Hi, folks. Let's get started. Welcome to have a new Konnichiwa and haitai, as we say in Okinawa. My name is Heather Young, and I'm the very proud Vice President of Communications and Public Relations at OIST, the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology. I am also the summit's co-chair for Japan. So, before I introduce this session, I would like to take a minute to thank everyone who has worked to make this summit and this session possible. I'd like to give special thanks to the Organizing Committee for their tireless work behind the scenes and for allowing us the privilege to present at the Science Summit of the 78th UN General Assembly. Also, thank you so much to my team at OIST, our partners at ELSI, the Earth Life Science Institute at Tokyo Tech, and the awesome speakers today. Thank you all for your time and energy. And thanks to all of you for joining us. You were in for a real treat with speakers from ELSI, the University of Amsterdam, and Leiden University in the Netherlands. This very, very meaningful session will consider how colonial practices are embedded in many aspects of scientific engagements, including research, policy, education, and outreach. You will hear from three experts from three regions discussing perspectives from astronomy that reflect colonial practices. And to have this conversation at the Science Summit is a privilege. The primary objective of the summit is to understand the role and contribution of science in attaining the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. It builds on work from last year's summit, which witnessed over 1600 speakers from every continent in more than 400 sessions. So the Science Summit brings together folks like you, thought leaders, scientists, technologists, innovators, policymakers, decision makers, regulators, financiers, philanthropists, journalists, and community leaders from around the world. Thank you all for being part of this conversation and this community. Thank you for sharing on the world stage. So, from Tomikusuku to Tokyo to Toronto and Tunis, from whatever time zone you're joining us, I know you will enjoy this session as it informs and inspires you. Over to you, Thelina. Thank you so much, Heather, for helping me with the sessions and also last year, this year, and to welcoming everybody. So, hi everyone. My name is Thelina, I'm an assistant professor at Earth Life Science Institute in Tokyo. I'm from Sri Lanka, but I'm based in Japan now. And this topic, decolonization science, especially for astronomy, is something really close to me because growing up in Sri Lanka and also working mostly with Europe and now in Japan. It's a topic that I'm really passionate about, mostly due to my personal experience. And I also want to introduce the two other colleagues that I know for a long time that joining this this year's session. So, we have Pedro Russo, who's an assistant professor at Leiden University in the Netherlands. And we have Talijus, who is a Dutch equity and inclusion officer, who is also part of the University of Amsterdam, currently in UK, I believe. And so, oh, keep that. And so, yeah, in the first half an hour, each of us will take about 10 minutes and go through the different topics that sort of that we are interested in. And then we have like half an hour, we can discuss and you're happy to, you're welcome to put in some questions, and also we can discuss if you have, if you're willing to come online with your audience video. And, right. So, let me start. Right. But before we go further with the, you know, declines in science, I just want to touch base quickly on what is equalization in general, what does it actually mean to us in general, or maybe it's actually some depending on where you come from it can mean different things as well. And, but, and also if you read about it, there are many different variations, meanings, scholars as written. And, but if you ask from public they also have different meanings and how it relates to, and if you ask from me, I also have different way than a scholar because of that because I grew up in Sri Lanka. And just for the decision we would like to go with the idea of that declines session is an action or a process of state withdrawing from a former colony and leaving it independent. And, and also then restoring justice for cultures, physiological and economic freedom, but these are still existing in many not just in science, many other forms. For example, my best friend works for one of the biggest textile industries, and a lot of these clothes as you find in your Western countries are actually made in these countries in South Asia. And it's a massive industry completely exploited. And in a very colonial way, so this is not just for science and other like many other industries has that it has these issues. And, but here we are here just to focus on science specifically astronomy and take some examples from astronomy. So, and in astronomy, it's really important that sort of we, we, a lot of the questions discussions we have can make everyone uncomfortable. And I have experienced that. And, but it's really important to have these conversations because I think coming in coming in coming from academia, we always believe sort of a like science is science is far from politics, and it's not. It has nothing to do with these kind of issues. But I did one of the, one of the really important things that I always surprised is that science is done by people and people are, are the subject actually created all these colonization and sort of different rules and regulations and putting people into these boxes. And, and it's reflects on science in a lot of ways as well. So, it is very much a political thing doing science, even though we think, you know, there's nothing to do with that. In terms as one of the things I mentioned that I few times that I'm from Sri Lanka, and which is the reason I mentioned that like a topic, especially topic like astronomy. It's very global in the sense, not just these, some of these telescopes are based in, you know, countries where you have most number of clear skies per year. And the way astronomy works is it's very global in the sense like people have to travel to countries that you have the resources. And a good example of this is actually Sri Lanka where we currently have about about a dozen PhDs in astronomy or related sciences. And, and they're all they're all actually outside of Sri Lanka. And it's very difficult to build anything or difficult to actually do anything when every single person who has a PhD tend to go out of the country.  And there's a bit of a difference between what is international staff salary and what is a local salary. And now that I'm in Japan, I have experienced that myself as a foreigner.  And, and this is far more evident in developing countries than actually developed countries. And so access to result financial resources is very much of various. And I think one of the examples is actually the ESO Chile was an example but in recent times this has been addressed and actually fix sort of like addresses issues and improve it. And, but many, there are many other places in astronomy and related sciences where the local and the global salaries are quite different. But there, I mean, this is not an easy issue to also solve because if you if you ask someone from a like let's say Netherlands to move to a developing country. You, you sort of have to provide the resources that person actually needs to based in a in a in that country as well. And, and then if when that person's can click on so you have been the person goes back to the Netherlands. You have to think about this social economics of you know continuation of their life as well. It's a bit of a complex situation but it's something that we all have to be aware and continuously improve through policies, and especially not to make not to abandon the local experts who has expertise to apply for these jobs and so on. And now other thing is that I would like to touch base today is actually colonization outside of earth. And I'm based at an institution that works on origin of life and origin of birth and we are so we are heavily looking at astrobiology and all these new missions are very much of important to us. And so it is very important to whenever we look into, you know, colonization of and does Artemis mission on the way and then there's more of the missions coming up that will sort of aim for moon but through Mars or even a space colony in between. And, and especially space missions like Artemis is actually looking into heavily mining and also colonizing as well. So, and one of the interesting things actually we saw some years ago. Some of these are like Frank sample is a head on the website that Europeans once explorers always explorers. And it's, I think there are two sort of two ways we have to look into one is actually how to change the narratives of these from explorers and discoveries and new words, and these are the sort of like the narratives that were used in colonial times when, you know, the Dutch Portuguese and many other countries expanded in the colonial efforts. But unfortunately, that mindset has sort of continued through space exploration as well. And, and that's sort of like this example from easy as a way to show how that's going into space exploration. And at the same time, the other aspect of this is that what kind of rules and regulations to look into colonization of celestial objects outside of it, which is largely unexplored so it's always the first to be first to do this have will have authority kind of approach right now, and who has the most number of resources also. So these are some of the two really important things when it comes to colonization that need to be addressed and discussed, but not being discussed so much. And yeah, so those are the few topics I wanted to touch base, and I would like to give the pass it on to Tana. Hello, everyone. Thank you for joining us here today and thank you to him and to Lena for kicking things off. I'm going to be talking about two or three different topics on the decolonization of astronomy. And my first topic is the one that is causing and has been causing quite a huge public outcry and was the news of the last three years and that is the topic of where we place our astronomy instruments, our observatories, so major astronomy observatories and installations are often both on indigenous land. So the one that's been in the news a lot lately is the situation in Hawaii and South African, and we are building the square kilometer radio telescope, which will be when it's completed the world's largest science experiment. Not only in South Africa, but also in Australia, and in both those places, these instruments are being bought on indigenous unceded indigenous land, the same goes for Chile and the Canadian