Narrabri Shire Council has been torn apart by a steep division between councillors which forced an abrupt end to their meeting on Tuesday, September 12.
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Three councillors stormed out of the meeting chamber in protest, after mayor Ron Campbell cast a tie-breaking vote to bar another councillor from joining the meeting via audio-visual link (AVL).
"What happened today was absolutely unbelievable. It demonstrates the five-four nature of our council and how we're not getting on with business," Councillor Greg Lamont told the Leader shortly after leading the walkout on Tuesday.
With Cr John Clements barred from joining the meeting, Cr Lisa Richardson unable to attend, and Crs Greg Lamont, Rohan Boehm, and Robert Browning leaving the chamber, Narrabri council did not have the minimum number of councillors needed to conduct the meeting.
"This is a ridiculous set of circumstances here today, ladies and gentlemen," mayor Ron Campbell said before rescheduling the meeting for later this month.
As a result of the meeting's interruption, councillors were unable to address a looming issue related to the local government's financial statements.
"The big issue with the financial statements is the auditor couldn't find sufficient evidence of all the transactions that were approved by the previous councils and management," Cr Lamont told the Leader after the meeting.
"We wanted to debate why the auditor couldn't give an opinion."
An independent auditor's report from the NSW Auditor General's office said Narrabri Shire Council was "unable to certify as to the completeness and reliability of the financial statements taken as a whole for the year ended 30 June, 2022."
"My audit procedures identified non-compliance with legislative requirements. The Council did not maintain adequate accounting records as required by Section 412 of the [Local Government Act 1993]. The Council staff were unable to provide all accounting records and information relevant to the audit," the report says.
A statement issued by councillors and management attached to the financial statements, and signed by Narrabri's mayor and general manager, accepts council's underlying books and records are insufficient, and resolved to undertake "a comprehensive project to rectify the issues".
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Council's finances
Mayor Campbell told the Leader on Monday, in the lead up to Tuesday's meeting, while he admits the situation is "a little embarrassing" for Narrabri Shire Council, the financial mishap was a "little glitch".
"This is just a situation where the allocation of that money was instead of putting it into our working account, it's gone in as borrowing, so therefore on paper you've gotta take that out of the next budget. That's the glitch," Cr Campbell said.
"It might take 12 more months to allocate those moneys through the system, and it's a situation that's unfortunate, but it happens. It's happened to three or four other councils."
Cr Lamont said he sees the auditor's report as a smoking gun, and is calling for the NSW Office of Local Government to investigate.
Mayor Campbell said such an investigation would be "totally unnecessary" given the amount of time and money already spent on the auditor general's report.
"For 10 months we've had the auditor general's office in here to deal with this, and they have said there's been no impropriety at all," he said.
The independent auditor's report makes no mention of impropriety or misappropriation of funds.
The auditor does conclude: "I was not able to obtain sufficient appropriate audit evidence to provide a basis for an audit opinion on the financial statements."
The AVL debate
Cr Lamont and Cr Clements had planned to make their case at Narrabri council's meeting on Tuesday, but due to work commitments Cr Clements needed to be in Sydney.
Narrabri Shire Council allows councillors to attend meetings via AVL in "extraordinary circumstances".
Cr Lamont argued that given Cr Clement's in-depth knowledge of council's inner workings he should have been allowed to attend.
"We felt we were being gagged. John has critical information about the workings of the council and we needed him there to participate," he said.
Just two weeks prior, however, Crs Lamont and Clements, had attempted to block fellow councillor Lisa Richardson, a new mother, from attending a council meeting via AVL.
Cr Richardson was eventually allowed to join that meeting, but only after 20 minutes of arguing amongst a room of nearly all-male councillors over whether or not her having a baby qualified as extraordinary circumstances.
"It doesn't matter who the councillor is or what their circumstances are, I don't agree with councillors not attending meetings in person," Cr Clements said at the time.
What happens next
The argument over Narrabri's financial woes has been tabled for council's next meeting on September 26, and Cr Lamont said the fight has only just begun.
"None of us are considering resigning, so it's going to be tumultuous council meetings and relationships from here on in," Cr Lamont said.
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