Hume City Council has released a statement explaining its withdrawal last week of an appeal against a VACT ruling that exonerated Cr Trevor Dance of a serious misconduct finding.
The council said today that the decision to withdraw the appeal was made once it became apparent that based on the Supreme Court Justice’s interpretation of the legislation, the matter should never have reached a Councillor Conduct Panel in the first place.
Hume Council’s CEO Sheena Frost said that if the new interpretation had been raised earlier in the process, the parties would have been saved a lot of time and money.
She said that different interpretations at each stage of the process about what constitutes serious misconduct reflect “the fact that the legal framework is flawed, and requires review.”
Ms Frost said the council would refer this experience to Local Government Victoria for input into the current review of the Councillor Conduct Framework.
As reported in episode #255 of the Local Government News Roundup, Cr Dance has called for a review of his case and the expenditure by the council to pursue the case through legal channels.
Ms Frost said an update of associated legal costs would be provided in a quarterly report due in October.