Maitland councillor Philip Penfold has come forward as owner and author of a mystery news website
A secret no more! A Maitland councillor has come forward as the owner of a mystery news website that has been operating for more than two months. It follows a push for councillors to disclose all interests in social media pages and online content.
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A Maitland councillor has come forward as the owner of a mystery news website, after questions were raised about the transparency of councillors operating social media pages and spruiking online content anonymously.
Deputy Mayor Cr. Philip Penfold made admissions to being the owner and author of www.maitlandnsw.com, a news website which was registered more than two months ago.
It claims to write articles of interest to the residents of Maitland, and includes political pieces, the most recent on August 11, titled ‘Mayor Baker attacks Penfold for opposing rate rises’.
The reveal followed a notice of motion passed at Maitland’s council meeting on Tuesday night, looking to ensure all administrative interests of councillors, in relation to social media pages and websites, be disclosed.
Liberal councillor Ben Mitchell raised the motion after being “fed up” with fellow councillors not being forthright about their involvement in social media pages and new “news” websites “popping up”.
“Some “articles” on these sites have almost word-for-word recounted councillor views, without being clear who the administrator is,” he said.
In notice of motion papers, Cr. Mitchell said the sites have been used to whip up hatred and slurs directed to other Maitland councillors, with comments often left to snowball while critical views to the administrator are deleted.
Cr. Penfold took to social media shortly after the meeting and said he was saddened to see majority of the meeting was spent complaining about social media posts, pages and groups, as well as websites.
“It seemed that few knew that any search of Facebook groups will show members who the admins are,” he said.
“I assist with a few group pages in Maitland. My pages Deputy Mayor Philip Penfold, and Our Maitland make it clear I am an administrator of them in the ‘About’ section.
“With the collapse of our only newspaper during the peak of COVID, and after the Australian Press Council made adjudications against Maitland Mercury twice this term with relation to their false articles about me, I believe it is even more important for individual elected representatives to communicate directly with their constituents.”
He went on to say he could be followed via his Instagram or Twitter account and website www.maitlandnsw.com.
Cr. Penfold also denied having any involvement with the recent rise of website www.myhuntervalley.com. which also came under question for certain political material published.
It can be confirmed the creator and owner of that website is Conan Visinko, an It specialist in Cessnock.
It was created more than three years ago.
Mr Visinko told The Newcastle News the website does not publish the author of the articles as they prefer to remain anonymous.
Maitland Mayor Loretta Baker, who supported the motion on Tuesday, said it was “pretty sad” councillors couldn’t monitor their own behaviour on social media.
“We need to behave in a respectful way with integrity, it’s sad we’ve had to do this,” she said.
“We owe it to the Maitland community, when there’s a whole lot of community pages out there that people aren’t aware of, being administered by councillors.
“People have been blocked from them and people living in the suburb, can’t get in to them.
“I would never have a page without my name on it if I was an administrator and I’m astounded people think that is OK.”
At the meeting, Mayor Baker praised Cr. Mitchell for his courage in putting up the motion.