islands, and, and other places as well. And so, as I said, unceded indigenous land, we're overlooking the objections and the valid critiques from the people who the land belongs to local communities, and, and this is causing a lot of tension. So it's the kind of the argument thrown against the Trump world, you know, it was fine in the case of Hawaii, we've always had or we've had telescopes here for decades while people are complaining now. And then the counter argument will be well in the old days, no one listened to us. So, so we, you know, now we have things like social media and so on, we have an opportunity or a channel in which to voice our opinions, so it's not. And this is often the case when we talk about historical wrongs, or the status quo and how it got your people will often say, but no one complained that name why can't I use this word, or, you know, in my time, you know, I use people from this particular community, or whatever, and they never said that, you know, they never had a problem when I did this thing or said this thing. And what we need to take into account here is how the balances of power shifting how, you know, people weren't as empowered or were much venturized in a lot of ways, in terms of what they could say and the repercussions they often people are now finding the voice not finding the voices but now finding ways to make the voices heard in a meaningful and effective way. And just because people just because something used to be done doesn't mean that it can't be critiqued and revised and that we should just continue to do something the way that it always has been. And so these colonial structures, for instance, that have been going on for so long. Sometimes people don't even know that that's what the origins of them are because they've been going unchecked for so long. A beautiful example of this is the South African astronomical observatory, where I used to work as well also here in Cape Town where I am. And it celebrated its 200th birthday couple of years ago, and it is the SAO is South Africa's oldest research institution, but it was started by the British as a as an aid for the navigation. So that the ships could, you know, so that they had accurate math of the stars and the sky, and for that they should could navigate the bottom part or the south of the African continent, and further their colonial activities all around the world. And so now it's done, you know, South Africa's oldest research institution is 200 years old 200 years of astronomy in South Africa but the origins of it are very, very different and a lot more sinister.  And so now we're at the really important juncture where we have this opportunity to listen to people to work with people and to empower to empower the people who are the would be original keepers of the land resources and other resources are the natural resources that we're using or disrupting or trying to, you know, infiltrate. And it's, there's some progress and there's still some difficulties, but it's been a very interesting journey so far and we seem to be moving in the right direction. Next slide. Thanks. So education and public engagement. I do a lot of work in both these sectors for astronomy. And what you see is that the astronomy education and public engagement is still very much from a largely Western view of astronomy and science. So this image you can see in the sepia tone is an image that's taken from a astronomy textbook or science textbook for kids, school kids, and it's something that's used in the southern hemisphere, and it shows you the northern horizon it shows you the constellation. And the thing about that is that where I am in take down right now at minus 34 latitude you can't see any of those constellations. So the education that we are giving young people is not child with their love reality. So you're showing people science or trying to introduce science to young people and get them interested and get them engaged, and what they see in the textbook has nothing to do with what they see in their love life. And that is not the way to go about engaging people. And so, also, for instance, the constellations, the names of the constellations, they all ancient three constellations or from ancient Rome, etc. We are not teaching our kids the constellations in the languages that they love in in the languages that they learn in. And it's not because there isn't a lack of, there isn't a lack of these names. Indigenous people from the Australian Aborigines and Torres Strait Island people, various, various Indigenous people from the Americas, from Africa, etc., all over the world and across Asia have their own very intimate knowledge of the sky. You think sky as, you know, as calendars, as timekeeping devices, as navigational aids, the same as Europeans have, but we only learn a specific subset of names. And that's another way to just engage people and make them think, you know, this kind of science isn't for them. And so easy and obvious steps to take would be to go out of our textbooks and make sure that they reflect the love reality of the children that we're trying to teach. So then the science community, Jonathan Marks, who is a, was a professor in life sciences, I think he's from the US, he has a three land definition of what science is. So science is a series of techniques, he says. So, you know, when people think of science, they often think it's collecting facts. So that's a part of a collecting facts, collecting data. Then science is a community of people, the science community who does the science, because science is a human construct. And then it is an organizational hierarchy in conversation with power. And to me, when you have people and you have hierarchies and you have power structures, you have what Elina so beautifully laid out for us already that you have politics. And so, yeah, we're talking about the science community, but now when I talk about the science community, there's a lot of politics involved as well. And the people who do science are expected to put a certain profile in terms of the who they are in their identities as a person. And so science academia and astronomy absolutely as well. It's largely based on the 17th century European social structures, where the people who can do science are usually people who come from money, we don't have family responsibilities etc. There's a feeling in the in Western science which comprises most of what we think of when we think of science that religion has no place in science. People with disabilities are very much excluded as they are in the rest of society, people who don't come from money, people who come from underprivileged socioeconomic background. And there's a lot of evidence that that's one of the biggest one of the biggest factors that contribute to whether someone will stay in science academia is whether they are at the very least comfortably middle class the moment you have the idea that religion is to stay in science and do a career in science. And so all of this is to say that the system of academia how we stated up is not broken we often talk about a broken system when it comes to why aren't they more women in science we often talk about this concept called a leaky pipeline, which implies that you know the pipeline is broken, it's not working as efficiently as it should. I'm here to tell you today that the system is not broken. It was absolutely focused way. This is a feature not about as they say in in computer science circles. So this is that we have about diversity and about who, you know, who can do science who ends up doing science who ends up being allowed to do science, where the money who gets to do what kind of science that is all based on the fact that we have a system that is no longer fit for purpose and is very much both on both up from a culture that came about in the 17th century when colonization really started to kick off as well. And it's not surprising therefore that you see these parallels within astronomy within science academia and within these structures that currently make the world go down. Thank you. Yeah. Pedro. Yes. Hi everyone. Thank you. Thank you for starting with reflection. And maybe I'd like to start by by saying that of course I come from a place of privilege. I am a white European man, I've been educated in some of the former colonial colonial powers, including Portugal, Germany and the Netherlands. And, and this discussion and some of the work and some of the discussions that I've been having for a long time with Helena, and also for quite some time now with Hannah, they've been helping me to reflect a bit about the role of the colonial structures within the formal structures of science and especially in astronomy. And it's one of the fields that I've been trying to explore and be touching and this is really just, you know, in a way, some of these reflections from this conversation. I will, I think, build a bit on the discussion that we had. One of them is about this idea of the knowledge and where knowledge belongs and what is knowledge, what is the artifact of knowledge. And what we reflected is about even the way that we build the narrative around the scientific enterprise, in this case astronomy enterprise is also a lot about the way that we write and perceive the history of science in the different places. And if we look at the ethnographic museums that we have all around Europe, we can see a lot of artifacts coming from all around the world, these former colonies, some of them showing these exotic lands, these eccentric people, and it's a way also to tell the narrative. When you look at the science museums, and especially science museums outside Europe, or the Western world, we see that the science museums reflect a lot on the knowledge that was produced from Europe. If you go to a science museum in Brazil, you'll see the instruments and the scientific instruments that have been developed, done, and used by Europeans, either in Brazil, or in South America, or in the global south. So I think they, in a way, they build a colonial view on the knowledge production and the knowledge that is used then to understand the world. And I think this is just another example that when we look at the construction of knowledge and the construction of narratives about knowledge, we have been using a lot of this imagery and the artifacts from the Western world. Next slide. Another one that connects very much with the two points that both Dylan and I mentioned, one of them is about brain drain, and another one is about construction of new facilities. And in astronomy, due to the limitations that we have in access to the night sky, a clear night sky, this is something really important, the location of our observatories. But if you look at this kind of workflow, almost pipeline of colonial resource exploitation, it was very much focused