Gavan O'Connor (Corio, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise in this grievance debate on a matter of great concern and importance to the future governance of the Geelong region, and also its economic future. In February 2007 the Victorian Ombudsman delivered an important report initiated by an own-motion investigation into the policies and procedures of the planning department of the City of Greater Geelong. This investigation became necessary because of serious complaints by businessmen and prominent members of the Geelong community about irregularities in the operation of councillor hearing panels when considering some large-scale developments before council, the actions of some council officers and massive inconsistencies in the application of council planning procedures.

As I reported to my constituents in my March 2007 newsletter to the Corio electorate, the report has exposed what the Municipal Association of Victoria regards as illegal conduct in the operation of councillor hearing panels, warns of significant potential for councillor conflict of interest over certain development proposals, and documents a litany of procedural and administrative deficiencies, abuse and councillor interference in planning matters within the council. The Ombudsman delivered a sobering and important warning to the Geelong community in this report about procedural fairness and the rights of citizens to be heard in council processes.

It is important for the Geelong community to appreciate that there are elected council representatives and paid council officers who take their responsibilities seriously and have conducted their time in council, or serving it, with integrity and distinction. However, there are others who have not. Their actions have betrayed the trust the community has placed in them when it elected them to the City of Greater Geelong.

The Ombudsman’s report is the third report—following the Whelan report and the VCAT report—on Frank Costa’s Hometown Geelong development that has raised serious questions about the conduct of some councillors, council candidates, planning staff, businessmen, developers and local Geelong politicians in Geelong council elections. In 2004, the very conservative Geelong Business News reported in several articles an unholy alliance between prominent Geelong identity Mr Frank Costa and other Geelong businessmen, and between Liberals, property developers and the Marles right of the Labor Party in Geelong to influence outcomes in the 2004 municipal election for the City of Greater Geelong. According to the Whelan report commissioned by the Bracks government into the matter, some $50,000 was raised by Mr Costa in cash and cash cheques from local Lara property developer Lino Bisinella, businessman Robert Riordan, car dealer Sean Blood, former nightclub owner Stewart Harrison and local fruit and vegetable merchant Glynn Harvey. The money was delivered to Councillor David Saunderson, who at the time was employed as an electorate officer to Mr John Eren MLC—now MLA—and distributed to councillors and unnamed candidates in the 2004 council election. An additional $21,000 was delivered to Councillor Saunderson by property developer Lascorp to assist candidates in the 2004 municipal election.

The Whelan report omitted to name unsuccessful councillors and candidates who received assistance from the secret slush fund, and to this day the Geelong community is none the wiser about who they are. However, details of the deal are still dribbling out some years later. A recent Geelong Advertiser article on 12 May 2007 entitled ‘Backroom rumblings: Bisinella was part of push to oust Ansett’ details allegations by Windermere ward councillor Tony Ansett that he was deliberately targeted in the 2004 elections through the funding of $21,697 from the Costa fund to a candidate identified in the Whelan report as candidate B, who opposed Councillor Ansett in the Windermere ward at that election. Candidate B has subsequently been identified by the Geelong Advertiser as Cameron Granger, a prominent member of the Labor right faction in Geelong and Marles’s confidant, factional operative, campaign manager to the former Corangamite Labor candidate Councillor Peter McMullin, former electorate officer to Lisa Neville MP and current electorate officer to John Eren MLA.

As a result of the Whelan report, Councillor Saunderson has been charged and found guilty of breaching disclosure provisions of the Local Government Act. It is also a matter of public record that Mr Costa has an application for a multimillion dollar Hometown retail development currently before council which requires a substantial rezoning to retail of industrial land required for the future development of the port of Geelong, to accommodate a current scaled down Hometown retail development. The Hometown proposal, according to recent Geelong Advertiser reports, has also been the subject of various representations to the Bracks government. The Hometown application is important because any proposed rezoning of land will impact heavily on the availability of land for the future development of the port of Geelong, which in turn has implications for future freight movements through the port of Melbourne and, in the long run, the economic development of the Geelong region, the state of Victoria and, indeed, the nation. The rezoning is opposed by Toll Holdings, who own the port of Geelong, as well as the Geelong Chamber of Commerce and the Geelong Manufacturing Council. There are very important considerations at stake in the council and the state government’s decisions on the Hometown proposal. It is not just a matter of the economic viability of the port of Geelong and the long-term economic future of the Geelong region and the state of the Victoria. What is at stake is the future of democratic practice and good governance at the local government level in the Geelong region and at the state level in Victoria.

There are several important things that must now occur if this festering cash-for-councillors cancer is to be cut out once and for all so the Geelong community can move on. Firstly, Councillor Saunderson and Mr Costa must provide full disclosure of the Liberal Party members and Labor Party members and other candidates who received campaign finance from the Costa fund in 2004. In addition, Councillor Saunderson must properly account for the $5,000 returned to the fund by Councillor McMullin and the other unidentified expenditures by Councillor Saunderson detailed in the Whelan report. Only when this disclosure is made will the Geelong community know who the candidates were and have their confidence in future local government election procedures in the City of Greater Geelong restored.

Secondly, Mr Costa should take the Hometown proposal off the table for council consideration in the interests of the Geelong community. Many councillors have been hopelessly compromised by the cash-for-councillors ‘Costagate’ affair, and Geelong’s business and wider community—as well as some of the donors—are still shaking their heads in disbelief that Frank has allowed his private business interests to override the wider community interest on this occasion.

Thirdly, Premier Bracks must establish an independent inquiry with judicial powers into the cash-for-councillors affair and an independent corruption commission in Victoria to ensure the integrity of governance processes at all levels in this state. The Premier needs to only look at what has happened with the Brian Burke saga and the Busselton Council in WA and what has happened in the Gold Coast Council in Queensland—both being the subject of corruption hearings by the respective anticorruption bodies in those states.

Let me conclude by stating that the silence of some senior political figures in both the Liberal and Labor parties in Geelong on this matter has been deafening. We are yet to hear of any condemnation of the cash-for-councillors affairs from state Labor members Neville, Eren and Crutchfield or from senior right factional operative Marles. On the Liberal side, the limp-wristed response to the saga from senior Liberals is a continuing source of embarrassment to its members—and I note the presence in the chamber of the member for Corangamite. The Geelong community expects its political leaders of all political persuasions to defend the integrity of governance in the region. It also demands that of key business leaders, such as Mr Costa, Mr Bisinella and others. It is time they all stepped up to the plate on this one.