Logan, Queensland, Australia, and the people of Division 11, Division 10 and Division 4 are left unrepresented by their councillors, something that many residents, particularly in 11 and 4, claim is a common occurrence with representatives missing meetings to avoid declaring conflicts of interest, and to pursue personal career opportunities.
The recent meeting where the issue of Pay rises for councillors was discussed, was held not long after another meeting which was attended by the three aforementioned councillors but in a strange twist they claimed their absence was a protest about concocting a plan to secure the pay rise by stealth, according to the news reported locally in a quote from Cr Ban. The twist is that previously she had in the media accused the rest of the councillors of attempting to reject the pay rise to stop the non chairing councillors from keeping in step with the recommendations from the independent tribunal. Confused? well so am I,
As far as being a spokesperson for salary, and considering the rise would see the city’s 13 elected representatives each pocket an extra $3050 to $5170 a year, and that the base pay without car, unlimited fuel allowance, phone , laptop, telecom services paid, office staff, and facilities, and probably other allowances is already around the $100,000 mark with the amalgamation loading, you'd think someone preparing to dump their division to pursue another elected position against a vow not to do so, and someone who previously continued to take a salary from the ratepayers while campaigning and failing to secure a federal seat before would think twice before looking so greedy and making a last ditch grab for more money before the next federal elections are called.
The real problem is that despite the very weak excuse of "a protest" for not attending, the excuse was made after, and to the press i believe, leaving the say of the people of those three divisions unsaid, and it's not the first time in some cases. The people of those divisions deserve better, they pay their rates and a councillor does very very well on the remuneration they receive for the little work they do ( apparently you can do the job . . . and. . . run a campaign for a federal seat without either suffering ).
Residents being unrepresented by a councillor at meetings should be a sackable offence.
The joke is, that it seems the councillors really want the pay rise, they really do, but they are trying to appear as if they don't support it now that it has come to light that if the base rate is handed down by the independent tribunal, council cannot pay less than that rate and if they vote for tat rise it has to for all, worse, failing to vote is a vote for the rise because it reduces the number against, just as abstaining in the meeting would be recorded as for.
The charade will probably be a TV stunt for the federal campaign, there isn't any other reasonable explanation because a real protest would have been to go to the meeting , have your say, represent the people like you're supposed to , and vote against if that's the view of the ratepayers.
The unfortunate thing for the old Beaudesert Shire area, it means that only one out of three councillors attended that meeting, and gave representation of the views of the ratepayers, the other two thirds of our area were unrepresented again.
25 comments:
They should have their pay cut, and anyone campaigning for another seat should have to resign, it's not fair to the residents. It's not like yhey ever answer their phone ever or call back anyway, you might as well have no councillor at all really.
Since 2006 Div 4 now 11, has been unrepresented - nothing new. This division has been divided and torn apart - individuals and groups have been victimised by one iddy biddy individual.
All I can say to Tony Abbott is 'You deserve her'. The sooner she is elected for Federal the better, so that this community can get on with their lives. Its been a roller coaster ride to say the least.
She will have no impact on our daily lives, just like the present State members for this area. In a Federal seat the damage will be minimal compared to the havoc created over the past few years.
Once in Canberra she'll probably aim for the top job - Prime Minister of Australia.
The shame of it all is that the people of Australia are supporting her financially all the way - bit like being on the dole?
Don't forget Councillor Seven who was Ummm!!! Absent Again!!. Part-Time must be the new Full Time.Casual Councillors, Councillors missing in action, Councillors preoccupied with Federal elections, other Councillors telling us they do not want but have to take the salary rise. The huge gesture of the mayor for her Salary donation.The sad thing is she is the Captain of this rabble.
Selfish, thats the only word to describe these bludgers. Selfish.
Once upon a time another Mayor made the grand gesture to give any increase in salary to charities - seems he forgot until shamed into it.
As for 'charities' seems Logan deems any group a charity these days even though a real Charity has to under vigorous scrutiny to become registered as one.
Any excuse to give passing money to favourites in the community.
The same Mayor promised that she would unite the Council by way of her Managerial experience and ability to puul a team together.
Has not vene met the pass mark with this effort.
Really!!! are our Councillors any worst than our State politicans and other Councillors? I wonder. And if they are , then "where the bloody hell are all of you ",when it comes to standing against these poor performers including the Mayor at Election time.
Seems to me we want to whinge but not to get involved when it comes to divulging our identity. Change will only occurr when people stand up for change.
Hi Newby, you obviously have not experienced the 'wrath' or retributions yet. Its good to be new.
Hi Newby, I've had constant reports of elected representatives using various methods to attack community members even those who have legitimately run against them at elections, and it doesn't stop at bitter responses on blogs, it can continue to using the police complaints and i'm informed real visits from police to intimidate and bully.
What i find amusing is that although you advocate using real names, as do many other posters who are ardent supporters of particular elected people, you as usual have not used yours, and neither have any of the others calling for peoples identity to be revealed, ever.
At the last election, for council, ther was some community members who had the fortitude to stand against long term incumbents with the result being that the incumbent was not elected, great result.
If you would open your eyes, and take off the rose coloured glasses you might be able to see that the polarising and marginalisation of the community done by some elected people is not what makes a good community, in fact the only thing it does is foster the promoting of the little grubby power hungry meglomaniacs egos as they take up all the committees in the area and controll everything community on behalf of of the elected person who remains hands clean but totally in control and very good people walk away from community work in droves.
