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Participate Melbourne
Acknowledgement of Traditional Owners
The City of Melbourne respectfully acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the land we govern, the Wurundjeri Woi-wurrung and Bunurong / Boon Wurrung peoples of the Kulin and pays respect to their Elders past and present. We acknowledge and honour the unbroken spiritual, cultural and political connection they have maintained to this unique place for more than 2000 generations.
We accept the invitation in the Uluru Statement from the Heart and are committed to walking together to build a better future.
Privacy statement
This site is owned and operated by the City of Melbourne using software licensed from Social Pinpoint. For details on how the City of Melbourne collects and protects your personal information in the course of your engagement with the Participate Melbourne website and in-person community engagement activities, refer to the Privacy Statement below. For details of how Social Pinpoint may access personal information, please refer to Social Pinpoint’s Privacy Policy. For information about the broader collection and use of personal information by the City of Melbourne, please refer to our Privacy Policy.
The City of Melbourne takes privacy very seriously. Our collection, use and disclosure of your personal information is regulated by the Victorian Privacy and Data Protection Act 2014. You can find more information about your privacy rights at the Office of the Victorian Information Commissioner.
How will we use and disclose your information?
We use the personal information about you to:
- administer the site and manage your account
- identify when you sign into your account
- send you electronic newsletters and information, but only when you have agreed to us sending you this information or when the information is necessary to assist with the administration of the site
- respond to queries that you have contacted us about
- attribute content that you post on the site to you
- analyse use of the site to inform ongoing improvements and enhancements
- inform policy decisions by the City of Melbourne
- for any other purposes that we indicate to you when we request your personal information.
How your information is used depends on the type of activity you are participating in, as outlined below.
Community engagement projects (consultations)
Feedback you provide through community engagement projects, including any demographic details you choose to share, will be given to the relevant City of Melbourne work area responsible for managing the subject matter or project your feedback relates to.
Content that you post on the site publicly will be viewable by anyone who uses the site and will display your username. Any publicly available reports from consultations may include quotes that you have shared in forums, surveys and other consultation tools.
The City of Melbourne has created a central repository (the Knowledge Bank) of most survey responses. The City of Melbourne seeks to maintain your anonymity within the Knowledge Bank. Any personally identifiable information that you provide, including name and contact details, will be excluded or deidentified within the Knowledge Bank to preserve your anonymity.
Where you have consented, staff members will also add any verbal feedback you provide to them, in their interactions with you, to the Knowledge Bank. Staff members can filter the responses in the Knowledge Bank by subject matter, neighbourhood or demographics to inform future projects, gain insights into neighbourhood sentiment or key themes, and to ensure the provision of consistent service delivery across the organisation.
To further protect your anonymity, where there are very small sample sizes, staff cannot filter in the Knowledge Bank by demographics.
While the City of Melbourne takes multiple measures to protect the anonymity of survey respondents, we ask that you help us reduce the risk of inappropriate information access and exposure by not including other information in your survey response that could possibly identify you or others.
Expressions of interest and event registrations
Participate Melbourne also collects personal information through Expressions of Interest (EOIs), event registrations, advisory groups or similar participation activities.
For these activities:
- Your personal information (including your name, contact details and any additional information you provide) will be shared with the relevant City of Melbourne project team responsible for administering the activity.
- Your information may also be shared with consultants (see ‘Third parties’ below) or delivery partners engaged to support the project or activity.
- Your personal information will not be added to the Knowledge Bank.
- Information is collected and used for the purpose of assessing your EOI, administering the event or activity, and communicating with you.
Moderation
We monitor the information that you provide in order to protect the integrity of the discussions from individuals and groups who may attempt to unduly influence the outcomes of a consultation process. For example, we check to ensure multiple contributions are not coming from the same source. We also review the site to protect it from spam or misuse.
Third parties
We may disclose personal information to third-party research consultants engaged by the City of Melbourne. You consent to us disclosing your personal information to the consultants for community engagement projects (consultations), Expressions of interest and event registrations as outlined below under the respective headings.