on the idea that there was resources in countries that could be on nations or in lands that could be colonized. These resources would have transported sometimes with terrible, in terrible ways, like to inflate people, and then they will bring added value on the lands that the colonial powers could really create these added value. Now, if we think about the current observatories that we have in the global south, and also in indigenous lands, like in South America, or even in Hawaii, or even in Chile, we also see that the most of this location of these amazing facilities that we have been building are in the global south. But what we can see is that the data that then we got from these places, or using these places, is then transported to the global north, transformed, and in a way brings added value by the communities, especially research communities in the big global north. Of course, it's a big step, comparing these, but I think there's something here to reflect a bit on the way that we use some of the land, some of the resources, some of the partnerships that we have with local countries, but I think we need to reflect also where the added value brings. And when I look at the added value, I mean about cultural value, social value, scientific value, but also economical value. And I think it's good for us to also reflect a bit on that. Next slide, Elina. Another aspect that we have been, there's been a lot of discussion all around the world, especially also in Europe, United States, about investment funds from the research, especially universities, but also research institutes. And also the universities in Europe, they do have investment funds. There was a big discussion about removing investments from funds connected with oil, with fuel, with fossil fuel. But it's also a big discussion that we still need to have or is still happening about the investments that we have in funds that they are connected with enslaved people or slavery funds. It's still an ongoing discussion and also we cannot forget that in a way we are benefiting economically, if financially, in our research organizations, including our universities, from these investments that we did for many decades, many, many decades on many that came from enslaved money. So I think we still need to look deeper into this question and trying to understand how our colonial past is still contributing to generate wealth within the research systems and of course astronomy, the astronomy enterprise. Next slide. One point that I think is also also interesting to reflect that connects quite a lot with the colonial colonial practices because we cannot forget the colonial practice usually there were very violent practices very much connected with the military interventions. And still today feels like astronomy and space exploration, they still have a very strong connection with the military and defense industry. There's a big discussion at the moment about the connections between fundamental research applied research and defend. Actually, the very famous astronomer Neil deGrasse Tyson wrote a book together with Elvis Lang about these alliances between astrophysics and the military. But it's quite interesting that even in an agency like European Space Agency that has in the mission, a very strong statement about the exclusive people purposes of space exploration. Every day, they find contracts with multimillion dollar euros contracts with companies that develop military uses, so that they are not only for peaceful purposes. So this is something that I think we need to reflect that sometimes we look at astronomy or space scientists like these almost exploration of the universe for exclusive peaceful purposes but we have strong links with the defense industry. So I think it's also a bit, another point that good to reflect on. And I think that's the next slide. I think now is the time for discussion. Yes. Thanks to Anna and Pedro. So, and I think we, we very briefly each of us discuss very large topics that each actually deserves like much larger discussion. So the whole idea for solo try to do the do the sessions at the UN science summit is to sort of keep developing and hopefully next year, we'll have ideally within couple of days to expand each topics. And those who are interested in these topics can also join some of the discussions or leave the discussions. Anyway, so next half an hour is for us to discuss a couple of issues and so on. And if you have questions or comments, please use the chat box and you can send in your questions and comments and or raise your hand and we can also bring in you to ask your question. And to start with, actually, someone in the audience, Yako, Yako Maloon, ask a question from Tana, which is really, which is a question I'm very interested in. Let me read the question out. Yako was asking, do you have advice how to reform academia? And maybe Tana and Pedro can pitch in, but one of the things I would love to see is actually open access. And, and the reason is, so, you know, my, so I have a lot of colleagues in Sri Lanka, some of our national universities. So to pay for a journal subscription, it would cost more than a salary of a professor. And it's that expensive for a developing country to get access to these journals. And so sometimes like I have to, as for my groups in there, very small, but a lot of the times I have to download the papers and actually share because that's the only way there's no other way to access these papers. And I think reforming academia also one way is to get it is open access.  And to the point, it's really hard to even such it certain changes. But I think that would make a huge difference in many countries to make open access data publications. Yeah, that's one of the things I'm really interested in reforming academia. Pedro, do you have anything to add? You know, Tana, I think Tana will have a bit more than me because she has been thinking about this for the last for the last months, maybe years about the way that in academia we can, especially in astronomy, especially in astronomy in the Netherlands, we can change a bit the way that we work. And I think a lot of it is what Tana mentioned is very, very important, this idea that we have the structures in place and they're not really, they were built like this. So we need to, in a way, rebuild them. So that's, I think it's important point. I think building a bit on what you're saying, Tilin, about open access, I think we need, you know, the open science movement, I think is also good to support that. It's not only about access to existing knowledge, it's also access to data, it's access to the methodologies, it's access to the software that will be enabling our colleagues from the global south to have access to this already existing body of tools, knowledge and data that can also build on that, that will be very, very supportive. I think that's an important aspect that we need to have. And so I'll let Tana comment a bit more. Yeah, thanks again, Jaco, for the question. I thought something in the chat there. As I said, there are a lot of resources on this topic and there are many people working on it. So I will say two things. I'll say what I said in the chat and something else as well. Three things, three things. One is that the first thing we need to do to borrow from the language of addiction and recovery is that we need to acknowledge that there is a problem. And so we have these, you know, these forums like we have now, Pedro and I have given this a version of the stock, the original version of the stock at a symposium.  We were the only people from the sciences. We're now speaking at, you know, the UN General Assembly, Science Summit, etc, etc. But what they isn't at the moment is a general acknowledgement that there is a problem. We need an in particular from the people at the top. And then the question becomes how do we get the people who benefit the most from the status quo to dismantle the status quo. It's something I don't know how to do. I don't know how to answer genuinely asking, but we need to acknowledge that there is a problem. You can't fix something if people are telling you which they are, that everything is fine. Why would you want to change it? And this is especially a problem in places where astronomy or science as it's practice right now has a very long history. And has, you know, a very, not just entrenched, but has a very storied and long history as a big part of nations identity or, you know, something like that. And then they're like, but this is working so great. Why, why is that, you know, up in the perfect system that works and has worked for centuries. So that's, that's the one thing. How do we get fine from senior management and there's evidence to show again coming from corporate because in academia we don't have that. For various reasons, we don't have that kind of studies done, but say from corporate there's evidence to show that when you want to do cultural changes or equity diversity and inclusion work or social justice work or psychological safety or whatever you want to call it in the workplace. One of the key indicators about whether the program will succeed or not is whether there is meaningful buy in from senior management. That's one. The other thing is, I would preach and this is for the sciences, especially the hard sciences, the physical sciences, which includes astronomy. Absolutely. I would preach humility, just because we know how to work with photons and just because we are often seen as super geniuses. If you are a lot of us have this experience if you tell someone, oh, I'm a scientist. Oh, I'm an astronomer. The first reaction is, oh my God, we must be so clever. And that might be true. But it doesn't mean you know everything about everything. So I would teach humility to know what the limits of your knowledge and expertise are and to reach out to people who have the knowledge and expertise to be able to do this. We've been thinking about the colonization centuries for decades. Before we, you know, had an inkling that maybe same we have a problem. So I'm talking about the humanities, the social scientists, the art. Reach over to them and this is something again that a lot of scientists don't feel comfortable doing or very dismissive of but have the humility to know where you're what your sphere of influences and what your knowledge space is and reach out to people who do have the expertise in this who have been thinking about it for a long time. We've been working on this for a long time. And it's a lot of you, you know, there was a time at universities where it was very cool and hot AKA you could get a lot of funding. And you're doing multi disciplinary work or interdisciplinary work. And this is a perfect example of that. How can we from the scientists work with the social scientists and human and the