No end to complaints, says Casey Council

By Sarah Schwager
CASEY deputy mayor Rob Wilson has failed in his attempt to stop people complaining to the council about councillors.
Cr Wilson put a notice of motion before last week’s meeting that the council end its complaints-against-councillors policy.
“This policy allows people to have a go at councillors and sometimes unfairly,” he said.
“If a councillor breaks the law then he or she has to deal with those consequences.
“But the ballot box is the traditional way a councillor is dealt with.”
Casey mayor Kevin Bradford disagreed and said the council needed to have some sort of complaint or report mechanism.
“Residents need to have some methods to complain,” Cr Bradford said.
“If councillors don’t do anything wrong, they don’t have anything to worry about.”
Cr Wilson pleaded to councillors that he did not want them to have to go through the things he had gone through in the past but the motion was lost.
Cr Colin Butler said the council officers should review the policy to see if they could come up with something fairer.
The council decided to establish a committee consisting of the mayor, deputy mayor, chief executive, and councillors Smith, Richardson and Farley to review and prepare a new complaints policy and report back to the council.