State government loses bid to wind up Davenport community council

A crime-riddled community in the state’s north is back in the hands of the local community council after a failed state government court bid.

Davenport Community Council committee, Maisie Winton. Picture: Dean Martin

A crime-riddled outback town is back in the control of a local community council that the state’s consumer watchdog tried to close down over alleged mismanagement.

The state government launched Supreme Court civil action last year in its attempt to wind up Davenport Community Council over a series of alleged organisational failures.

These included alleged breaches of the Associations Incorporation Act, such as a failure to present audited financial statements in 2022 and 2023 and to hold an annual general meeting.

If successful, the council would have been forced into administration.

But this month, Associate Justice Katrina Bochner dismissed the government’s case. She found the Consumer Affairs Commission did not follow legally required procedures.

The council chambers at Davenport in December, 2024. Picture: Emma Brasier

This, she ruled, including failing to receive relevant court approval before issuing the wind-up notice to the council on October 14 last year.

“There remains a discretion with the court as to whether such an order should be made,” she said.

“Winding up on the certificate … requires an order of the Supreme Court.”

She did not, however, issue any orders on the merits of the wind-up application from Consumer and Business Services.

Consumer and Business Affairs Minister Andrea Michaels said the government would consider its legal options amid deep confusion over how services are delivered in the troubled community.

The Advertiser visited the town in December last year, finding the council buildings and a youth engagement in tatters and overrun with feral cats.

Locals told of a gang of children aged 8-14 who never went to school, roamed the streets while threatening residents with weapons and breaking into properties.

Davenport elder Malcolm McKenzie said he was bitterly disappointed with the ruling.

He wrote to authorities asking it to further intervene to prevent the council from managing the community.

Council chief executive Lavene Ngatokorua referred inquiries to committee member Maisie Winton, who said she was happy with the ruling.

The state government launched Supreme Court civil action last year in its attempt to wind up Davenport Community Council over a series of alleged organisational failures. Picture: Emma Brasier

She said the council had a Port Augusta office but had not run services in Davenport for nearly five years. Town elders and the Aboriginal Lands Trust have said the council received $2m in mid-2021 from the National Indigenous Australians Agency (NIAA) to run services over three years, including the youth engagement centre.

But none had been delivered, they claimed. The trust took control of some services in 2020 after a resident petition before it was handed back to the council three years later.

The trust said it never had access to the NIAA funding.

Ms Winton said she did not know who in the council, or its contractors, received NIAA cash. She conceded the council did not deliver services to the town’s 150 residents in three years. A NIAA spokeswoman said there had been “no performance issues identified” at the council before funding stopped on December 31 2024.

Originally published as State government loses bid to wind up Davenport community council