, 9 full submissions were received, responding to the documents provided on the RTP website.

With the closing date now passed, the RTP Evaluation Committee will evaluate the RFT responses addressing the capabilities, benefits and risks of those responses, before making a recommendation to the auDA board late this month. auDA then plans to undertake contract negotiations during November 2017.

Applications are now open for the roles of auDA Independent Chair and Independent Director. auDA has commissioned recruitment agency Hattonneale to run the selection process for these appointments.

Click here to review the position descriptions and details of the application process. Members are encouraged to review the roles and share the link with suitably qualified potential candidates.

Applications close on 6 October 2017.

Long-term demand class member Ian Halson has been appointed to the casual Demand Class Director vacancy on the auDA Board.

The Board received high-quality nominations to the role, which led to two rounds of interviews to inform the selection process.

Mr Halson brings to the Board a mix of technical and commercial expertise and a decade of experience as a demand class member. An owner of domain names across .com.au and .net.au, he is familiar with other namespaces including the .nz and .uk ccTLDs.

The casual vacancy position will run until the 2017 AGM, when members will have the opportunity to vote on the permanent position.

We are pleased to welcome two new staff to auDA who have recently commenced. 

Genevieve Mati has joined auDA as a Policy/Secretariat Officer. Genevieve joins auDA from the NSW Ministry of Health and has considerable experience managing working groups and committees. In her secretariat role, Genevieve will provide support to the Policy Review Panel as they undertake their work over the next 12 months.

Donna Townsend joins auDA as a Policy Compliance Officer. She joins us from Greyhound Racing Victoria and has many years of experience working with compliance and complaints. Donna will help continue to build auDA’s compliance capacity managing and monitoring complaints.

We welcome Genevieve and Donna to the auDA team and look forward to the knowledge and experience they bring to the organisation.

Planning is underway for the 2017 auDA General Meeting, to be held in Melbourne on Monday 27 November 2017. 

A call for nominations and notice of the AGM will soon be sent out to members in line with Constitutional and legal timing requirements.