A COUNCILLOR who breached the Local Government Act’s councillor code of conduct with “aggressive” behaviour towards two council employees has also been censured for “the use of profanity” in an email to a fellow councillor.
Arbitrator, Justitia lawyer Sarah Rey, noted that an email from deputy mayor Cr Hampton to Cr Darrel Taylor clearly directed invective at Cr Taylor.
The email was copied in to all nine Frankston councillors.
Ms Rey, was originally hired by Frankston Council to investigate a complaint lodged by mayor Cr James Dooley against Cr Taylor, but found no merit in the mayor’s complaint about an alleged “lack of respect” in an email he received from Cr Taylor.
By contrast, Cr Hampton’s May email to Cr Taylor stated: “Just goes to show what lengths you will go to save your ass when you are so wrong and you try to bullshit your way out … I feel sorry for anyone who believes your bullshit.”
Councillors traded emails in the days following the mayor’s decision to allow amendments to a notice of motion introduced by Cr Taylor at May’s public council meeting asking for an internal council audit of the Wells St revamp project where costs rose from $3.58 million to $4.239 million.
Cr Taylor had stated in an email he found it “astonishing” that Cr Dooley had allowed his NOM to be amended by Cr Glenn Aitken to include an audit of several major projects in Frankston.
Council CEO Dennis Hovenden told councillors at a subsequent public meeting that widening the audit meant its results would not be known until after the 22 October council elections.
The mayor objected to Cr Taylor’s use of the word “astonishing” in an email, copied in to all councillors, seeing it as “a deliberate and malicious slur”, but the arbitrator ruled this was not the case.
Cr Taylor’s use of the phrase “a blind man could see what was going on” was also deemed by the arbitrator to not be directed at any particular individual.
Cr Dooley said he could not comment on code of conduct investigations when asked whether he believed Cr Hampton had breached council’s councillors’ code of conduct with his emailed comments about Cr Taylor.
Frankston’s councillor code of conduct calls for councillors to work collaboratively by “demonstrating leadership by focusing on issues and refraining from personalising remarks regarding other councillors”.
The mayor told the arbitration hearing he had talked to Cr Hampton about the inappropriateness of his email.
At the time Cr Hampton sent his “derogatory” email he was under investigation for allegedly being aggressive towards Cr Taylor and two council employees in public at a function at The Deck Bar in Frankston.
An independent panel, convened by the Municipal Association of Victoria in July, found Cr Hampton breached code of conduct clauses in displaying “aggressive” behaviour towards the council staff members.
Cr Hampton was ordered to apologise to both employees.
It was also alleged that Cr Hampton said “piss off you cheeky bastard” and “piss off” several times to Cr Taylor at The Deck Bar late last year, but the two-man panel, barrister Peter Harris and MAV governance member Matt Evans, decided such “enthusiastic conduct” did not merit censure.
When contacted by The Times Cr Hampton said the expressions he used in his email to Cr Taylor were commonly used in Australia.
“It’s an Australian colloquialism and I don’t know why he’s got his knickers in a twist,” Cr Hampton said. “Cr Taylor has a proven history of exaggeration.”
The independent panel in June found Cr Taylor’s “evidence was exaggerated” over allegations Cr Hampton was ejected from The Deck bar rather than deciding to leave on the evening Cr Hampton was found to have acted aggressively towards the two council employees.
Cr Taylor said he stood by his evidence.
Ms Rey noted Cr Hampton’s emailed “use of profanity [was] clearly directed at Cr Taylor” in her arbitration findings.
The arbitration meeting to hear Cr Dooley’s dismissed complaint against Cr Taylor is one of several to be held in recent months amid a flurry of complaints by councillors about fellow councillors in the lead up to next month’s council election on 22 October.
The hearings are believed to have cost ratepayers tens of thousands of dollars in fees to lawyers but council CEO Dennis Hovenden has refused to provide a ballpark figure or confirm the final total bill.
