ICAC Ann Vanstone says reduction of councils would result in less wastage from investigating complaints

Combining councils could improve their integrity, says new ICAC Ann Vanstone: “Addressing poor conduct in one council is better than addressing it in five.”

Ratepayers’ money wasted investigating unnecessary local government complaints could be saved if the number of councils was reduced, says the Independent Commissioner Against Corruption.

In one of her first public statements since her recent appointment, former Supreme Court judge Ann Vanstone said the amalgamation of councils could improve the integrity of local government across South Australia.

Ms Vanstone was responding to a call in The Advertiser this week by Adelaide Lord Mayor Sandy Verschoor for the number of councils to be reduced from 68.

Ms Vanstone joined her predecessor, former Federal Court judge Bruce Lander, in expressing frustration about the number of complaints about councils, particularly from elected members against other elected members.

Independent Commissioner Against Corruption Ann Vanstone said the amalgamation of councils could improve the integrity of local government across South Australia.

Adelaide Lord Mayor Sandy Verschoor says it is time to seriously consider reviewing council boundaries across the state. Picture: Sarah Reed

Other frequent complaints involved disgruntled ratepayers dissatisfied with individual council decisions.

“Many complaints and reports received about integrity issues in local government tend to have similarities,” she said. “I see money being spent by councils over and over again across South Australia on the same issues.”

Ms Vanstone said the repetition “is costly not only for councils, and ultimately ratepayers, but for integrity agencies like the ICAC”.

She believed smaller councils often could not identify risks and implement controls “as effectively as a bigger, more experienced and better resourced council”.

“Individual councils do not necessarily have the resources, knowledge or expertise to deal with inappropriate conduct and poor practices, which is why they often seek costly legal advice,” she said.

“The argument is not that bigger councils will be immune from poor conduct but that they might be in a better position to implement regulation because of accumulated expertise and corporate knowledge.

“To put it simply, addressing poor conduct in one council is surely better and certainly cheaper than addressing it in five.”

Asked for more detail about possible reforms, an ICAC spokesman said Ms Vanstone would not comment on what she thought would be “the optimum number or size of councils or any other policy issues in relation to local government”.

“But the commissioner takes the view that where she has information which can inform public debate about a policy issue, she should, so far as is appropriate, disclose it,” he said. “The commissioner simply observes she is seeing similar integrity issues across a number of councils, with each of them spending time and money on trying to address them.”

Mr Lander regularly used his annual reports to detail how most complaints involving councils were frivolous, vexatious or relatively minor and he needed to be freed up to focus on serious cases of misconduct or corruption.

Ms Verschoor welcomed the support of Ms Vanstone.

“We need to do things differently and get better returns for our ratepayers,” she said.

“In my opinion, merging councils would reduce duplication and streamline services and as a result, councils would be able to provide greater support for our communities.”