Proposed 40 per cent rate hike is democracy not at work on northern beaches

Northern beaches residents looking down the barrel of a 39.6 per cent rate rise are rightly angry. We think some of that ire should be directed towards the NSW Liberal Party for its shambolic failure to submit nomination for last year’s local government elections.

Councillors narrowly supported the move for the massive rate hike at a rowdy extraordinary meeting on Tuesday night by just one vote.

Councillor Mandeep Singh, a member of the Liberal Party, opposed the motion. So, too, would a number of former Liberal councillors who surely would have been elected if the NSW Liberal headquarters had not missed the deadline to lodge candidate nomination forms last August.

The Liberals would have helped defeat the northern beaches gouge, but the outcome is even more tainted – councillors ignored their own resident survey, which found 51 per cent opted for a pegged rate increase of 10.7 per cent. Only 11 per cent voted for the 39.6 per cent rise that was successfully moved at the meeting.

The council shelled out $173,000 for the survey. It is maintaining the bureaucratic habit of feigning consultation and ignoring results, but it’s clear the majority of councillors had little interest in residents’ opinions. Adding to the insult, Mayor Sue Heins on Tuesday spoke airily about high inflation, storms and floods, COVID-19 and cost shifting.

Northern Beaches Council was formed eight years ago after the amalgamation of Manly, Pittwater and Warringah councils, partly for economies of scale reasons following a review of local government boundaries by the Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal.

How’s that going? Not too well, apparently: The council is facing a $90 million black hole in the face of the widening gap between rates income and escalating cost to maintain services such as roads, footpaths, sports fields, playgrounds and pools. The council issued a statement: “Rates income each year is capped by the ‘rate peg’ set by IPART. Recently, this has been less than half the inflation rate and rates income is now $24 million lower each year than if it had been keeping up with inflation.”

Of course, other municipalities face the same challenges, but whatever benefits were expected through amalgamation of northern beaches councils may have been undermined by empire building. An independent councillor, Vincent De Luca, claimed staff numbers had increased by 12 per cent since 2016 and their $159 million wage bill took 40 per cent of the budget. CEO Scott Phillips receives a salary of $544,000 – $100,000 more than NSW Premier Chris Minns.

The 39.6 per cent hike proposal will now be submitted to IPART, which is expected to deliver a resolution in May in advance of budget deliberations in June. If approved, it would mean an average annual increase of $673 for households and $1611 for business.

The northern beach relishes the sobriquet “the insular peninsula”, but it is a misnomer. For all the celebrity wealth of Palm Beach and Manly’s high-priced apartments, there are huge swaths of ordinary working families and pensioners. Many will find the rate hike unaffordable. All will find it absolutely absurd.

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