Mosman mayor’s anger over merger most horrid

MOSMAN Mayor Peter Abelson says the public inquiries at Manly on Tuesday confirmed the undesirability of merging Mosman with Manly and the southern part of Warringah.

Major Cr Peter Abelson - Mosman Municipal Council meeting with new council members. The council also invites residents to sit at the council table.

MOSMAN Mayor Peter Abelson says the two public inquiries at Manly Golf Club on Tuesday only confirmed the undesirability of merging Mosman with Manly and the southern part of Warringah.

Cr Abelson told the evening session that the proposed merger was not a “preferred option”, was “completely different” to any earlier proposal by the State Government and that no previous community consultation had been conducted on it.

“Mosman Council strongly opposes the proposed merger of Mosman with Manly and the southern half of Warringah, which would increase the population fivefold from around 30,000 to more than 150,000 people and radically reduce local representation,” he later said.

“At the 2012 council election, over 81 per cent of Mosman voters opposed amalgamation and in more recent polling only 23 per cent of residents supported a possible merger with North Sydney, 17 per cent with Manly and 7 per cent with the six-council model proposed by the Independent Local Government Review Panel.”

Cr Abelson said Mosman Council was running a budget surplus, whereas its operating budget was depicted as being in deficit in the proposed merger paper, which also lacked a proper business case.

He told the gathering on Tuesday that costs almost always significantly increase after amalgamations and that there was no evidence for any cost savings in larger council units throughout Sydney.