Councillors face a “day of shame”

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Councillors face a “day of shame”

SOUTH Gippsland Shire councillors have been accused of exploiting ratepayers by misusing expenditure claims to generate income, “in a day of shame for councillors”.
Those were the words of former councillor Jim Fawcett, who resigned from council effective yesterday (Monday), along with former councillor Lorraine Brunt.
The pair attempted to have council reveal the extent of what they said was the misuse of expenditure claims during heated debate at last Wednesday’s council meeting, but they were shut down by the other councillors.
Cr Fawcett moved a notice of motion, seconded by Cr Brunt, calling for council CEO Tim Tamlin to “provide a suitable summary document of the findings and recommendations of the Councillor Expenditure and Code of Conduct Review and make the summary document public.”
Cr Fawcett said doing so would reveal why the review was undertaken: because he said some councillors were abusing the process and the information should have been made public at least seven months ago.
Cr Fawcett said the Councillor Expenditure and Code of Conduct Review deals with code of conduct behaviour, manipulation of vehicle log books to maximise mileage to boost claims and deals with current councillors who seem to think expenditure reimbursements are a form of income.
The review was undertaken at the recommendation of municipal monitor Peter Stephenson, appointed by Victorian Local Government Minister Adem Somyurek to improve council’s governance. Mr Stephenson was concerned council had not implemented aspects of an auditor’s report about councillor expenditure and code of conduct.
Cr Ray Argento – with the backing of all councillors bar councillors Fawcett and Brunt (Cr Aaron Brown was absent) – amended the motion to call for the CEO to bring a future report on all confidential documents that could be released. Deputy mayor Cr Alyson Skinner seconded it.
“There is greater interest than just one document,” Cr Argento said.
Cr Fawcett said the amendment was made to suppress the release of information showing councillors were treating expenditure reimbursement as income and making inappropriate claims.
But mayor Cr Don Hill said Cr Argento’s amendment was more consistent and improved Cr Fawcett’s motion by opening it to all documents, and so approved the amendment.
That irked Cr Fawcett, who retorted, “Mr Mayor, you are deluded”, prompting laughter from Cr Brunt and Cr Hill to say Cr Fawcett was out of order. Cr Fawcett responded, “You are”.
The votes of councillors Hill, Argento, Andrew McEwen, Jeremy Rich and Rosemary Cousin saw Cr Argento’s amendment become the new motion. They later all voted to pass that motion.
Cr Brunt said, “The public wants to know.”
“Will you be deciding behind closed doors which one of these documents the CEO brings back? Can you do that in open council?” she said.
She moved an amendment to Cr Argento’s motion calling for the scope of confidential documents to be revealed to be limited to councillor conduct and mediation documents. Only she and Cr Fawcett supported this and her amendment was lost.
Cr Skinner said she took exception to Cr Fawcett’s comments about council’s failure of governance, finding it “derogatory”.
Cr Fawcett said, “The six of you are hell bent on keeping from the public the things that have occurred in the last two years.
“The public should be outraged at the abuse of your position.”
Cr Fawcett said Cr Argento’s amendment did not stipulate how far back the CEO should go in reviewing confidential documents for possible release, and was indicative of council’s willingness to hide information from the public.
Cr Fawcett said Cr Jeremy Rich was entitled to claim travel reimbursement from his home in the Melbourne suburb of Armadale to attend council business.
However Cr Fawcett, referring to the policy more broadly, said other aspects were “being used as a revenue stream” and the travel amount councillors could claim “should be capped”.
Cr Fawcett doubted council operations would improve in the future, following the countback to replace councillors Brunt and Fawcett yesterday (Monday), with the same six councillors still able to dictate council policy.

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Posted by on Apr 2 2019. Filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry

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