Another Clayton’s ‘Consultation’
Published 10 months, 3 weeks ago in Where I Live.The following appears on Glen Eira Clowncil’s website under the heading “Consultation for Glen Eira Community Plan” - “Glen Eira City Council will conduct six open forum community workshops throughout February, as part of its community consultation process for the 2008–2012 Glen Eira Community Plan.”
Since when is a ‘workshop’ deemed as ‘consultation’??? Here is the ‘translation’ as to what will happen based on endless previous experience. (1) An administration (read: ‘puppet’) appointed ‘facilitator’ will run the show (2) All those who attend will become stupefied after being presented with an overload of facts and figures and pretty pictures intended to induce mind-numbness and a false sense of security (2) Attendees will be repeatedly told how wonderful the kingdom of Glen Eira is (3) Time for public questions and debate will be stringently controlled so that if the community is lucky it might get 15 minutes of raising issues that it feels are relevant. (4) The answers to this will be – ‘your concern is noted’ and it will then disappear into the ether never to be heard of again, reported upon, or acted upon!!!
Finally, the performance indicator in this ‘community plan’ for consultation is simply ‘perceived community improvement’. Does this mean that the objectives are achieved if there is a miniscule 1% ‘improvement’ on a dismal previous assessment? Is this really ‘accountability’ to the public? How about including performance indicators which aim for 70% improvement? But I’m in fairy land, of course. Would this clowncil ever state a figure which can then be held up as ‘evidence’ of its abject failure on ‘consultation’??????
1 Response to “Another Clayton's 'Consultation'”
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I appreciate more than anything the lack of records published about what occurs when Council “consults” with its residents. There appears to be no minutes kept of resolutions made from the floor.
As Councillor Lipshutz rightly said…..we elected him to govern on our behalf….we delegated our rights believing Councillors were “there for the people”…Residents are caught between a rock and a hard place to get any satisfaction….What we need are ballsy candidates to stand at the next election who will stand up for our interests first and foremost……
Two residents turned up at the Information Session for the Draft Budget. The rest of us realised that it was fruitless attending the Meeting, because their decisions had already been made.
Not one word of the Draft Budget was altered to incorporate any suggestion put forward by a resident, and this is indicative of calling for public input without any intention to change.
As long as we have no expectation of genuine consultation with a view to being listened to, residents won’t be disappointed in their elected Councillors, because the Administration runs the Council by default…..It seems “robust debate” in Council is a thing of the time -