Campaign caution

By Ed Merrison
THE Knox Reform Coalition’s (KRC) campaign to replace Knox City Council with its own set of candidates has put pressure on present councillors but may run the risk of backfiring.
The coalition has mounted a public campaign to install its own candidates in all nine Knox wards at this month’s local government election.
Geoff Lake, president of the Municipal Association of Victoria (MAV), said it was not the first time a campaign such as that mounted by the KRC had been run in local elections.
Mr Lake defended the right of a group to mobilise in opposition to a standing council providing the campaign be operated in a transparent fashion, but the MAV president said a concentrated effort to oust a council was not guaranteed to succeed.
“I know it has happened in other elections and it has backfired. It has probably been as unsuccessful as it’s been successful,” Mr Lake said.
A fortnight ago Knox Reform Coalition distributed a leaflet branding the council ‘arrogant and out of touch’ and declaring that KRCendorsed candidates were ‘better qualified and better motivated’ than present councillors.
There are signs that such efforts to undermine the council have been met with incumbent councillors closing ranks.
At the last council meeting councillors took the opportunity to declare their involvement with committees and delegates rather than tabling reports.
Collier Ward councillor Garry Scates said it was conceivable that the council had closed ranks in the face of the KRC campaign.
“I think it would have drawn councillors together. Comments made by that group have been detrimental to each and every one of us so, of course, there’s some comradeship,” he said.
Knox mayor Jenny Moore defended the council’s vision and track record and denied the KRC’s campaign was responsible for council’s united front, citing instead the City of Knox’s 2003 decision to change the rate paying system as a unifying moment.
“We’re a council and we’re a team. It’s not unusual for councillors to congratulate each other.
“What’s pulled this council together has been the leadership to change from site value to capital improved value in the face of misinformed criticism,” Cr Moore said.
Chandler Ward councillor Ben Smith said it was important that sitting councillors and their opponents be judged on what they had done.
“Local government shouldn’t be about politics, it should be about outcomes.
“The people of Knox are clever and responsible enough to make their decision based on what they know,” Cr Smith said.
Responding to the intensification in campaigning ahead of upcoming elections in Knox, Mr Lake said circumstances were neither exceptional nor objectionable.
“The election process is fought with a lot of passion and people put in a lot of effort, so it doesn’t surprise me that inventive strategies are being employed.
“As long as it doesn’t get in the way of voters casting their own free choice, I don’t see a big problem,” Mr Lake said.