Just take a look at the issue of the Greenbank neighbourhood centre, for example (an issue I've been following for some time) the group was thrown out of it's community centre room when the councillor cancelled the funding for the rent without telling them. Also they were not informed of the non payment of rent until the final warning and then even after paying 10 weeks rent were still evicted as not paying it. After a lot of other goings on, we now have a group of people, whose allegance is predictablly nefarious, calling for the creation of a neighbourhood centre in greenbank and looking for a heap of money.
So getting this straight, they got rid of one neighbourhood centre (which could not be bought, and would not support elected people) and now want to bring in a new one which has no qualms about such matters.
One last thing, As the blogger I have the right to creatively edit, or reject comments, or even ban you by IP so that all your different comments can't even get to the blog, I have never done it, . . . . .yet.
So glad to see that the Greenbank issue has not totally been buried.
We know that the group of community workers who were so shamefully evicted are still going strong. They work on the streets, in parks and private homes, while the buildings at the Greenbank Community Centre sits empty 75% of the time.
Logan promised to include them on their data base and assist with finding a venue for them - that was 2 years ago and still the group is out on the streets. Don't you just love Logan?
Now a group of three are lobbying for another venue - under the guise of neighbourhood centre yet only offering the activities run at Jimboomba.
Last year Logan stated that they would not provide any more centres and this year the three announced that Logan would look at including a venue in the budget. Who is pulling who's leg?
One of the three has made statements in the community that she is a special friend of the Mayor's and privvy to 'much information'. Another is an ex-BSC cr who plans to run for Logan again.
All I can say is shame on Logan - do you think the people of Greenbank are idiots?
UNOWHO" Thank you for the lecture. However wasted it was!> When I spoke about identities,it was in reference to the next Election when you and others can and I hope offer some alternative options as Councillors instead of the obvious ones at this stage.The wider the field the better chance we may find a real fair dinkum performer for each Division.
'Newby' I really hope you will stand for the next council election, otherwise I will be voting for Mickey Mouse or Daisy Duck. I reckon they could do a better job than what we have and who will be running according to the papers.
Thanks Newby, . . . I'm sure my "lecture" was not wasted as it was aimed at the points you made rather than particularly at you as a commenter, and at others who also make comments calling for identities to be revealed.
And, I agree, we need some real community people to get up and put their hat into the ring, the obvious contenders don't cut the mustard, . . . at all.
We do not need anymore LNP representatives only due to the perormances of there predecessors.I suspect that they would only be puppets of the already elected threesome.
Reading about the new Scenic Rim Councillors who appear to be gagged by their Mayor or controlled (either way), I have to wonder whether it would be any better being back in Beaudesert at present. We need to clean the Councils of these tired hacks and bring freshness to our Elections so as we receive new ideas. Look at Ipswich and then compare our two mayors efforts in comparison. One is a Master Saleman and our two are just watertreaders who cannot really control thier respective Councils.
Whoever is advising this federal Candidate really needs to learn some political tactics. However the Wright elctorate is full of shep and their vote will go the way of the LNP Party because they know no better. So really you could run a Barbie Doll and it would win.
The advisors are the B-B Guns, so it stands to reason why there is such a lack of thought and professionalism being demonstrated.
Anon 8:33 - we already have a barbie doll running for Fed.
She will win the Fed /Seat and her shadow will go on and replace her in Div 11.
So when will the "shadow" come clean with us. It would seem he does not own the company he claims to own, well one of them any way, and his positions of grand and importance do not stand up to scrutiny either. It's about time for the truth,isn't it.
I will continue to reject threatening comments, unreservedly.
Look, you may think you're in a position of power, or have some influence or freinds who believe they have some little power but at the end of the day we all end up a long long time dead, and to me you are just not worth the bother of even conversing with so your emails go straigh to junk until you want to use a propper one and not an anonymous web based one where you can hide and go phishing.
You do not frighten me , at all and if legal action is the way you want to go , Bring it on, happy to accomidate that eventuation.
Oh and by the way , you stuffed up and gave a little too much information in your last threatening email, I know exactly who you are now, and who you are getting to send this rubbish, not so clever.
Now please stop the harrassment fo this blog.
Go Unowho!!! Well Said!!
Whoever is sending threats via e-mails needs to be careful - they can be prosecuted. Bullies forget that it works both ways!
This is not Afganistan or China where people are thrown in jail or shot for expressing their views.
Some people in the community really need to grab a brain and realise that people in glass houses should not throw rocks.
This blog must be hitting a nerve - so keep on keeping on. We the people would be mushrooms without informative blogs such as this one.
There is no doubt that some people want to stop the facts going out to the public as they may just differ to how they might prefer the story to be told.
I have taken precautions and am prepared to go to a pay site with my musings if attempts to shut thsis blog down using political weight succeed.
I have been informed that complaints have been made to the providers of the blog framework but have as yet not delivered the result wanted, it doesn't matter, every word including the deleted stuff still exists on a web based storage facility and can be raised anew within 24 hours.
Good for you - give them curry.
As a 'victim'of defamation, character and reputation assault, I'm sure by the same group, I have no time for any of them.
The strange thing is that not once have they been game to say anything to my face - pack of cowards.
I am a strong believer in karma and the time will come when it all comes back to them.
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