This Sydney council was about to spend $70,000 on a trip to Korea. Until it changed its mind

Strathfield Council will dramatically cut back on a planned councillor trip to a sports festival in South Korea that was initially budgeted for up to $70,000.

The council last month agreed to accept an invitation from the mayor of Gapyeong County, a sister city of Strathfield since 2011, to the 71st Gyeonggi-do Sports Festival in May, and had planned to spend up to $70,000 on the trip.

A sports event held in 2015 at a stadium in the province that Strathfield councillors will visit. Credit: Korea Council of Sport for All

But after the Herald made inquiries, Mayor John-Paul Baladi said he would plan to reduce the cost.

“With great reverence to our sister city, it should be resolved that no exorbitant cost can be justified alongside Strathfield Council’s current focus on financial sustainability and responsible spending,” he said in a statement.

Documents from last month revealed the council approved plans to spend “up to $70,000 (rounded) dependent upon the final delegate numbers” for councillors, the general manager and required support people to watch the festival. The council allocated $7550 per delegate, with final attendees yet to be announced.

But now Baladi will pay for his own flight and request councillors either do the same or use what remains of their personal travel allowance.

An invitation from the Gapyeong County mayor shows councillors are invited to take part in the opening ceremony, visit tourist attractions and participate in a “welcoming dinner party”.

For the three-day, four-night event, Gapyeong County would pay for accommodation and a bus rental as well as nine meals, the invitation said. The council would need to fund its own airfares and all other expenses.

Labor councillors Karen Pensabene and Rory Nosworthy, along with independent Matthew Blackmore, had earlier signalled they would move to dramatically reduce the cost of the trip.

“Residents are paying more, getting less with this council,” Nosworthy said. “It’s austerity for residents and luxury for councillors.”

Pensabene said trips to the council’s sister city had traditionally had three councillors and one interpreter, but this delegation had grown to six, leading to “significantly higher costs, at a time when our community is grappling with rising council rates and a cost-of-living crisis”.

However, Baladi, who was last year elected as one of Sydney’s youngest-ever mayors, said the council had not increased rates, and the county’s last visit to Strathfield had cost $15,000 under the former Labor-majority council.

Strathfield councillors last visited Gapyeong County in 2022. During the three-day trip, the mayor, one councillor and the general manager met county officials, visited the local high school, and laid a wreath at the Australian Korean War Memorial Monument. The whole trip cost $9426.

Before a delegation from Gapyeong County arrived in Strathfield last year, the councillors voted to “respectfully decline” their “generous offer” to donate a Korean War memorial stone to the local area.

The trip follows a $20,000 stay Ku-ring-gai councillors took to the Blue Mountains last month.

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