humanities to bring about a change, a meaningful change in academia, whether it's the colonization way, or, you know, better, better teaching practices, etc. And then the third thing I will say to finish this is, we need evidence based intervention, which is a weird thing to have to say to science, scientists, especially hard sciences, especially the physical sciences, where everyone thinks, you know, scientists are just data, you know, data robots, we're just collecting robots and we don't have biases because we're really good at masters or somehow that means that you can't have internal biases about how the science works. And it's exactly the opposite. A lot of what we do when it comes to trying to again do the social justice, equity, diversity and inclusion, biological safety, decolonization work is surface level work that looks good. But talk at a gold school is like a picture with the girls at the end of the talk, you put it on your organization's website and take it off for the hashtag women and girls in stem day or whatever it is that happens in February. I'm very busy on that day. I do like five, six talks on that day every year. But we don't know what the lasting impact of this is we're not doing evaluation, we're not following the evidence that often comes out of, you know, the social sciences on what things do we actually have to do to change to make meaningful and sustainable change and make progress in the way that we want to make progress. What does this progress look like? How long will it take? All that kind of stuff. We're just doing surface level good optics work. We need evidence based intervention. And the data is out there. The evidence is out there about what was, but it's not glamorous. It's not cute.  And again, you think scientists would be okay with doing, you know, what the evidence tells you even if it's not cool or doesn't look as flashy. But it's something that I have found is very difficult to get people to engage with because they want the easy fixes. They want the quick fixes. So those are the three things. Thanks, I'm going to go to another question that Boris submitted. I will read it out so everyone online and also can. Those who are watching this later can also listen in. Boris asked, could you talk about how western science through colonialism has impacted how knowledge systems are prioritized? And how do you believe that makes its way into our educational and outreach practices moving beyond the content we present? Pedro or Tana, do you have any? I think I'm trying to understand the question, but I think if I understand that, I think we need to reflect that the most of the current knowledge system that we have in place, the one that we know that we teach at universities, we teach at primary education, secondary education, has been built with this vision of the western perspective of science. And that's been the priority. And even when we colleagues from, and I'm using a lot of the term global south, but maybe even from formal colonies, they still use these materials because they were available. So I think there's a very lack of reflection about these practices and we have been prioritizing this knowledge. And I think we didn't have, or we are now starting to question some of this knowledge and trying to understand how other knowledge systems, how other type of knowledge, valid knowledge, could also be part of our better understanding of the world. So I think I'll like just to believe it like that. So but for sure we have been prioritizing a western perspective of the knowledge for decades, if not centuries. Yeah, if I could also add, since I, my education of my school education is from Sri Lanka, everything we learn in science is basically western science. There's, even though we have so much of science that was done in Asian countries or especially in Arab, and none of these actually make it to the textbooks. So everything you learn and the other fascinating thing I found is that culturally we have such a strong connection with like the system, because most of these, especially South Asia, a lot of us back then, a lot of things were based on agriculture and agriculture was based on the system and how the stars are moving and, you know, the harvesting, the timing, everything. And, and this was such a good knowledge that doesn't really exist anymore in textbooks or disappears since colonization. And, and we are learning them, but in a very western perspective, still today. So, like, pretty much my education, my father's education, even my, like, my nieces and nephews education in Sri Lanka is still like 50, it's been 70 years since we got the freedom. But we are still learning very much of western curriculum. I think that's one of the hard difficult things in a country like the education reform is really hard. And to bring in these local perspectives into and something that, especially us, we need to work on locally as well. I think that's, that's just to add more decolonizing astronomy and science actually goes both ways where it's, it's not something just the white like western global north should work on, but it has to also something that global south and developing countries need to work on as well. Like it has to be from both sides, or multi sides. Um, can I go to another question? Yeah. Daniel asked what could be the mechanisms used to assure that astronomical research and technologies are exclusively related to peaceful purposes. That's a very interesting question. Maybe I can start with some of the pointers and this is a very, very interesting question. Of course, there's a big discussion in the ethical community for ethical ethics of science and technology about unintended use of research, right? We never know when, because if we look at open science, we make our knowledge useful for others, but also to other fields and people can also use that knowledge for other purposes that sometimes when we are developing or creating this new knowledge, we don't know what's going to be the last use, the unintended use. So that's something that we cannot fully control. We can have the ethics and we can have ethics compliance. And if we look for example at working with companies, we can also look at the ethics and compliance of the ethics of these companies related with environmental issues, legal issues, and maybe also military use, you know, where every time there's a public procurement for certain type of construction development of thousands of euros, the companies need to comply. You need to make sure that they pay taxes, they pay social security, but we can also have systems to make sure that their investments are not in slavery money, that they are not damaging the environment, and maybe they're also not damaging other nations. So we can have in place systems to make sure that the companies that we work with are compliant with ethical requirements that we as a field can demand. I would also say that of course a lot of the mechanisms and legislature decision making happens at a level above where scientists sit as well. So we as a science community need to be more perhaps vocal in our political activity where we lobby our politicians and the people who ultimately make these decisions. Science is political, where our money comes from it's often decided by governments that you know they make specific decisions about how they're going to fund certain sciences. But in return, we can also, you know, use our collective voices, make sure that the people who are, you know, the lobbyists, the legislatures, the policy makers, etc are aware of our feelings on this as a community and how we'd like to move forward. So, again, it's starting from the first principle of acknowledging there's a problem, letting people know that there's a problem or, you know, as a community we have decided like these are some guiding principles that we would like you to incorporate. And so it does also require us as the science community to be active advocates and loud advocates for change at the highest levels as well. Yeah, one more thing I would like to add is that it's also interesting way to look at some of the large, large scale research infrastructures are based, you know, in countries that the funding actually comes from the global north, or like very wealthy countries.  And, but also interesting to see, like, how much of local scientists get it get published, or become at least quarters of published papers in these research infrastructures, and because a lot of the large institutions. The first orders are based in global north or very wealthy countries. And, and that's one of the interesting things actually to look at, you know, how much of credit or how much of access. The local scientist has to these infrastructures. Maybe we can go to one more question. I saw Pedro already answered a few things on the chat. Let me read out. Ariana is asking, do you have some examples of good practices or cases that have already been put in practice in order to decolonize astronomy. I actually have. So, recent. The IAU, if time and Pedro is okay with me going first on this. Recently, so the IAU has a regional meeting has a couple of regional meetings and the, the regional meeting for Asia and Pacific was held in Japan in August. And I met the couple of people from the TMT, the 30 meter telescope team who was visiting. And one of the things actually good things they said, you know, TMT has been an issue for the longest time and still want to go. And I think one good practice that we, there's been a lot of discussion but finally implemented is that there's a new news sort of like a new team in place. And there are a few people who are local and from indigenous communities joined the TMT community engagement team. And this is especially the community engagement team. So I think that's one good way to go about that you are engaged with the community, local community, but also through the leaders are the local community members as well. And that's a good way to sort of engage these large infrastructures with local engagement. But on the other hand, I think a lot of the times these. So this is a good practice. But as what I have seen is in many big infrastructures, when we say, oh, we should actually do something. These these infrastructure should engage locally. And a lot of the times that means, you know, doing outreach or local engagement community activities. And at the same time, it's very important. I feel like it's very important that we sort of work on changing the perspective of the top management, because as long as the top management has the same view of doing science and where we're not doing running activities, no matter how much local activities you run internally, and the mechanism won't change. And you will be engaged locally, but then it's very important to bring that connected back to the top level as