The Local Government Advisory Board is just so wrong in its 'Right To Request A Poll' notice in today's West Australian.It can't even get it's own recommendations right!
The Notice states that the Board recommended, in three cases, that orders be made to amalgamate districts. The Board actually made five such recommendations, the other two being Vincent/Perth and the G5 (Nedlands, Claremont, Cottesloe, Peppermint Grove and Mosman Park).
As I have already observed on this blog (http://ianrker-vincent.blogspot.com.au/2014/11/yes-we-do-deserve-say-and-have-legal.html), the right to a poll is determined by the LGAB recommendation not by any purported Ministerial response to the recommendation.
The electors of Vincent, Perth and the G5 councils do have the right to a poll - and the clock for submitting a formal request for a poll will not start ticking until the LGAB admits its error and publishes a new notice to that effect.
It is also likely that the LGAB is wrong in implying (by omission) that electors of a district not wholly amalgamated have no right to call a poll. The Local Government Act gives the right to call a poll to 'affected electors' - defined in the Act as 'electors whose eligibility as electors comes from residence, or ownership or occupation of property, in the area directly affected by the proposal'.
This definition clearly applies, for example, to the thousands of Canning residents proposed to be transferred to South Park and the Bicton/Palmyra residents proposed to be transferred to Fremantle/East Fremantle.
Ian, you are absolutely correct in saying the LGA gives the right to call a poll to ‘affected electors’ which is just about all of us one way or the other and here is why –
ReplyDelete‘Subclause (1) of Clause 8 (Electors may demand poll on a recommended amalgamation) state among other things ‘Where the Advisory Board recommends to the Minister the making of an order to abolish 2 or more districts (the districts) and amalgamate them into one or more districts…’. Nowhere does it state that when the abolishment of 2 or more districts takes place that these districts must be adjoining districts and that subclause (2) only takes effect if the amalgamation(s) is of adjoining districts in their original size. Subclause (1) does not preclude the residents (electors) of districts, being adjoining or otherwise and proposed to be divided up, from being afforded a poll.
As currently indicated, Canning and Cockburn will be abolished and amalgamated into one or more districts with surrounding districts namely Gosnells, Melville, Kwinana and Fremantle. In that process Canning will be abolished and amalgamated into 2 districts that of Gosnells and the City of Melville and Cockburn into 3 that of Kwinana, Fremantle and the City of Melville. A similar scenario applies for East Fremantle and Cockburn being abolished and amalgamated into one with Fremantle. It is a clear case of 2 or more districts being abolished and amalgamated into one or more.
Annexing Bicton/Palmyra to Fremantle effectively terminates the existence of the original City of Melville district causing the current Council to cease to exist having two of its councillors living in Bicton. That in itself could be considered the abolishment (formally putting an end to) of a district adding the City of Melville to the mix of its surrounding districts being abolished.’
I am sorry to have to say it; they have stuffed it up completely. Only Notice No. 3 is true to its word, amalgamated onto one. Notice No. 1 and 2 is a dog’s breakfast as explained above.