TWO warring Hobsons Bay councillors should end their dispute without costing the city further expense, ratepayers have told the Weekly.
As first reported by the Weekly, mayor Tony Briffa urged fellow councillor Peter Hemphill at a press conference last week to accept his apology and end a long-running dispute.
Cr Briffa has claimed the dispute could cost ratepayers up to $250,000 in legal fees.
The dispute started last June when Williamstown North’s Cr Hemphill complained about Cr Briffa, alleging misconduct with regard to three emails sent to former Mobil public relations adviser Maureen Short.
In the emails, Cr Briffa said Ms Short should be dismissed for “attacking” him at a public meeting in early 2011 about Innova’s proposed toxic soil plant in Altona.
Cr Briffa also said Ms Short had failed to declare her “conflict of interest” in supporting the plant as a resident without disclosing her past employment with Innova.
In August, an independent councillor-conduct panel found Cr Briffa had breached the council’s code of conduct. A second complaint by Cr Hemphill over the adequacy of Cr Briffa’s apology has led to a three-day hearing at the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal for the pair.
While Cr Briffa has twice apologised, a serious misconduct finding at the VCAT would see him stripped of his mayoral robes and disqualified from standing as mayor for four years.
As reported by the Weekly, Cr Briffa has claimed legal action could cost the equivalent of “10 footpaths, the annual operating budget of five community centres, an upgrade of a significant park, an upgrade to a local road [or] improvements to a shopping strip”. Last week, he again urged Cr Hemphill to accept his apology so the council could focus on its job.
In a media statement, Cr Hemphill said: “If, as Cr Briffa claims, the legal costs are going to top $250,000, then more than 90per cent of that is Cr Briffa’s share of the costs. He has engaged expensive lawyers with an open cheque book. His lawyers seem intent on dragging out the hearing to longer than the couple of days it should take, to ramp up the costs.
“I challenge Cr Briffa to have the matter heard before VCAT, as he opted to do, without lawyers involved.”
Based on online comments received by this newspaper, a vast majority of readers agree with Cr Briffa that the matter should end with his apology.
Moonee Valley councillor Ange Kenos offered to act as impartial mediator for the feuding pair, saying he knew both men and considered them honest and decent.
Former Hobsons Bay mayor Brad Matheson said Cr Briffa had apologised twice. “The losers of this scurrilous game-playing will be ratepayers who will more than likely have to foot at least a 4-5percent rate increase this year to pay for badly-needed infrastructure and maintenance.”
See Letters, page 14, and