well. And which is still lacking in many of the infrastructures. So I think we've turned up and if you have anything to add. I mean, I added a few examples a bit more, more specific, I think, I think you touch some important points, but I know that the SKA, the telescope they with the share sky exhibition I think there was an attempt, and I think it's, it's, I know, and there's a question about best practices I think there's a complexity of solutions that we need all to apply all of them at small scale large scale. Long term change but I think an initiative like to share sky that was giving visibility to cosmologies from the first nations or the initial nations of the land where these facilities going to be built I think it's a good attempt to bring to the ground the indigenous some of the indigenous knowledge that we have about astronomy and the night sky so that's just an example, a very, very specific example. Okay. We do have a question of asking Morris is asking if you have any resources you'd like to recommend how to best carry out evidence based interventions. Sorry, I was trying to, I was trying to Google this as you were tapping. So, I don't know is our slide deck going to be available because there's, there's links to the links to the references are in the slide deck so if we can make that available somehow they clickable links. And that's great to start. They are resources out there. They often I find them in just like this in the slide deck of, for instance, talks that I've attended at conferences. And you could possibly find them online. They, I would say that you should look out this is how I've been kind of going about this is look out for equity diversity and inclusion or equality that equality diversity and inclusion conferences for sciences or for academia in your local area in your country. And a lot of what we call EDI work the equity diversity and inclusion work now starting to include the colonization. What I will say about the colonization work and evidence based work is that it's very specific to your local context. Each place has its own issues that is grappling within a unique way or issues that exist. So it's, so yeah, so it's very important that you understand the general frameworks that we're talking about, but that you need to look at your local context to either that's at a national level or continental level, a departmental level, your sphere of influence and what that, how these frameworks will be applicable to your, to your local context because there's no one size fits all solution. I'm sorry. I'm not giving you, you know, specific pointers, but there is a body of work on this and it is very region specific and, and yeah, place specific. So, yeah, if you're in the UK, I can point you to some of these resources if you're in South Africa, maybe I don't have off the top of my head a lot of resources for instance, Asia Pacific, but maybe to Lena has. There's a lot of work that's being done in the US. I would say in general, yeah, the US is further ahead, for instance, then Europe when it comes to grappling with these issues for various reasons. And so that's one of the problems that we have in a way own colonized kind of view of how we're doing decolonization work. A lot of our work and our evidence also comes from the US. And it's not necessarily applicable wholesale in Europe or in Asia or certainly in Africa or even, you know, a nice, yeah, or even in South America, even though you know things are happening in the Americas. So we need to be mindful of that as well. And it's not the kind of thing that we as scientists are playing in, which is why we need to work with, with our counterparts in the humanities and the social sciences. So maybe that's an easier place to start contact some look up if you're at the university or look up where you're in your local university on the, you know, the webpage going see who's working on this kind of work and send them an email and say, Hey, I'm interested in this. Can you help me or does your science faculty have a as we have at Leiden. Pedro works in the department of science for society. Yeah, look up in your local institution whether you're at the university or not, your local universities and see have a Google see if they are people who are already working on this in your local area and shoot them an email and say that you want, you know, you want to chat about this. Helena. Before we close I know that it's already time but I like to reflect a bit on the on the question from Enrico Gomez I don't know if that's still possible. I don't know if you want to. Yeah, yeah. I think the question is about the indigenous law is systems that they don't have the share the same ontology and epistemic framework of academic communities. If stars and mountains were built observatories are regarded as person how could it be integrated in practice of research. I think it's the question that we see a lot and I think it's one of the central questions sometimes about the discussion and sometimes about the tension between whatever we call it Western knowledge and indigenous law systems. I have to reflect and kind of might add a few things here that the indigenous law systems do they follow a very close system close to the Western science, they follow the scientific method, you know, they are based on observations that are based on creating hypotheses that I have based on observations a few months later a few years later, and they do predict the same way that's not in Western science does behaviors, phenomenon and events. So in a way, indigenous law systems follow exactly the same methodology that we have in Western science. The big difference is sometimes they were not recorded in the ways that we define as the definition for science, peer review publications, journals, access to these, but the knowledge that exists is scientific knowledge. I think that's one of the first reflections that we need to have about the indigenous knowledge systems, sometimes it's only at the publication stage that it's not Western knowledge. The second one is about the construction of telescopes in sacred mountains and the Hawaii is a very example. I don't even need to compare it if in Europe will say that we have to destroy a cathedral to build radio telescopes, the uproar that will have in these communities right this will not happen in a city saying, we're going to destroy this cathedral to build radio telescopes that will be also parts of the same discussion that we see now, but it will be the same in a natural park natural park of specific requirements that you cannot build something there because it's been defined as something that we want to protect. So I think the, these type of connections is not so much about indigenous people is about how we recognize the autonomy, freedom, and, and off the indigenous communities and I think that's something that we need to reflect. I don't think they are that far off from what we do in the Western world. Thank you, I think I have to sort of close now. And maybe each of us can add some very, very short final comment. And then I have some updates that I will share with everyone. Maybe we can go start with Turner. I just want to thank again everyone for the, for the time for joining us here for the excellent questions. And I hope that you, if not, that you know that if you haven't found answers at least some questions and my homework for you. If I may be so bold is to please take these conversations these sorts of questions into your local research communities and start, start having them. I think that's yeah, I think that's going to be where the, where these kind of conversations are very powerful if we have them often and openly in our local context. Thank you. No, I guess you know that what we did here is a bit of a reflection of observation and some looking at the previous work done by many, many scholars and also academics and activists on this field. I think what I would say I think it's really up to all of us in the that working science and working astronomy that working in policy to really reflect and make sure that we do Kate ourselves. This is not something that is impossible to do I think we just need to educate ourselves, and there's enough literature that enough work done by many decades of previous thinkers on the topic. I think we, we, we all that to them. Thank you. And I would like to add that this is a conversation that should have a long time ago. And if it did my life would have been much easier. And so many of us would have been in a had much more resources and access growing up. But it's a conversation recently started, and I would sort of beg everyone really encourage everyone to keep going. And lot of lot of these, it's, it might be hard to find like evidences and practices that are already in place because not not so much it's practice right now, but it should be. But one of the best things we could do is to discuss and ask questions, a lot of questions and make my evidence, because every time you bring this topic up. That would help somebody out there at some point. So please continue the discussion it's really really important and I hope to that all of you will join next year. And next year we hope to make it a bit longer. So if this is a topic that you are actively engaged and would like to contribute in some way, or you want to give a talk or join a discussion please write to me. And, and then we will have access to this video through the platform soon. And later it will go on YouTube, but it will take a couple of weeks to get into YouTube. And, and also in the meantime, if you can go to the same page and provide some feedback for the summit science summit program I would really appreciate it. So with that I would like to close. Thank you very much for joining from wherever you are. I appreciate spending time with us and asking all these questions and comments and being engaged. Thank you. Bye bye everyone. Thank you. Thank you. Bye everyone.


