Wyndham council should sack chief executive Kerry Thompson for hiring a private investigator to spy on staff and wasting almost $355,000 of ratepayers’ money, according to the Australian Services Union.
Branch secretary Brian Parkinson said Ms Thompson had shown an “appalling lack of judgement” in spending $354, 892 to hire the private eye and fight unfair dismissal claims lodged by five parks and gardens workers who were sacked on the investigator’s word.
“Councillors need to be asking serious questions of the CEO for the sake of employees at Wyndham and the ratepayers in the municipality,” Mr Parkinson said.
Fair Work Australia commissioner Anna Cribb, who last week ruled that supervisor Phillip Leyshan should be reinstated, found that Ms Thompson had sacked him without reading his written response to the allegations against him.
Mr Parkinson accused Ms Thompson of hiring and firing staff to suit her own agenda, “not the interests of ratepayers”.
“It beggars belief that the CEO and senior management spent a vast amount of money, time and resources on setting the stage to sack [Mr Leyshan] without bothering to read his own personal response to the allegations,” Mr Parkinson said.
As revealed by the Weekly, Wyndham council has conducted as many as nine investigations into its own staff since Ms Thompson became chief executive in July 2010.
In March last year, the council launched a controversial investigation into former sustainable development director Greg Aplin, a council employee of more than 30 years. While the investigation is understood to have cleared Mr Aplin of wrongdoing, he resigned from the council in June 2012, entering into a far-reaching confidentiality agreement and receiving a large payout.
A council source said investigations had become increasingly common.
“The sad thing is that the people who are leaving are the ones who put in and were committed to the community,” said the source, who did not want to be named.
Ms Thompson defended her actions, saying she took the steps she believed were necessary to prevent inappropriate workplace behaviour and the misuse of ratepayer resources.
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