Southern Peninsula
GET YOUR
FREE TV GUIDE
Caring for local families for over 40 years www.rosebudfunerals.com.au
123 Jetty Road, Rosebud
INSIDE!
Ph: 5986 8491
An independent voice for the community
Your weekly community newspaper covering Safety Beach to Portsea
17
FREE
Wednesday 31 July 2024
For all advertising and editorial needs, call 03 5974 9000 or email: team@mpnews.com.au www.mpnews.com.au
Kanga Crush
RED Hill got the better of Langwarrin on Saturday in a lowscoring affair. Grabbing an eight point win, they sit fourth on the MPNFL Division One ladder. Picture: Paul Churcher See Sport page 29
‘Secret’ meetings to go online Keith Platt keith@mpnews.com.au MORNINGTON Peninsula Shire last week agreed to televise online briefing meetings that are held behind closed doors. The decision was made at the same time that council adopted a review of its public transparency policy. It is understood by The News that councillors and the CEO Baker met the following day and discussed rescinding the motion they had adopted just hours before. Legal
advice will be sought. Debate at the council’s Tuesday 23 July public meeting followed a report from governance officer Diana Harris and acting governance manager Pam Vercoe that stated briefing and workshop documents were not intended for public release and often included confidential information. Their report comes two years after council decided the policy should be referred to a “citizens panel” and “feedback” sought over a four week exhibition period from the “wider community”. Councillors were told that most respondents thought the policy
was “easy to read and understand”, although some concerns were raised about “the lack of explanation of the concepts of public interest and confidentiality”. However, the report by Harris and Vercoe states that no changes were needed as both “concepts” were explained in the policy’s definitions section. Briefings are usually held in the weeks leading up to a formal council meeting and can involve councillors and officers engaging in candid discussions about upcoming issues. “One of the challenges sometimes in discussions is that they are very
wide ranging and they drift off into different areas … That is where it becomes more problematic as far as information that is made publicly available,” CEO John Baker said. Officers provided information “but also respond to a broad range of what could be described as blue sky thinking about testing ideas and concepts”. Cr David Gill, who said he had been trying for eight years to get more public access to council’s secret briefings and workshops, questioned why it had taken two years for the review of the transparency policy “which apparently doesn’t
change anything”. He said there was no “real explanation of why briefings should be confidential, it’s just that they are”. “I’m looking to increasing the trust we have in our community, that they should know more about what happens with council,” he said. “People always suspect they’re not being told everything. The more we can let people really know … these meetings shouldn’t be secret.” Gill said the shire’s approach to opening up briefings to the public would be a model copied by municipalities throughout Australia. Continued Page 10