Hello and welcome to today's webinar and thank you for joining us. Today's webinar topic is the three R's, Rent, Repay and Refund. The core responsibility of the RTA is to administer the tenancy laws for Queensland and provide information for all people involved in a tenancy. My name is Lynne and today's session is going to run for approximately 30 minutes. With today we'll be going through rent, I'll be going through payments, rent ledger, increase and decrease of rents. We'll be looking at repairs and maintenance, urgent and non-repayers and less or intended obligations. We'll also be looking at the refund of rental bond, so this talks about bond claims, disputes, money over and above the bond and we'll also be looking at rent refunds. With an additional R, I've also decided to touch on records and the timeframe in which you need under the residential tenancies and Rooming Accommodation Act 2008, what records you need to keep and what are those documents and for how long. If time permits, I will answer questions submitted, however be aware that we do have over 800 people registered for today's event, so time may not actually permit those questions. But to submit one through, you just need to expand the small box on your screen and you can type in where I've got the arrow as a demonstration there on the screen. If I'm unable to get to your question and you do need an urgent answer, please don't hesitate to contact our call centre on the 1300 363 11. So the first of our R topics today is about rent, so let's start with rent payments. Rent can be paid in the listed approved ways, which is cash, check and please be mindful that check is just that, a check and not a bank check, it can be a personal check. Deposit into an account or bank account, credit card, F-POS, a deduction from a pension or benefit or any other agreed way by the lesser agent and the tenant. The approved way of paying rent must be stated on the tenancy agreement. Remember you must give a copy of the proposed tenancy agreement to the prospective tenant before they are committed into that tenancy or before they do pay you any money. If an unapproved way is preferred or an agreed way, the tenant must be given a choice of at least two other approved ways in paying their rent. If a particular method of paying rent involves any of those fees or the tenant must be advised of the fees that go along with that particular method, I'd like to point out some of the examples that I have seen on tenancy agreements that do not comply. So if you have a tenancy agreement that offers bank check, money order and a rent card system, then that is actually not compliant. If you are offering one of these, then you would be offering two of the approved ways, which one can be check and maybe one can be a deposit into a bank account. A money order is not listed as an approved way. Remember too, if there is a change of rent payment methods during a fixed term, both the lessor agent and the tenant need to agree. And where this comes into play is particularly if a rent roll has been sold and they've got fixed term agreements in place, if the tenant and the previous agent have agreed to a particular method of payment, then that needs to continue through. And again, if the tenant agrees to change, then that's fine, but otherwise both the lessor agent and the tenant need to have that agreement in place. With rent arrears, while most tenancies will run smoothly with little or no problems, when a tenant does fall behind in rent, there is a process that you need that you are able to follow. And whilst we encourage communication between the parties, if it is a one-off situation, we then encourage lessor agents to contact the tenant to find out what has gone wrong. And for tenants, we also encourage them that if there is a problem, to talk with the lessor or the agent and let them know why the rent has been paid and work out when it will be paid or what will be happening. As majority of today's audience is general tenancy, I will be focusing on that timeframe. If the tenant is seven days behind in rent, then on the eighth day is when you can issue a Form 11 notice to remedy breach, given the tenant a clear seven days to rectify the breach. If it's not rectified in full at that time, you then can issue a notice to leave on the grounds of failing to rectify the breach for rent arrears and giving a seven day time frame. Remember, you need to allow service time for delivering the notices. So if your business practice is to post notices, then there are several methods. So you can have priority posts, registered, express or a standard mail. Please refer to the Australian Post website, I'll put those details up there which is auspost.com.au to see how long it would take on each of those time frames. So for an example, if I decide to use priority mail and it's stated on the website that it was two or three business days to be delivered, then I would need to add that time frame onto my notice. We have seen an increase in having notices served by email and this is fine, providing the tenancy agreement at the start, both parties have agreed to issuing and receiving of notices by that method. One of the questions coming in is, can you hand delivery? Absolutely, there's nothing stopping that, that again is hand delivering to the address on the tenancy agreement. Time frames for other tenancies, as you move all dwellings and ring recombination do differ. So please refer to our publications or website for that information. Just to be clear on the remedy breach notice, and this has also been due to some of the tribunal rulings as well, the amount owed in section five of the remedy breach notice is the amount that is due at the time of issuing the notice. You'll note that there is an asterisk in that section that states any new rent due during this breach process must be paid on time. Where we have seen errors has been where people have added up the arrears due at the time of serving the notice and the amount for the rent that's due in the future to the end date of the breach and put that amount in this area. That would be an error. So please remember, it is the amount that is actually due at the time you are issuing the breach notice. It is the amount that's due. We do see clients mentioned separately that maybe in a touch letter that further rent is due during this period, which is outlined again just reiterating the fact that there's already an asterisk on this notice that says new rent must be paid during that process. With the rent ledger, it's a recording of the tense history of rental payments. The date that the rent was paid, the amount, the period that it covers and that it is for rent. It would be encouraged that if there is a dispute over rent arrears to produce this and talk with the tenant about what payments have been received and where the arrears have actually occurred. Sitting down with a tenant and a calendar and maybe going through this ledger and also the tenant's payments and trying to work out while making sure that there's no errors on either side. Quite often we hear tenants say at the end of the tense that we are two weeks in advance at the start and that there's money owed to them at the end. In most cases, this is not quite accurate. It is that the first two weeks rent has been paid and then as the tenant lives there, those days tick along and are used. When the two weeks run out, that is when the next two weeks are due. I'm just going to point out because this actually might answer a couple of people's questions that have come through. Remember, you cannot ask a tenant to pay rent for a period of time that has already been paid. I'll just reiterate that. If a tenant has already paid rent in advance, you cannot be forcing them to pay for rent for a period that has already been covered. If you do have a claim at the end of the tense before rent arrears or you need to go to the tribunal for a warrant of termination order on the grounds of rent arrears, you are going to have to produce a rent ledger showing the paid to rent dates. Also too, if a tenant does ask for a copy of their rent record, then the less or the agent must provide that within a seven-day time frame. Someone's just asking what's the maximum rent we can ask for. In a periodic tenancy, it's two weeks rent and for a fixed term, the maximum you can ask is one month. So just have a talk here about rent increases. The Act requires the less or agent to give tenants two months' notice in writing to increase the rent for general tenancy for a fixed term or a periodic agreement. So in a fixed term, you can only increase the rent if there is a term allowing it and you cannot increase rent under a six-month period. The time frame allows the tenant to not just be informed about the upcoming increase, but to also prepare for any adjustments that they may need to make for their rental payment. So if they were doing a direct payment, then they'll need to adjust this directly with their bank. Just by putting the term in the fixed term agreement is not doing the notice when the tenant signs the agreement at the start. You will still need to give the minimum of the two months' notice in writing, notifying of that increase. Quite often we are asked, is there a formula on how do I know how much to increase the rent? There is no set formula and it's always best to know your rental market and what the conditions are. So whether it's a slow market or whether there's a large or an oversupply of that type of accommodation in your area, there are no hard, fast rules about this, but again, best to look at each case or each tenancy at an individual level. However, I'd like to point out that under section 92, a tenant may dispute a rent increase if they believe it to be excessive. And with this time frames do apply and the tribunal may take into account the range of market rents usually charged for comparable properties, proposed increased rent compared to the current rent. The state of repair of the premises, the term of the tenancy, that is the length of the tenancy, the period since the last increase if there has actually been any, and also anything else that the tribunal considers relevant. It is recommended to have a comparative rental information. So for example, you could go to many of those real agency rental sites on the website and use a comparison on the type of property that you have compared to other properties. In relation to, you could look at adverts in the local newspaper or other properties that you manage or own in that particular area that might be something similar. If you are increasing a rent between tenancies, and again, the tenant feels it's excessive under what we call significant changes between agreements, the tenant may dispute the increase. However, time frames exist if they do want to dispute it and the tenant would need to also sign the agreement and then follow that process. If you want to know more information about significant changes between agreements, please go to section 71 of the Residential Tenancies and Room Accommodation Act. So one of the questions coming in in relation to the increasing of the bond when there is a rent increase, you can do that. Obviously, there is maximum amounts that you can charge for a bond, no more than four times the weekly rental amount if it's $700 and under, if it's over that it's negotiable. But also, please keep in mind, you can only increase a bond no less than 11 months in between. So now I want to actually have a talk about rent decrease. And during the tenancy or between tenancies, there may be a reason to decrease the rent. Section 94, I've actually listed some of the reasons that you'll find under that section, and that is that