City challenge on CfG membership

Andrew Mathieson
A COMMUNITY activist is attempting to take legal action against City Hall over allegations of a conflict of interest in its membership of a lobby group.
Ocean Grove’s Bob Thompson has launched his own investigation into council’s relationship with Committee for Geelong.
Geelong’s mayor and the City’s chief executive officer sit on the committee’s board of management.
Mr Thompson has challenged the committee membership following changes to the Local Government Act on rules governing conflicting duties at councils.
Mr Thompson said he would use Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal to prove Geelong’s council was breaching the new laws.
“I reckon I have got them by the throat – they really don’t have a dog’s hope in hell if they go, according to the letter of the law,” he said.
Mr Thompson said issues such as the committee hearing plans for Geelong’s Armstrong Creek urban growth development before council suggested an improper relationship.
Mr Thompson believed council’s membership of the committee created a “public perception” of a conflict interest.
“My point is that you can’t serve two masters,” he said.
“There is also a part in the act itself that say you can’t be disloyal by serving someone else.”
Mr Thompson said he would pay $314 in expenses out of his own pocket to have the VCAT hearing.
Mayor John Mitchell, in a letter to Mr Thompson, denied council broke laws when it voted to renew its Committee for Geelong membership this year.
Cr Mitchell said Mr Thompson’s assertions contained “a number of factual errors and contentions, which are rejected”.
“I see nothing to be gained for the ratepayers of the City by engaging in an exchange of your correspondence on your contentions of conflict of interest,” Cr Mitchell wrote in response to Mr Thompson.
Cr Mitchell believed Mr Thompson’s objective was for council not to renew its membership.
“The interests of council’s ratepayers are served by the council participating as a member of the Committee for Geelong,” Cr Mitchell said.
Council pays $20,000 plus GST a year for its committee membership.
The committee has expanded its role to include “advocating and influencing decision-makers”, according to a council report in February.
Cr Barbara Abley was the only councillor who voted against renewing the membership.