Yesterday Clr Linda Eisler spoke at the Boundary Change Forum on the proposed Canterbury Bankstown Merger
No time limit was given before the meeting. Many were upset that they had not been told there would be a limit of 3 minutes. Councillor Eisler managed to cover the issues raised in the following speech. She will be making a submission to the commission before 28th February deadline:
I have been a fulltime councillor since 2008. My ward is East Ward and I live on the Canterbury boundary in Hurlstone Park.
I sit on around 12 committees and am on 2 chambers of commerce. One of the committees is Southern Sydney Region of Councils which does what the proposed merger is supposed to do. It saves member councils money. Councils from Woollahra to Sutherland band together to do submissions like: street lighting; energy cost control; amalgamations, and, tenders like: waste management; pool supplies; temporary staff; telecommunications.
SSROC programs saves more money than any amalgamation could.
Canterbury has reduced its staff over the years. We had 700 staff and now just 540 by natural attrition and redundancies. I don’t believe in a council the size of Canterbury and with the services we provide that there is room to reduce. We have also outsourced what we can.
The residents made it very clear in our survey that they do not want to be amalgamated with Bankstown. I can tell you, residents whether Labor, Liberal or Green voting, have told me they DO NOT want to be amalgamated with Bankstown.
Why have we been amalgamated with Bankstown? Canterbury is 150k residents and growing. Bankstown has 200k residents and told they were big enough to stand alone! The amalgamations around us are less than Canterbury on its own. It does not make sense.
As a full time councillor I am available 7 days a week. People ring anytime from 7 in the morning to 10pm on a Sunday night. I answer calls from one end of Canterbury to the other, not just East Ward.
The main issue for people is DA’s.
What is built next to and near determines their quality of life. Canterbury should be made smaller, not bigger. Size impacts councillor knowledge and therefore any judgement and decision I make.
I spend hours reading the DA’s and talking to the Director, questioning the decision making. Joining Canterbury to Bankstown will make it impossible to make fair and just decisions.
The workload on Councillors will be immense. The proposed merger would dramatically increase the ratio of residents to elected councillors to 23,399 residents per councillor, up from 16,696 in Bankstown and 15,063 in Canterbury. In reality, however many residents there are in a council that’s how many residents per Councillor. So from 150k to 350k in a merged council.
Based on international comparisons there is not a good case for making either of these councils any larger. Sydney councils are on average almost four times larger than metropolitan councils across the developed world, with the average population of OECD metropolitan councils 27,224 .
It also impacts on the voice of residents and community groups: The larger the council the more muted their voice. The point of being local is to give them a voice.
When I drive around Canterbury I see signs saying Welcome to Canterbury; street signs with our logo; trucks; uniforms; stationary and the list goes on. Extraordinary expenditure will be needed to change to a Canterbury/Bankstown logo and for what? Supposed savings which can easily be gained through SSROC? Savings Council constantly works to achieve.
Not only that, things like IT mergers will be extraordinarily expensive. The time staff spend supporting and serving the community will need to be devoted to the merger.
The staff are wonderful. I’ve worked closely with them. It’s not the size of councils that needs improving. It’s the quality of Councillors. Councillors need to be better trained. They need a better understanding of what their role is. They need to be more accountable. There should not be anyone on Council who is a developer or real estate agent, in my opinion.
We are a LOCAL body, not a State body. Make us this large and that is gone.
Through being on Council and involved with council committees and advisory groups (youth; multicultural; arts; environment; SSROC; Green Way; Aboriginal; Aquatic; Interfaith; floodplain management; traffic; disability), plus, attending community events all over Canterbury has meant I know this city. I just manage my commitments. It is demanding as Canterbury is a big council, big in size and big in numbers.
Both Canterbury and Bankstown are still growing. Demands for more development are continuing. Merge us and we are not a local council.
The numbers of the proposed mergers around us say there is no justification to merge us.
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