the premises are destroyed or made completely unfit to live in, loss of a service, facilities or goods to be provided, or the amendable standard of the premises decreases substantially. Another reason may be that you negotiate to decrease rent while you're waiting for an item to be repaired. So again, an example might be if it's taking eight weeks to get parts to fix an air conditioner or a stove, you may consider reducing the rent for that period of time as the goods supplied with the tenancy have been lost during this period of time. So it's best to get in early and negotiate rather than leave it and have a dispute further down the track or there's a request for a higher amount of compensation for the loss of the item. So again, a rent decrease or potentially you could be offering a compensation amount. Remember, any changes to the rental amount needs to be put in writing and agreed and signed by all the parties to that tenancy. With rent increases and decreases, the best thing to do is to know your rental market before you even promote the rental property. So now moving on to our second of the R's in today's webinar, we're going to be looking at repairs and maintenance. The legislation is very clear in relation to the lessor's obligations under section 185 and that is at the start of the tenancy, the lessor must ensure the premises and inclusions are clean, fit to live in, good repair and not in breach of any health and safety issues. Whilst the tenancy continues, they must maintain the premises in a way that remains fit to live in and the property and the inclusions are maintained in good repair. If you are aware of any issues dealing with health or safety of the premises, they should be addressed in a reasonable timeframe. Whilst the Act does not provide a definite timeframe to carry out those repairs, it is recommended to do these again in that reasonable timeframe based on the individual situation and the individual repair. At the start of the tenancy inform the tenant what your process is for notifying you about maintenance issues and time and time we have seen as tents progress from either from a landlord who manages their own property to an agency or agency to agency, not everyone has those same practices. Remember there are urgent and non-urgent repairs under the Act and I will talk about those shortly. Make sure you have a nominated repair listed on your tenancy agreement for those urgent repairs as well. Whilst the lessor has the obligations, I am just going to quickly touch on the tenants' obligations as well. They are generally found under Section 188 and it states that the tenant must keep the premises inclusions clean and not damage the property. At the end of the tenancy, they must leave the premises in the same condition it was at the start, there is fair wear and tear. Fair wear and tear is always that area that is open to interpretation. It seems everyone has sometimes a bit of a different interpretation or what the understanding of it means. But you do as landlords and agents have to allow that when a tenant does vacate that to expect that there will be an amount of fair wear and tear. So example that the scarf marks from everyday living in the property may be considered that whilst a hole in the wall or significant damage to the wall is not. Fair wear and tear may also be caused by the environment and also from time. So example might be some damage, might make an item brittle or may fade over time as well. I'm not saying that big stones on carpets and holes in walls are fair wear and tear but again sometimes some of the small things from everyday use is deemed to be that fair wear and tear. Section 217 talks about the obligations of the tenant notifying the list or agent about any damage or repairs it's required. And the notification you need to understand can be by way of phone call. It could be an email, fax if you've got that situation or a letter or the tenant may just issue you a notice to remedy breach to the list or the agent informing them of the repair. It's important to let the tenant know at the start what's the best way they should report problems and also to make sure that they have those contact details particularly if something does happen after hours. Remember your routine inspections that you carry out as part of your business practice during a tenancy is a great opportunity to identify any current repairs or future maintenance that may be required further down the track. Fact outlines what is an emergency repair under section 214. So without reading the every item listed here it's deemed to be a serious fault, damage or failure or breakdown of essential services to the premises. It could be a fault or damage that makes the premises unsecure or insecure or unsafe or insecure I should say or likely to be injuring a person. So examples might be that the toilet or the hot water system's not working, it could be a burst pipe in the wall causing flooding or a serious gas leak. So common sense approaches usually required have that conversation with yourself or what happens if I don't attend to this immediately what may actually happen or does this problem fall into what is listed in the legislation as an emergency repair. This may actually help you determine the urgency of that particular repair as well. The security and health and safety of the people living there should also be taken into account and again this is why the legislation has outlined a lot of that what is deemed to be emergency repairs. If the tenant cannot contact the lessor agent or their nominated repairer listed on their tenancy agreement they can organise a suitably qualified person to carry out the repair to the maximum value of two weeks rent and the lessor will need to pay that bill or reimburse the tenant. So again the tenant can also apply the tribunal for an order about the repairs. This is now that the RTA has seen an increase in general in relation to the calls to our call centre and also in our dispute area in relation to repairs in general. So as always the RTA encourages open communication between parties in a tenancy and that both sides do this in a respectful way. Dealing with any matters in a timely manner and keeping those lines of communication open if there's going to be a delay or if there's problems. Doing this can avoid a matter escalating to a dispute that may not necessarily have to have happened in the first place. So again that self resolution and keeping everybody informed if there is a repair to make sure that people know what is actually happening and again particularly if there is a delay. So now on to our third and last hours of today's session which is refunds and what we're looking at is refunding the rental bond and also to looking at refunding of rent. So let's just have a look at the bond refund side of things. Let's look at if it is money that remember what a bond actually is. It is money that is paid by the tenant at the start and it's used for financial protection for the less or should there be a breach of the agreement. Just to give you some idea of the RTA's stats of all the bonds refunded 68% were paid out as agreed refunds and this is where the tenant was getting the full bond or where there was a claim that was agreed by both sides. On average the RTA refunds about 1,000 bonds per day. So remember the RTA requires an Australian bank account to deposit any bond money into at the end of the tenancy and the quickest way to ease this way is to make sure that both sides of the tenancy that's the lesser agent and the tenant complete an agreed form and submit that to the RTA. So when the tenancy has ended or the tenant has vacated if everybody agrees how the bond is to be paid out complete a refund form, a form for and submit that to the RTA. If there is no agreement and again the tenancy has ended or they have vacated then either person can submit the refund form to the RTA. This is going to start what we call a notice of claim process where the other person whose signature is missing will be informed of the claim and has an opportunity to dispute it. This person is going to have 14 days to respond to the notice. If they disagree they can complete a form 16 dispute resolution request form and lodge that with the RTA within the timeframe. If they agree with the claim they can sign the notice and return that back to the RTA and the payment will be made. Or if they choose not to do anything or not respond to the notice the bond will be paid out at the expiry of the notice to the party who has done the claim. Again that notice of claim process is a 14 day process and again the RTA follows the rules in relation to allowing clear days so we would also be allowing time for postage as well. It is always important that the RTA has up-to-date information and so if you have any changes to your address, email or for real estate agents if there's changes in your agency for staff or your property managers please let us know. Make sure that we always have current information. If you want to know where to find information about the payments by the authority under the Act they're found in under sections 123 to 144. Just quickly touching on and this is why we probably have some of the bond disputes. So what happens if there's a problem at the vacate inspection? So what happens if you find that there's some clean to be done or that there's damage or that there's rent owed? Again reminding you that the tenant is to return the premises in the same condition they was it was at the start of the tenancy less bare wear and tear. And whilst the Act does not state that you have to give the tenant the opportunity to rectify any of the problems we know that previously under the agents under the property agents and motor deals Act there was a code of conduct to give the tent to the opportunity. But it has been seen since then to be that it is best practice to inform them of the problems and work out a solution to rectify. So if you're doing the inspection together with the tenant you can discuss it directly with them and get a resolution of what's going to happen. But if the tenant's not present we would recommend communicate the issues with the tenant reminding them their responsibilities under the Act informing them of the issues and negotiating the steps to rectify and to be able to move forward so that you can get an agreed refund happening. About 50% or half of our disputes that the RTA receives each year are bond related matters. So by communicating at the end dealing with expectations looking at those rights and responsibilities and sharing evidence such as your entry and exit condition reports, photos sometimes this can resolve these issues and does not require a dispute. So where possible the RTA always recommends self resolution in the first instance. So comes the important part that I really