COUNCILLORS have backed away from becoming transparency trailblazers by voting down a proposal at the latest public council meeting to record confidential Kingston Council meetings.
Cr David Eden had urged fellow councillors to support his proposal, first raised at June’s public council meeting, to record confidential meetings between councillors for possible future public release if a matter being debated behind closed doors is subsequently deemed to be made public as often happens (‘‘Let there be light’ on decisions, The News 20/7/16).
Four councillors at the latest council meeting backed a council officer report recommendation to maintain the status quo and not record in camera meetings that are generally held after public council meetings.
Crs Tamsin Bearsley, Ron Brownlees, Geoff Gledhill and Paul Peulich voted to not record confidential meetings while Crs Eden, Steve Staikos and Rosemary West supported the suggestion.
Cr John Ronke did not attend the meeting and Cr Tamara Barth left earlier in the evening.
Cr Brownlees said council officers and legal advice had highlighted “the potential for risk … for officers and councillors” if in camera meetings are recorded involving personnel or staff discussions, private matters for community members or commercial in confidence debates.
“The issue gets raised about transparency and accountability and I keep saying we’re all accountable and we’re all fairly transparent and this council I think has the record of being a council with one of the lowest number of items discussed in camera,” he said.
“Quite often a lot of those get revealed in time anyway.”
Cr Geoff Gledhill said council would have to ask any parties mentioned in confidential discussions to give their permission to release any recordings.
Mayor Cr Tamsin Bearsley believed voting by councillors on in-camera matters should be noted and released so the public knows how councillors voted but actually recording the meeting itself is a step too far at this stage.
“At the moment it’s complex and we need to figure out a way forward and we haven’t done that yet.”
Cr Eden said legal advice had dealt with several of the points of contention raised by councillors against the recording of confidential meetings.
“It’s disappointing we can’t go through the legal advice because it’s confidential,” he said.
“If the public ever had access to that legal advice they would see that almost every issue that has been raised has a solution or there are current provisions to protect people’s privacy.”
Cr Brownlees highlighted council’s existing commitment to transparency around council meetings.
“We’re the first council locally to start recording our meetings and streaming them live. That showed our commitment to being transparent and accountable.”
First published in the Chelsea Mordialloc Mentone News – 3 August 2016
