Canterbury-Bankstown councillor Barbara Coorey denies wrongdoing, says she is the victim of ‘kangaroo court’

A councillor censured for purported misconduct – including bullying and harassment – has denied any wrongdoing and declared she “won’t be silenced”.

Canterbury-Bankstown councillor has been formally censured. Barbara Coorey.

A Canterbury-Bankstown councillor says she “won’t be silenced” after she was censured for alleged conduct breaches.

Independent councillor Barbara Coorey was formally censured last Tuesday in a closed session of an ordinary council meeting.

It is understood the censure is in relation to an incident on September 13 between Cr Coorey and the Canterbury-Bankstown general manager Matthew Stewart at an extraordinary council meeting last year, in which staffing issues following the 2016 amalgamation of Canterbury and Bankstown councils was discussed.

The council resolved Cr Coorey had breached a number of clauses – which included “conducting oneself in a manner that is improper or unethical” and “is an abuse of power or constitutes harassment or bullying behaviour”.

Cr Coorey denied all allegations and said council “have the wrong person to censure”.

Canterbury-Bankstown councillor Barbara Coorey. Picture: Matthew Vasilescu

“It was Labor instigated and it was done by desperate people trying to silence me on the demerger issue,” she said.

“This is a complete kangaroo court led by a mayor who ought to know better considering the findings and recommendations that came out of the parliamentary inquiry recently.”

Cr Coorey, who previously served as deputy mayor on Canterbury Council, said she was “elected to start the process for the council demerger which is what I have been doing”.

“This was a total Labor vote and I want to make it clear that the Liberal Party (councillors) walked out,” she said.

“The mayor knows the horrific incident that happened on that night with councillors walking out crying and very distressed as a result of what happened behind closed doors.”

Cr Coorey said she held Canterbury-Bankstown Labor mayor Khal Asfour “fully responsible for the chain of events that happened on Tuesday night” and called on him to resign.

Canterbury-Bankstown mayor Khal Asfour. Picture: Tim Hunter.

“The censure should have been against him. It was not I who misused rate payers money, it was not I who bought expensive clothes on rate payers money,” she said.

“The fact that the mayor was prohibited from being a candidate for the upper house, that in itself speaks volumes about him,” she said.

Canterbury-Bankstown Labor councillor Linda Downey said: “There’s a code of conduct that people abide by and a mechanism in place if people breach the code of conduct and the censure motion is part of that mechanism”.

Labor councillor Chris Cahill said he disagreed with Cr Coorey’s statements.

“If that sort of behaviour happened in any other workplace that person would be exited and it can’t be tolerated in any form,” he stated.

Labor deputy mayor Clare Raffan said: “It’s important for councillors to uphold the code of conduct and to call out any breaches of the code of conduct”.

Ms Coorey said she was considering all her legal options.

“I have continuously denied all the allegations contained in their censure motion submissions but unfortunately I’m one person against Labor councillors hellbent on persecuting me for standing up to my constituents,” she stated.

A Canterbury-Bankstown council spokeswoman said the matter was discussed in a confidential session of council and they were not able to comment.