Ivan Dean, Speeches Index

Wednesday 5 September 2007

LOCAL GOVERNMENT AMENDMENT (ELECTIONS) BILL 2007

Mr DEAN ( Windermere ) - Mr President, I probably should say that I was not quite sure where I stood in relation to this bill because, as the member for Murchison says, it could well be called the 'Ivan Dean bill'.

Mr Harriss - The doubts removal bill.

Mr DEAN - But I did take some advice as to whether there were any conflicts of interest and I am assured there are not and that there is no reason I should not speak to the bill. I have to make sure that I do not get too upset when I speak about this bill, Mr President, because what happened to me still comes back to me fairly clearly.

Do the amendments go far enough? I do not believe they do, but then perhaps the need to rush these amendments through before 15 September - which I think will be the date - means it is necessary under the circumstances. However, as I said, I do not think it will satisfy all the needs. It is interesting how this arose, very clearly precipitated by a position that, I must say, I knowingly took. I read through it fairly closely and I believe that I had a reasonably good understanding of the legislation applying at the time.

The words that got me into trouble and precipitated this, after having been pressured by a number of journalists and the public, was that I made a comment along the lines of, 'I am not interested in the second salary; it will be given to charities and youth groups', without identifying a specific charity or youth group. It was words to that effect. That statement, of course, caused a working colleague of mine within council to make a written complaint against me to the Electoral Commissioner, Mr Taylor. So it all started from there.

Following that - and I think it is important to tell this part of it, Mr President - I received a phone call from the commissioner telling me of the complaint and of his intention to forward it to the office of the DPP for consideration of a charge of bribery. At that time I was incensed about the fact that there was no interest shown at all in interviewing me and getting my side of the story. I found that very difficult in the circumstances because I had pleaded to tell my position, my side of it and my interpretation of the legislation, but I was told by the commissioner at the time not to say anything because they were not interested in that. To me it was a very ordinary position to adopt, having been a police officer for some 35 years who has always given an opportunity to a person to explain their position if they wanted to. In this instance there was none at all. Had it taken that course, I doubt very much if I would ever have been charged; I am confident I would not have been. I knew the passage of law reasonably well, I had read it and I believed I understood it. As it turned out, I did understand it. It was the fact that other people did not understand it at the time and the magistrate found favourably for me. In the meantime, I suffered tremendously, as did my family. It almost pulled us apart and broke us up. It was a terrible situation. The DPP rang me and simply said - and he felt very comfortable with it, which also was distressing - 'You will be charged with bribery'. I knew very well at that time that that offence was one where I could have been jailed for a period of 12 months. It was sheer hell. I hung around then for many months until the finalisation of the matter.

I take the opportunity here today to thank the many thousands of people who supported me and my family, who met with us, and who wrote to me. I had a number of QCs around the country offering to take my case. That gave me some comfort. I had people from the mainland and other countries in the world ring and talk to me. I also take this opportunity to thank my very knowledgeable and supporting legal counsel, Mr Shaun McElwaine.

Then, to rub salt into the wound, the Electoral Office obviously was not my favourite supporter at the time when the results were finally made known. The Press were advised and they rang and advised me of my success. I was pretty unhappy about that as well and rang the Electoral Office and voiced my displeasure at having been overlooked and not being considered. Having said that, this part of the law has been vague forever. There has been a lot of discussion about it over a long time. Clearly there is the rush now to move this on very quickly.

I will ask a number of questions here and raise a number of issues. With the amendment as it now stands, if it is supported by this Chamber, could I make a statement under this changed legislation when a local government election is called? That is, if I am silly enough to stand again. Could I make a statement, if I am pressured, along these lines: nothing will change? Could I make that statement? If journalists come to me and put the same question to me about salary, and if I was to say to them, 'Nothing will change', would I be committing an offence under this section? I would like that question answered.

Mr Parkinson - I would be careful, if I were you.

Mr DEAN - I have looked at this fairly closely and have taken advice again in relation to it. As I understand this, a fine only applies. I think I am reading that right. I think it is five penalty units, that a fine only will apply. What other penalties apply? Would a successful candidate lose their position, for instance, if they were found guilty of an offence under this section or do they still retain their position, but pay the fine? What would also be the position under this legislation if some other person, unknown to Ivan Dean, says, 'I know what he'll do, he will give his salary away again; he will not take his salary'?. Do those people put themselves in jeopardy? Ivan Dean certainly could not because he would not know about it.

There are other matters, Mr President, that need amending within the Local Government Act, in my opinion. I realise why this matter is coming before us today and I would have liked to have seen those items attended to as well. There are just a couple of issues I want to mention and one is in relation to forcing local governments to hold public meetings. That has in fact received quite a lot of publicity over recent times because currently the position is that a local government body or a council is required to hold a public meeting if there is a document or, in the Launceston City Council's case, a thousand signatures. That can force a council to hold a public meeting on anything; it does not have to relate to that council area. Currently you could have 1 000 people signing a petition here, presenting it to the Hobart City Council and forcing this council here to hold a public meeting in relation to, say, the Aquatic Centre in Launceston. Then you could have people at that meeting not necessarily from the Hobart area putting forward motions and voting on motions to force this council here to at least consider those motions. There need to be amendments in that area, in my opinion.

