Kevin Hillier says nothing has changed at Wyndham council
Why did I think the new year might bring a new attitude from our council? A new mayor, a relatively new CEO but still they serve up the same bureaucratic rubbish.
We have a councillor on a leave of absence and unsure whether he will see out his commitment. He is not seeking re-election in November but he owes it to the people who voted for him to see out his time; taking your bat and ball and going home is just not on.
He was found to have breached the councillor code of conduct and the Local Government Act and was benched for two council meetings. I think attending meetings would be more of a punishment than being banned.
Another councillor was accused of verbal abuse. The council investigated and did not uphold the complaint. Fair enough? Well, not really, because council has refused to release the investigator’s report, claiming it’s confidential and inappropriate to provide specific details.
Inappropriate for whom? Not the person who made the complaint, not the investigator, not the council which based its decision on the report and certainly not the councillor who has been exonerated. So who would find the report inappropriate? What happened to the promised open and accountable council?
To quote the mayor from her column in this newspaper: “Council is proud of our increasing customer focus in this council term. One of the important ways we can improve is to get honest feedback from residents”.
Here you go mayor, honest feedback from a resident: Release the report and tell councillors they made a commitment to serve until November, so suck it up and do it. Not surprisingly, not one councillor has responded to my question, via this column, on whether they will seek re-election in the coming election.
I have now emailed each of them at their council addresses. This is the contact point at which, the mayor assures us, we can ask questions and councillors will respond. I’ll let you know what replies I receive.
If you have any news or events, let me know at kevin@howdypartnersmedia. com.au