Community engagement projects (consultations)
For community engagement projects, the information supplied to the research consultants is limited to raw feedback responses and excludes your name, contact details or other information that could directly identify you. However, it may include demographic details such as your age, gender and suburb.
The insights derived by these research consultants will assist the City of Melbourne to identify opportunities to improve our services, projects, plans and policies.
Expressions of interest and event registrations
For expressions of interest and event registrations, your name, contact details and any additional information you provide may be shared with relevant project teams and consultants for the purposes of assessing the submissions or supporting the delivery of events or activities.
If you register for an event or activity through a third-party platform such as TryBooking, your registration details will be collected by that platform in accordance with its privacy policy. Registration details will be shared with the relevant City of Melbourne work area and may be shared with consultants for the purpose of administering the event.
Planning scheme amendments
In the case of submissions you make on planning scheme amendments, City of Melbourne will disclose your entire submission, including your contact details, to Planning Panels Victoria within the Department of Transport and Planning. Submissions and contact details are stored in a Panel Book (typically a OneDrive file shared between all parties to the panel, where it is stored for three months before deleting).
Planning Panels Victoria will facilitate all contact with you on matters relating to the panel process including to circulate agendas, inform you of the date and time of the panel hearing and to send correspondence to you on any other matters relating to the relevant planning scheme amendment.
All third parties have agreed to the collection, use, and disclosure of data in accordance with this Privacy Statement. The City of Melbourne will not disclose your information to another external party without your consent, unless required or authorised by law.
If you have any questions about the consultants engaged by the City of Melbourne, please contact participate@melbourne.vic.gov.au.
Access and correction
If you wish to access, correct or delete any of the personal information you have supplied to the City of Melbourne, please email your request to participate@melbourne.vic.gov.au
Updated February 2026
Terms of Use
The following terms and conditions (“Terms”) govern the use of the Participate Melbourne website (the “Site”). The platform is owned and operated by Social Pinpoint Pty Ltd on behalf of the Melbourne City Council (“City of Melbourne”).
Your access to and use of the Site is conditioned on your acceptance of and compliance with these Terms. These Terms apply to all visitors, users and others who access or use the Site.
By accessing or using the Site you agree to be bound by these Terms. If you disagree with any part of the terms then you may not access the Site.
You must use the Site in a manner consistent with any and all applicable laws and regulations.
Social Pinpoint and its suppliers use reasonable efforts to protect the confidentiality of content you provide in accordance with the Participate Melbourne Privacy Policy. However, we cannot guarantee that we will be able to wholly protect your information from improper purposes by unauthorised third parties. You acknowledge that there are risks inherent in internet connectivity that could result in the loss of your privacy, confidential information and property.
You agree and understand that any content posted by you is subject to the rules of our Moderation Policy.
When you create an account with us, you must provide us information that is accurate, complete, and current at all times. Failure to do so constitutes a breach of the Terms, which may result in immediate termination of your account.
You are responsible for safeguarding the password that you use to access the Site and for any activities or actions under your password.
You agree not to disclose your password to any third party. You must notify us immediately upon becoming aware of any breach of security or unauthorised use of your account.
The Site may contain links to third-party web sites or services that are not owned or controlled by us.
We have no control over, and assume no responsibility for, the content, privacy policies, or practices of any third party web sites or services. You further acknowledge and agree that we shall not be responsible or liable, directly or indirectly, for any damage or loss caused or alleged to be caused by or in connection with use of or reliance on any such content, goods or services available on or through any such web sites or services.
We strongly advise you to read the terms and conditions and privacy policies of any third-party web sites or services that you visit.
We may terminate or suspend access to the Site immediately, without prior notice or liability, for any reason whatsoever, including without limitation if you breach the Terms.
Provisions of the Terms which by their nature should survive termination shall survive termination, including, without limitation, ownership, disclaimer, indemnity and limitations of liability provisions.
