PROBITY COMPLIANCE AUDIT........David Taylor.

SHIRE OF YORK            

PROBITY COMPLIANCE AUDIT REPORT

         A RETORT

Probity Blues…………Former Commissioner, James Best, may be right in claiming in his ‘Open Letter to Residents’ there has been no known, finite evidentiary disclosure of corruption within the Shire.

Blatant misconduct, being illegal harassment of individuals, and possible, attendant abuse of authority could be another matter.

The question of a competent administrative sector certainly is.

In his Official Probity Compliance Audit Report, the DLGC Principal Advisory Officer, Stuart Frazer, questions the abilities and performance of “Key Staff” at the Shire of York Offices, suggesting it needs to be improved to meet the requirements of good governance across a broad range of mandatory disciplines.

Despite the suspension furore, of the Councillors who were directly involved in non-compliant resolutions, two have resigned and most of the others do not appear to have anything to answer for.

Mr Best’s prognostications regarding so-called anonymous cowards hiding behind their keyboards, causing harm to good people- is an interesting enigma. Obviously the financial damage of having to pay out staff, some of whom were allegedly asked to resign, has harmed the good people of York. Maybe this is what he meant?

A synopsis of the DLGC’s , Shire of York Probity compliance Audit follows:-
For those of you who get lucky and have an opportunity to read this 29 page synoptic snap-shot
of where the Shire of York went wrong (according to the DLGC)- enjoy, but do not expect anything deep, meaningful,  fair and reasonable and understandable to leap from these pages .

It starts off with a Wikipedia style potpourri of what York is and where it is.

I think a lot of people know that it is 99.865 Km from Dumas House where Tony Simpson, the Mortician for Local Government, sits in his crypt. Also many of its 3,439 residents know that Mr. Simpson has clowns to the left of him, jokers to his right and York will be stuck in the middle withhim until the next election.


The only glimmer of hope is that Commissioner James Best has gone west.





Now, regarding the content of the Audit, in the beginning, God, created the heavens and the earth in just seven days. In fact it was six- as he took Sunday off. 

Stuart Frazer, Principal Advisory Officer for the DLGC, managed to conduct the Probity Compliance Audit, at the York Shire Offices, in just two working days or 15 hours if there was no overtime involved. (The importance of probity has only appeared to become an issue between the DLGC and York since Ray Hooper phoned his mates after he re-assigned himself (quit) on April 15, 2014.)

The DLGC is gracious enough to admit that although ‘the (Audit) report makes specific recommendations in circumstances where the Shire is not compliant with statutory requirements-as (the Audit) was conducted over a period of only two days ( it) does not represent a detailed examination of any specific issues that may need addressing by the Shire’. That is really deep, albeit contradictory and totally inane!

Add to this- that of the 16 listed circumstances of resolutions where the Shire was deemed to be not compliant, most were either moved or seconded by Councillor’s Tony Boyle, Pat Hooper and Mark Duperouzel.  Two of whom have resigned and the third, Pat Hooper, at one stage took a leave of absence without due and proper authority being granted.

So, if most of this Audit angst was created by Boyle, Hooper and co, why is it that the three other
councillors, including President Matthew Reid, and the community of York, have to suffer for the sins of others?

York’s audit report then goes on to describe, in depth, what ‘Probity’ means according to the DLGC.
That is ‘evidence of ethical behaviour, complete and confirmed integrity, uprightness and honesty, that accord equal opportunity for all participants, to enable all parties to deal with each other on the basis of mutual trust and respect’.

When the current Shire President, Matthew Reid (I assume) queried, on behalf of his fellow Council Members, David Wallace and Denese Smythe, what were any specific issues that may have involved them that needed addressing- and they had the trust and respect of the York community, Tony Simpson showed his personal trust and respect by suspending them for six months and sending them off to Local Government Probity and statutory requirement puppy school for being cheeky.

So what were the conclusions of the audit regarding the sharing of responsibility for non- compliance with statutory requirements by the Shire of York Council under the terms and provisions of the Local government Act 1995 (Act)?

It certainly blamed the CCC-Councillors, Committee Members and contractors. Then it casually mentioned a number of areas where there was the possibility that the quality of the overall performance of the Staff of the Shire of York could be improved.

1. They are, among others that “key staff need to have a clear appreciation of statutory meeting practice and procedures to ensure the quality and correctness of minutes to ensure compliance with the provisions of the ACT’ and that’ staff lack knowledge and understanding of timeframes for (Annual Financial) returns including the legislative framework and good practice governing the process for proper completion of (Financial) returns’.
“For example, the current completed annual return period is from 1 July 2013 to 30 June 2014, completed returns and acknowledgement forms showed a return period of 1 July 2014 to 30 June 2015.

(Key Staff appear to have decided to do a leap year.)
“………..and employees(Staff) make the necessary corrections (on their return forms) to time periods, dates, missing signatures and blank sections of their returns by amending each return or replacing the return with the correct information where applicable’.
(If done in an inappropriate context, in any other industry but the Public Sector, this could be considered a serious offence through the backdating of documents.)

2. ‘A further concern is that important documents (assumed to be in the custody and control of key staff) were not retained in accordance with the Shire’s recordkeeping plan and State Records Act 2000 which also demonstrates the need for training in this area’. These documents include such material items as ‘full and accurate records, of the Shire’s business decisions and transaction into meet all legislative, business, administrative evidential and historical requirements and that ‘these documents were not retained in the Shire’s recordkeeping system’
(Now that is not a bad effort.)

3.Even better is that ‘council staff and in particular key members of staff, require training in areas of declaration of interest, recording declarations of interest in the minutes of meetings, report writing including the framing of recommendations and record keeping, and the retention of information.’
(Will they be trained? Who knows?)

4. In conclusion, a sort of Coup De Grace, this magnificently understated probity audit says that’ the extent of non-compliance with the Act and concerns with procedures and practices………. at officer level raises some concerns with the governance processes at the Shire’.

The terms ‘Key Staff, ‘Staff’, ’Council Staff’, ‘Officer’ and ‘Employee’ all refer to the staff- employed by the Shire of York Council-, who are paid to provide and facilitate all the required intellectual, material and physical procedures to allow the Shire of York Council to provide good governance as required by the DLGC.

This Probity Compliance Audit was conducted on September 15 and 16, 2014. Most of these staff are still employed by the Shire of York and the local community knows them well. Have any of them been suspended or chastised?-No!

Council Members took the brunt of the blame.