Qld integrity crisis: Council watchdog ‘needs law change, more resources’

Councillors are being left in states of distress over misconduct charges for trivial offences, the boss of Queensland’s embattled council watchdog says. Now she’s pushing for change.

The boss of Queensland’s embattled council watchdog says she needs more resources or the laws governing her job rewritten as she acknowledged the distress councillors were feeling in sometimes over-the-top charges.

Independent Assessor Kathleen Florian told a parliamentary inquiry investigating her office that councillors were being investigated for misconduct that could technically see them sacked for behaviour that didn’t warrant that.

Ms Florian said the laws were unclear on a range of ­issues, including a councillor’s implied right to political ­expression.

The extraordinary appraisals come after months of pressure and revelations in The Courier-Mail that councillors and mayors were facing investigations over issues as trivial as lending out keys to a town hall, blocking a Facebook troll and speaking about a desire for Covid-19 vaccinations to be handled well.

Ms Florian was questioned about the distress councillors felt about misconduct complaints for minor transgressions, which carried a potential penalty of termination of office.

She said the committee should “look at the definition of misconduct and determine whether all of it should be there”.

Breaches of the acceptable request guidelines – when a council officer is asked to do something – should be a lesser “inappropriate conduct” charge, she said.

She said lower-level misconduct should be referred back to council to be dealt with as inappropriate conduct.

Independent Assessor Kathleen Florian

Ms Florian said penalties for misconduct could be reconsidered, or different categories of misconduct created attracting different penalties.

“So in my humble opinion, dismissing more matters is not the answer,” she said.

“The answer is either adequately resource, or take a look at what is misconduct … but I think one or the other has to come out of this so we have a change and that we’re not in this position moving forward.”

Ms Florian said there had been a “culture shock” following an historical under-reporting of councillor conduct.

She said the Office of the Independent Assessor had considered how to reduce the apprehension and communicate to councillors that a complaint was “not the end of the world”, but “an opportunity to learn a lesson, pick up and move on”.

The backlog of cases and delays were helping “build the tension” and while she did not understand councillors’ fear, “I absolutely accept it because I see it,” Ms Florian said.

Regarding the implied right of political expression, Ms Florian recommended the code of conduct be made more specific to the role of an elected representative, or a broad code carry guidance that recognised those rights and obligations.

“You would expect that there are robust discussions in the council chamber,” she said.

“It’s if they become disrespectful, that’s when potentially it could be inappropriate conduct.”

Ms Florian said it was “not for me” to determine how a matter should be handled if the legislation was not clear.

The Councillor Conduct Tribunal was the only power to determine such things.

“When you’ve got uncertainty about something, you have two options – you amend the law or you get certainty through the process,” she said.