There’s plenty wrong with our councils, they say

IF COUNCILLOR Bruce Kent reports what he heard at a special forum called by the Bass Coast Ratepayers and Residents Association in Wonthaggi last Saturday afternoon, October 29, and he can get four other councillors to support him, there should be root and branch change at the Bass Coast Shire Council.

There was simply no denying that what one of the guest speakers, Cr Heather Wellington of the Surf Coast Shire, had to say about what’s wrong with local councils, clearly applies to Bass Coast.
President of the ratepayers’ group, Kevin Griffin, said as much at the end of Cr Wellington’s address.

“The issue of transparency is very dear to my heart,” said Cr Wellington, a qualified doctor, lawyer and long-serving councillor (9 years at Surf Coast, 4 years at Geelong).

She said she’d had to fight tooth and nail at both councils to get even basic information to answer questions from local residents, only to be told that all she would be given was the information needed to make decisions at up-coming council meetings.

“I was constantly told that the issue was an operational matter which wasn’t a councillors’ role.

“But are you going to tell me that if Qantas staff were going to leave the passengers’ luggage behind, that a director of the company couldn’t get involved because it was an operational matter, that’s rubbish.”

Cr Wellington related the story about when she first became a Geelong councillor, she thought she was doing the right thing going out to visit residents who had been trying to get action for 10 years on the number of gravel trucks using a residential road.

“There were 100 trucks-a-day and they were being driven mad by the dust and noise.

“I asked to be briefed about what permits were in place and over the course of 12 weeks, I exchanged 50 emails with staff, following up, only to be told that my questions were causing staff stress. These were senior officers, not administration staff but after that I stopped communicating with senior staff and went exclusively through the CEO.

“I was initially told that there would be an investigation but later they came back and said they were simply reviewing the relationship between council and administration and would be preparing a new policy.

“They said I couldn’t have the document, that all I was entitled to was the documents needed to make decisions at the council table.”

Cr Wellington said she ultimately won the day, despite not receiving support from her fellow councillors, resorting to making an FOI application for the release of the report, which council took to VCAT when the FOI process came out in her favour, some 18 months later.
“I eventually got the documents, but it took a long time, and the council finally had to admit there was no permit in place and the truck movements were stopped.
“The residents were grateful, they still are.”

She said councillors needed to involve themselves in helping residents solve their problems with council when necessary.

And if they were afraid of answering direct questions from residents and ratepayers they probably weren’t suited to the role.

Cr Wellington said that while the process took a long time and she was blamed for allegedly costing the shire’s administration time and the council legal expenses, it ultimately led to a freer exchange of information between councillors and the administration.

So, what’s wrong with council?

* Councillors are far too dependent on administration
1. Induction and ongoing education and training should be by independent experts not senior officers
2. Officers induct councillors and then spend many hours each month briefing them.
3. Many councillors have no experience working with large organisations and managing CEOs.
4. No clear mechanism to challenge inappropriate application of governance rules in council meetings (e.g. when Mayor Whelan moved adoption motion for Annual Report at last week’s meeting.
5. Councillors are overwhelmed by complex information, lack confidence to question or object and are often frustrated by the lack of access to information.
6. Governance reviews often focus on the ‘problems’ of ‘councillor conduct and behaviour’ without considering the interface with the organisation.
7. The dynamic of the councillors hiring the CEO, for the CEO to then hold the councillors accountable doesn’t work.
8. A common theme was of councillors frustrated by being blocked, feeling intimidated or not being listened to or being refused information. Councillors don’t want to reflect negatively on the organisation but revealed alarming concerns about the quality of their interaction with their organisation and their councillors that needs to be addressed as a priority for the health of the sector.

* What should change?
1. Compulsory disclosure and verification of candidate credentials
2. Local Government Act 2020 should define the role of councillors as including community representation both within and outside the chamber, and to imbed councillor right to access information.
3. Have common governance rules across all councils with limited capacity for local variations.
4. Education of both officers and councillors about different roles and effective governance relationships.
5. Establish a councillor peer professional organisation to support councillors (e.g. ‘Councillors Victoria’).
6. Councillor access to expert, independent advice, possibly with two non-elected ‘expert’ councillors added to each council to support decision-making."

Cr Wellington was also asked about the locally vexed question of “council question time”, saying that if the administration didn’t like the way processes such as question time were going, they would often seek to review the local laws, so that they could change the rules.

Cr Wellington said, as a councillor, she had recognised that 48 closed briefings sessions for 12 open council meetings was more an attempt to control council than it was to get good decisions and she had stopped going to briefings, instead conducting her own research and encouraging residents to write letters, petition and campaign for action and change.

Another guest speaker, the Shadow Minister for Local Government, Richard Riordan, from Colac, promised a review of the Local Government Act and the rating system if the Coalition won government, saying also that councils needed a clear focus on their responsibilities for local infrastructure and services, rather than on global, national and state issues.

Ratepayers Victoria Inc President, Kelvin Granger, alleged some councils were spending up to 80% of funds from rates and charges on salaries and the cost of administration and it had to stop.
“Why the Parliament of Victoria has permitted this to continue is just beyond belief,” he said.