By Stephen Brook and Kishor Napier-Raman
The Olympics are over, but the Olympic spirit is still strongly coursing through the veins of our elected representatives.
How else to explain the sudden ceasing of hostilities across the political landscape on Wednesday when our Olympians arrived back in Sydney aboard a Qantas jet to be met with a wave of superfan rapture from Governor-General Sam Mostyn down.
High-profile Qantas critic Senator Bridget McKenzie at the welcome home event for athletes in Sydney on Wednesday.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese entered into the spirit by giving a lift on the prime ministerial plane “Toto One” to Opposition Leader Peter Dutton, CBD was told.
The feelgood bipartisanship didn’t last long. While at the event, Dutton used a brief live cross to Sky News to call for a stop to migration from Gaza. Never one to miss an opportunity is our Dutts.
McKenzie gets into the Qantas spirit
And it was pleasing to see shadow transport minister Senator Bridget McKenzie, taking a day off from her usual ferocious takedowns of Qantas by enthusiastically embracing the event, even clutching a Qantas-branded flag.
“It was wonderful to be able to welcome home our athletes who put on that incredible display of sportsmanship,” McKenzie told CBD. “To see them with their loved ones was fantastic ...
“I think my job is to be the very best shadow transport minister I can be every single day, and I don’t back away from that.
“Credit where credit is due. Qantas did a great job in facilitating the celebration for our athletes today.”
Meanwhile, the best that Melbourne could manage was a balloon arch that gold medallist Keegan Palmer skated through. The vibe of the event matched the ranking Victoria achieved in the local medal tally – fourth behind Queensland, NSW and Western Australia.
OUT THE DOOR
And so to the basement tier of democracy, otherwise known as local government.
At Merri-bek City Council, where Cr James Conlan had been set to be banished for a month without his allowance after an independent arbiter found he breached standards of conduct under the Local Government Act 2020.
Quite the naughty step, we feel.
And why? Because of the single word “shamefully” Conlan used in a social media post. Yup, it’s true, we checked.
Councillors who breach their suspension and perform council duties (which can include giving speeches and posting on social media) can face further punishment, including up to 12 months in prison.
James Conlan has resigned from Merri-bek City Council. Credit: Justin McManus
Conlan has had enough and quit on Wednesday just ahead of a regular council meeting.
“Instead of legitimising this undemocratic process, I have just resigned from my council position,” he told CBD.
He said the whole independent arbitration process was secret (again with the threat of heavy penalties) until the decision was announced.
“It’s an extraordinary regime reminiscent of North Korea, not a so-called democracy,” Conlan told us.
It was back in March that the council, in Melbourne’s inner north, passed a motion in solidarity with Gaza. The motion called on the council to cease trading with companies profiting from arms sales, to continue flying the Palestinian flag and to create a $10,000 support fund for local Palestinian asylum seekers. As far as we can tell, the motion failed to gain any traction in the UN General Assembly.
But Conlan’s social media post to his supporters reporting on the council vote in March created major waves.
“Councillors who voted in favour were myself, Cr Bolton, Adam Pulford, Cr Angelica Panopoulos, Mark Riley and [Oscar] Yildiz (he’s blocked me so I can’t tag him),” he wrote.
Then he controversially added the following:
“Shamefully, numerous councillors left the meeting during the Palestine item to avoid voting, including Cr Lambros Tapinos (ALP), Cr Annalivia Carli Hannan (ALP), and Helen Davidson (Ind).”
Davidson complained about the use of “shamefully”, alleging it was a personal attack that questioned the integrity of the councillors.
Independent arbiter Jo-Anne Mazzeo, appointed to investigate the complaint, basically agreed.
“The post clearly demonstrates a failure to treat the named councillors with dignity, fairness, objectivity and respect and the arbiter was unable to conclude that the post, and in particular the use of the phrase “shamefully” could be read or interpreted as anything other than disrespectful towards the named councillors,” Mazzeo said in a report published in council agenda documents.
The arbiter accepted Davidson’s submission that the social media post was misleading to state that councillors “shamefully” left the meeting.
“Leaving a meeting should not be referred to in the manner it was in the social media post, which implies it was an inappropriate course of action by the named councillors,” she wrote.
In a text before Conlan’s resignation, Davidson told CBD the arbiter’s decision was a fair decision.
“I needed to stand up and take the misconduct seriously. [Neither] I nor anyone else who serves our community on council should be made to feel unsafe by our fellow councillors.”
Conlan, speaking from an overseas holiday, said his post was a factual report.
“I didn’t bully, harass, or intimidate the councillors who abstained from voting. The ‘crime’ that I really committed was to embarrass those councillors by bringing attention to the fact that they didn’t vote on one of the most important and publicly scrutinised issues of this council term – the genocide of Palestine.
“But instead of engaging in a robust, public dialogue on the issue of Palestine with my fellow councillors, I’ve been dragged through a secretive, repressive and undemocratic litigation process.”
Conlan had previously flagged his intention not to stand for re-election in October.
Merri-bek Council said his resignation was effective immediately.
“The Minister for Local Government and the Victorian Electoral Commission have been advised,” it said in a statement. “As Mr Conlan is no longer a councillor, the suspension determined by the arbiter (due to start 15 August) cannot apply.”
CAUSTIC CORRS
Corrs Chambers Westgarth is feeling sensitive. The corporate law firm has drawn months of critical media coverage of its bloated salaries for top partners, high-profile departures, and those pesky bureaucrats at the Workplace Gender Equality Agency revealing that it had the worst gender pay gap data among the big legal players.
And last week the legal fraternity got worked up over an anonymous and rather clumsily written 1500-word screed to former sex discrimination commissioner Elizabeth Broderick, who now works as a consultant for organisations trying to fix their cultural rot.
The letter described Corrs as a workplace dominated by an “alpha male locker room culture” and singled out one specific practice as being “a misogynistic and anti-female practice” that froze out prospective female partners by giving them “third-rate work”.
Former sex discrimination commissioner Elizabeth Broderick.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen
Corrs did not appreciate CBD’s questions about this letter. A stern email from partner Christine Covington, head of gender equity at Corrs, called the allegations in the letter about the firm’s culture “serious and false”.
“It is incomprehensible that any journalist would proceed to make serious allegations against a large and identifiable group of people, lawyers no less, in those circumstances,” she wrote.
Covington debunked some of the letter’s claims about the firm’s performance on this front.
“The percentage of women in the partnership has increased from 23% to 32%; and the number of female equity partners has more than doubled, from 11% to close to 25%.” We can just see the glass ceiling crumbling before our eyes.
Covington then informed us that the firm regularly briefs feared defamation barrister Sue Chrysanthou, SC, including in successful action against Nine, owner of this masthead. And if we proceeded to publish an article on the letter, we could expect to be hearing from the top silk.
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