Mrs Smith - I thought a local in the area had to put the motion up. Last time I chaired a meeting in Launceston I had to tell someone from Riverside that they were not a local elector so they couldn't put the motion.

Mr DEAN - There have been discussions on this. It was closely pursued at a recent public meeting where a council was forced to take it on to get legal advice in relation to exactly that and it was identified then that the way it was interpreted was that anybody was entitled to vote and anybody was entitled to be a part of it and it did not necessarily have to come from that local government area.

Mrs Smith - But the actual motion had to come from a ratepayer, didn't it?

Mr DEAN - I do not think that was the situation but I stand to be corrected on that. That is just one other area, Mr President, but there are a number of other areas. One area that I refer to is in relation to people standing for the position of mayor in local government. To me, it is a nonsense that a person standing for the position of mayor in local government - and deputy mayor I think is the same - must have had at least two years' experience as an alderman in the first instance. In fact it is one year but we know that a term is two years so in effect it is two years before they should be considered for the position of either mayor or deputy mayor.

You can in fact stand for a position within the Parliament without any background at all and you could well become the Premier of this State within a matter of a few weeks without any previous training or knowledge whatsoever. You could do that, but you could not become the mayor of a city or a deputy mayor unless you had had at least 12 months' but in effect two years' previous experience. I think that prevents people standing for those positions who would have the ability and capacity and would perform very well in those areas. I am simply raising this because I believe that there are other amendments that should have been considered to the act and the regulations.

Mrs Smith - Do you think compulsory voting, though, is an issue there if you are going to change all of that, or you could have a lobby group put somebody up, non-compulsory voting, and get their team to vote? I thought that was always the issue - that it is non-compulsory voting, whereas with the State it is compulsory voting. If people vote a person in and they end up Premier, it is the people who voted the person in.

Mr DEAN - I must admit I do not agree with compulsory voting for local government or for anywhere. In fact it is not compulsory voting at all, as we have often said in this House. It is not compulsory to vote in the State election. All that is compulsory is to turn up and cross your name off. So it is a bit of a nonsense, really.

Mrs Smith - If you are going to turn up, you are not going to just turn up for no reason.

Mr DEAN - Well, some people do. I know of many people who turn up at a State election and all they do is get their name crossed off and they walk out.

Mrs Rattray-Wagner - I hope they are not in my electorate.

Mr DEAN - They do it, so it is not -

Mrs Smith - So how do they know that someone has not ticked the box for them?

Mr DEAN - So there is no such thing as compulsory voting, there is compulsory turning up.

There are other issues that I would like addressed and perhaps the Leader will do this. I raise the situation where people stand for local government but also hold other offices and, in those other offices, give out rewards, give out money, make donations and do other things that, if they were not in those positions, would contravene the amended section here.

For example, as I interpret this, as a member of the Legislative Council, during the critical period when the local government elections are called, I will be quite entitled to go out and give donations, give awards, give rewards and do all the other things referred to in this section without contravening it, provided I do it as a member of the Legislative Council. So there needs to be some clarity on a number of these issues, Mr President, because that is likely to occur with a number of people.

If we are going to be fair about all of these things, we also should be looking at some of the other issues. For instance, under the Local Government Act, as I understand it, a person standing for a position in a council as a mayor is quite entitled to say they will not use or take possession of the council car that is made available to that position. There are people out there who have their own vehicles and would not want a council car. Is that not an advantage over somebody else who does need a vehicle? There are a number of issues in the whole thing that, to me, are not right and are not fair. If we are going to do this, we need to do it properly and we need to be fair to everybody.

The other thing that I want to raise, Mr President, is an issue that was raised during my defence in my case and was commented upon by the magistrate. What is really the difference in doing what I did in those circumstances, as opposed to the person who goes out and says - and it did happen - if I get into council there will be no rate increases, or I will fix your road or the footpath outside of your home or I will ensure that a car park - as one group did - is built at a certain place in a certain area. What is the difference? That was raised as quite a big issue in my case.

I have concerns with a number of issues in relation to this and I am not satisfied that the amendments here will satisfy it. I am confident in saying that this will be raised again, and I will be interested to see where it goes.

I think it can be seen that I am still fairly bitter about the whole thing, but it needs to be done, it needs to be right and it needs to be done in such a way that we can all understand it, we all know how to use it and nobody is likely to find themselves in the position that I was in. I would not like to see that happen to anybody, or any family, because it should not have happened under any circumstances. It was very ordinary.

Return To Main Page. Return To Speeches.