Perth Voice Interactive

PERTH city council’s administration has poured cold water on lord mayor Lisa Scaffidi’s suggestion staff should’ve been helping her declare travel and gifts

At Tuesday night’s meeting Ms Scaffidi reiterated previous statements that she didn’t know she was breaching rules, and that staff hadn’t given her proper advice on disclosing all gifts.

“It should be a team effort,” Ms Scaffidi said.

Comprehensive induction

But a “clarifying” statement issued by media officer Michael Holland on behalf of the administration on Wednesday evening, says all councillors “are provided a comprehensive induction on their roles and obligations under the local government act 1995”.

“Administration is unambiguous in its advice that the content of annual returns and gift registers are the responsibility of the individual.

“Suggestions to the contrary are incorrect and do not accord with the legislative requirements”.

Hammering the point home, the statement says councillors are given “detailed, prescriptive instructions on the accurate completion of annual returns, including by providing case studies and examples of correct returns”.

Local government minister Tony Simpson also took a swipe at the council’s elected members outside parliament on Wednesday morning.

“The administration is working well. The acting CEO [Martin Mileham] has made a raft of changes to policy, bins are being picked up, services are being done,” Mr Simpson said.

But he described councillors as “acting like children”.