If you wish to terminate your account, you can cancel your registration by contacting info@socialpinpoint.com.
Content that you have posted on the Site may remain on it, even after you have cancelled your registration. You are not entitled to have the content removed.
You can choose to receive newsletters and other updates from us by email. If you choose this but then change your mind, you can unsubscribe at any time by following the process set out in the emails that we send you.
Upon termination, your right to use the Site will immediately cease.
These Terms shall be governed and construed in accordance with the laws of Victoria, Australia, without regard to its conflict of law provisions.
Our failure to enforce any right or provision of these Terms will not be considered a waiver of those rights. If any provision of these Terms is held to be invalid or unenforceable by a court, the remaining provisions of these Terms will remain in effect. These Terms constitute the entire agreement between us regarding the Site.
You agree to indemnify and hold Social Pinpoint and the City of Melbourne, their subsidiaries, affiliates, officers, agents, licensors, and other partners and employees, harmless from, any loss, liability, claim, or demand, including reasonable legal fees, made by any third party due to or arising out of your use of the Site in violation of these Terms and/or arising from a breach of these Terms.
You agree that in no event will Social Pinpoint or the City of Melbourne, their suppliers or licensors, be liable for the Site and its content, or any claim or demand made by you or a third party resulting out of (i) any content you submit to or transmit through the Site; (ii) the interruption of use or loss or corruption of data; or (iii) your use of, or inability to use, the Site; (iv) unauthorised access or alterations of your data; (v) statements of conduct of any third party on the Site.
Participate Melbourne contains the copyrighted material, trademarks, patents, trade secrets, and other proprietary information (“Proprietary Intellectual Property”) of Social Pinpoint and its suppliers and licensors. Social Pinpoint and its suppliers and licensors own and retain all proprietary rights in the Intellectual Property. For the avoidance of doubt, content posted on the Site by you and other users of the Site (“Content”) is not Proprietary Intellectual Property.
Except for Proprietary Intellectual Property which is in the public domain, or for which you have been given written permission, you may not copy, modify, publish, transmit, distribute, perform, display, or otherwise use any such Proprietary Intellectual Property and the provision of such Proprietary Intellectual Property to you through the Site does not transfer to you or any third party any rights, title or interest in or to such Proprietary Intellectual Property, including, without limitation, any intellectual property rights in any content and material included therein.
You may not: distribute, sub-license, translate, reverse-engineer, decompile, or disassemble the Site or Proprietary Intellectual Property or the source code thereof, or attempt to derive the source code thereof in any other way, save and only to the extent any foregoing restriction is prohibited by applicable law; modify the Site or Proprietary Intellectual Property or merge all, or any part, of the Site or Proprietary Intellectual Property or the source code thereof into another program; or remove, modify or alter any of Proprietary Intellectual Property from any part of the Site or the source code thereof.
You agree that any original Content that you produce, contribute or post on to the Site may be made available to the public under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Australian licence. This licence lets others share your Content, where the end user acknowledges your contribution. View the full terms of the licence.
We grant you a Creative Commons licence which allows you to copy and adapt Content on the Site placed by others, subject to the terms of the licence. You can view a copy of the licence.
To the extent permitted by applicable law, you unconditionally and irrevocably consent, and will obtain all other necessary unconditional and irrevocable written consents from other persons involved in producing any Content (text, images and video), to any act or omission that would otherwise infringe any moral rights in any Content which is transmitted by you onto the Site.
We reserve the right, at our sole discretion, to modify or replace these Terms at any time. If a revision is material we will try to provide at least 30 days notice prior to any new Terms taking effect. What constitutes a material change will be determined at our sole discretion.
By continuing to access or use the Site after those revisions become effective, you agree to be bound by the new Terms. If you do not agree to the new Terms, please stop using the Site.
If you have any questions about these Terms, please contact us at info@socialpinpoint.com
Updated July 2019
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