want to make sure everyone understands is the claiming on the bond. So if you are the less or the agent claiming on the rental bond only ever claim what you are entitled to claim. So example would be if there's a $2,000 bond and you have a claim that you know or that you estimate to be around $800 then only claim the $800 not the full amount. I put an example up here. So the RTA requires you to provide details of your claim in section four, the refund form and in that part it states details of claims slash amounts. The example I've put up there shows two days rent and the amount, general cleaning and carpet cleaning and the amounts. So again we've seen some claims coming with very limited information and this is not what is required. So again please look at your business practices and ensure that you do comply. We are looking for what the reason is and the individual amounts on each item. So again if you can look at your business practices to make sure that when we receive information at the RTA on a bond claim we know. Even if you do not know the exact amount but you have an estimate it is better to put something like that in rather than just leaving it blank. So following on from the notice of claim process if someone has disputed the claim within the timeframe then this will lead to a conciliation with the RTA dispute resolution service. The RTA needs to know information about the claim on the bond so the sooner the lesser agents can get more information in through to us the quicker the conciliators can deal with the matter. So remember the role of the conciliator is impartial. They are there not to take sides but to facilitate the discussion and negotiations to see if the matter can be resolved. It's a voluntary process so we're not going to force parties to participate although we are strongly encouraging them to do so. The RTA has an 82% resolution rate where parties do participate in the conciliation process. So if a bond dispute is resolved then both parties will sign a refund form and return it to the conciliator within the timeframe that they're required and then the bond is paid out accordingly but should not one party return one of the forms then the matter's not resolved. So if it's not resolved what happens is the person who has issued the form 16, the dispute request will then have a seven-day timeframe to lodge an application with the local tribunal and also notify the RTA of the tribunal receipt. I have to reiterate again that this is a two-part process. You need to lodge within the required timeframes and you also need to notify the RTA of the details of the receipt. If the application has been made within the required timeframe then the RTA holds the bond till the outcome of the hearing and the direction for the payment from the tribunal. If no application's been lodged then the RTA is going to release the bond as per the original refund form that we've received. Remember, if you have to go to the tribunal do not leave it to the last minute. Gather all your paperwork, your evidence, photos, everything that you have ready to go and lodge within the required timeframe. Information can be found on the QCAT's website which is qcat.qld.gov.au. I know that we've got people have asked in questions but what happens if you don't know the bond amounts? I would make an estimate and hopefully that, you know, example might be if you think something to get repaired might be about $300 or $400 then you might be claiming $400 or $500. It's best to put an estimate and claim what you think you need rather than claiming a full bond amount that you know may not necessarily be required. So just continuing on, so I'm just a bit conscious of time so we may actually run a little bit over but I thank you for your questions that you are submitting and again this will probably actually help us put together a future webinar as well. So in relation to money owed over and above the bond amount. So what happens if this is the case? Again, it may be dealt with in the conciliation process with the initial bond dispute and if that be the case the conciliator there may be an agreement reached between the parties and a payment plan has been drawn up as part of a conciliation agreement. But if it's not done in a bond dispute initially and the bond's been finalised and already paid out to you then they may be still seeking money above that then you need to submit a form 16 dispute resolution request with the RTA advising that you're seeking compensation or the money above the bond amount and what those amounts are for and then look we can issue it look at issuing you a no-save-on-resolved dispute if it's not resolved and you proceed directly to the tribunal for an order. Just remember that because the matter has progressed to the RTA dispute resolution service does not stop parties from still trying to communicate during this process or trying to get a resolution themselves. Just quickly too just touching on the final hour of the refund side of it. This is just a reminder that if money has been paid for rent then it needs to be put towards rent. Under section 96 it cannot be used for other purposes such as water or cleaning bills at the end of the tenancy. Please note this section of the legislation which is number 96 does carry penalty provisions with it and that's 40 penalty points. So the other part that I want to bring up is the section 97, the apportionment. At the end of the tenancy, rent is to be appropriately apportioned and should the tenant overpay rent at the end of the tenancy then this needs to be refunded back to the tenant. Okay, I am conscious we are actually on time or we're actually behind time so I apologize for that. I'll just quickly go through just one more hour and I know that when I originally came up with the concept of the three hours I actually calculated about 10 hours but clearly we don't have time for that. So on the three hours just adding one more about the records and this is just purely a reminder that the lessor agents are to keep the records relating to the tenancy for one year after the tenancy ends and the documents that you need to include are the entry condition report, the exit condition report, the tenancy agreement, rent payment records or the rent ledger. Again, maybe also recommended too to actually have a copy of any written notices or correspondence. So again, we have a lot of information on our website and I know a lot of questions that have been submitted through have not actually related to today's topics. Just to give you an idea, I have been in touch with QCAT and I can say that probably we will be running a second webinar with QCAT in the near future to give you information. As for a copy of today's presentation, a copy of our webinar will be available on our RTA's website in approximately about a week's time. So please go there for a copy of it. If you need answers to questions today urgently, again, please contact our call centre. Thank you again for attending today's session and again, I do really appreciate it. We will be running future webinars and if you do have specific topics that you would like to know more about, feel free to give us an email and again to eventsrta.qld.gov.au and we will look at trying to address those in future webinars. Again, thank you very much for your time this morning. I really do appreciate it and the webinar will end now.


Who was once mauled by a lion on a movie set? I mean, I'm going to go with Jeff Cobo. That one's easy. That's Jodie Foster. I'm going to say Jodie. You look guilty. Like, I told him this story. I told him this story not too long ago. I was like, ooh, you're right. And I told him, I was like, you're absolutely right. It was me. It was you? You were mauled by a lion? Yeah, when I was eight. Oh my god.  Who has a tattoo around their belly button? Baptista. Dave? I'm a girl with Sophia. I feel like it has to be Dave Baptista, but I suspect it might be Brian Tyree Henry.  Who was born in the same hospital as his wife? Oh, I think it's Sterling. A Sterling. A Sterling. You! Got it, Sterling. I was like, wait for me to you, man. I don't know about you, Sterling. I was like, that's weird. Who had a fistfight with Ice Cube? That's easy. That's like a trick question. It's Charlie Day. Oh, Charlie. Him. That was it. That was pretty bad. Who appeared in the Australian soap opera Neighbours? Who would be in Neighbours? Zach Quinto? It can be Jeff. I know, I've never seen Neighbours in a film. It was all forever. It was huge in the UK. Is it Sterling? No? What would he be doing in Australia? Is there an English person in Australia? No, he's not English. I don't know. He's American. You! Is it you? Oh my God! Really? An Australian soap opera? Who told you to think you know someone? Dave, you don't know anything. I was Keck. As a kid, who used to go by the name of Kelby? Kelby. Oh, that's Sterling. Sterling, Kelby Brown. Who had a rap battle with David Arquette? Charlie Foster. Brian Tyree. It could be Brian, but then it could be Charlie Day, too. Oh my God, and if it's Jeff Goldblum, that's really wrong.  And I won just so much. Clearly. David Arquette could not grab his wig. I love his wig. I would have a piggyback. If I lose this, I would never be able to hold a piggyback. I don't respect the David Arquette. Who used to dub the Rome movies in French? Oh, Jodie Foster. That's an easy one, I guess. Whose middle name is Peckham? Peckham? Peckham! I know this because I'm friends with him and we can't believe that his middle name is somewhere in South London. It's Charlie Day. Charlie Peckham Day? Ha ha ha ha ha! Charlie, it's Bay of Rhode Island. That's what Charlie's called. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Charlie Peckham! He should have never told me that. CPD. Oh my gosh. Do you know it's an area of South London? I do know that, yeah. That's where the Peckhams originated. Then they came over here to America and then inbred for many years and made me. Which two cast members studied at Yale? That is Sterling K. Bryan and Jodie Foster. Well, we know Jodie, then. Me? You did? I did not go to Yale. I would never get in. Bryan and Jodie. Just saying, Bryan. Ha ha ha ha! Who was the main star of a Michael Jackson music video? This one. The only one who can dance. Which music video? Had to be one of the later ones, I imagine. Yeah, clearly just saying. Who pretended to play the guitar in a David Hasselhoff music video? That is a trickier question, I would say. Come on, Goldblum, please. Goldblum. It's gonna be David Tista! It's gonna be David Tista. Honestly, I was like, watch me, David. Oh, David Bautista. You, it's you! It's always you! Dave, who's real name is Alicia? Well, the interesting thing is it's probably not Zachary Quintaro. Are you Alicia? Yeah, I am. I am Alicia. I am Alicia. Alicia. Thank you, Alicia. Thank you.