Big swagger, broad hat, fighting words: How serial pest Andrew Thaler held a council to ransom

The first meeting for the Snowy Monaro Regional Council is meant to take 10 minutes. However, with serial pest Andrew Thaler as a newly elected councillor, it took more than two hours.

Ratbag broadcaster and scrapyard owner Thaler was originally going to have to attend the meeting via video link because of a ban prompted by the council describing his behaviour as “aggressive, disruptive, verbally abusive and offensive” towards staff.

However on Thursday afternoon, Thaler swaggered down the streets of Cooma like a statesman in his trademark Akubra hat, walking into council chambers without a fight. He amicably shook hands with his supporters, who excitedly congratulated him on his election – all the while a man followed Thaler with a phone to record every moment of his interactions.

Newly-elected councillor Andrew Thaler in Cooma on Thursday afternoon.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

Thaler optimistically told a small media pack he planned to reform the council in a way that represents the people, as from his perspective it was failing to do its job of providing for the community.

“We reject the old style where it’s a ruled autocracy from the top. People own this building, they own this council, they own these streets, they own these footpaths. Pride, mutual respect, understanding, tolerance, inclusion,” he said. “You can have as many pride flags as you want, but don’t ram it down everybody’s throat. Inclusion is the answer – and that includes Andrew Thaler and his family.”

The hint of Thaler’s frustration towards LGBT pride highlighted an underlying hostility held against many groups – particularly women – revealed last month in an investigation by this masthead.

Thaler, who regularly posts videos to his Facebook page, described a council librarian in June as a “fat, useless, ugly cow of a thing”, and said, “go and try to get me evicted from the library, bitch, I make this as a public record and I’m coming for your job.”

At that stage Thaler was a member of the public who had run unsuccessfully for state and federal seats, but on October 1 he was confirmed as one of 11 councillors who will represent the Snowy Monaro shire for the next four years.

The newly elected councillor has lived in the Snowy Monaro town of Nimmitabel, near Cooma, for about a decade. Many locals – particularly female community leaders – say they have been pestered, defamed and intimidated by his broadcasts and video ambushes for years.

In 2018, the Snowy Monaro Regional Council said it had restricted Thaler from its business premises because it “identified a risk to the health and safety” of workers.

On Thursday, Thaler said the ban had been a lie, but from 1pm when the meeting began, he would end those lies.

“The community have been told a lot of lies by this council, the lies end today … there is no ban,” he said.

As the meeting began on Thursday, Thaler’s words of hope to reform the council for the people quickly fell flat. About 30 members of the public streamed in and appeared divided into two camps, vehemently against Thaler and supportive of him.

The swearing in immediately erupted, with people yelling for quiet as Thaler declared he wanted to make a point of order. Councillor Tanya Higgins huffed “it’s all a circus” and councillor Bob Stewart snapped at Thaler to “show respect to the process”.

Thaler opposed almost every motion during the two hour and 19-minute meeting. Arguing against how a chairperson is voted for, arguing for a delay in voting for a mayor and deputy mayor and arguing against voting for a new council chief executive, as the original CEO David Hogan resigned after Thaler’s election.

Newly-elected councillor Andrew Thaler at the start of the meeting.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

Members of the public groaned, rolled their eyes or shouted out statements such as “what a load of rubbish” either in support or against Thaler as councillors got bogged down in shouting matches.

At 3.19pm, the meeting ended. Newly elected mayor Christopher Hanna said after he would be “very upset if the focus of this council moving forward was all about councillor Thaler”.

However, councillor Narelle Davis, with raised eyebrows, told this masthead “this meeting last time was over in 10 minutes”, hoping everything would become more efficient.

Meanwhile, members began to shuffle out of the room, with an air of anticipation for the next meeting.

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