Last year Somyurek was behind major changes to the local government act when, as Minister, he oversaw this Bill as introduced to Parliament. A highly contentious section of the Bill changed Councils from multi-wards to single Councillor ward structures. This means instead of 3 Councillors elected to represent one particular ward, one Councillor would now be elected from each of three wards. This change has been heavily criticised by the minor parties, Councils, and even the Victorian Electoral Commission advised against the move saying that evidence showed that multi-member wards worked best for local democracy.

Other likely losers under this change that would enable winner-take-all contests would be independents, women candidates, and other minor parties. This appears to be a naked power grab to increase Labour party candidates’ chances of gaining seats in Local Government Elections.

The Greens have suggested that Somyurek “corrupted” Local Government in Victoria and a Melbourne Mayor has claimed that Somyurek’s changes to local democracy would likely “stack” local Councils with candidates chosen by faceless men behind closed doors. Greens local government spokesman Sam Hibbins said Premier Daniel Andrews had allowed Mr Somyurek to open local councils up to control by Labour factions.

Many are now calling upon the Government to review Somyurek’s decisions whilst in Office. 

Somyurek dismissed South Gippsland Council in June 2019 and installed three Administrators to take the place of Councillors. The head administrator Ms Julie Eisenbise was on the Commission of Inquiry panel appointed by Somyurek. Administrator Zahra is a Labour Party person who lost his one term seat to Russell Broadbent. Administrator Brown has been a consultant providing policy and strategic advice since 2009.

An insider within the South Gippsland Shire has long held the belief that the sacking of its Council was a manufactured political move to ensure the Labour Government could seize control of the region as it did in Bass Coast-an article from the Age dated June 29th, 2020 appears to now confirm this hidden agenda. What is not clear is what part the National party played in its naivety in supporting this political move. Eventually it is hoped that through a State Government ombudsman investigation into the sacking of the Shire council and the personnel appointment of the administrators all will be revealed. Danny O’Brien has appeared to be a solid supporter of those working towards the dismissal of the Council and needs to come clean on his motives in this matter. Mr O’Brien has failed to date, to comment to this newspaper on his actions. 

Update: Mr O’Brien just sent in a response to this matter.

Mr O’Brien denied any involvement with the Leongatha Business Association and the two Ex-Councillors involved in the Business Associations Town Hall meeting of March 14th 2019 although he was in attendance.

When asked as to whether he still considered his decision to support Somyurek’s desire to sack the South Gippsland Council back in June 2019 was appropriate in light of the Minister’s decision not to show him or other MP’s the Councils response to his “show cause” notice dated April 2nd 2019, Mr O’Brien responded by saying “Nothing has changed that would cause me to change the decision I, and the Opposition, took”.

Mr O’Brien was then asked the following question.

When the Minister stated during a radio interview in April 2019 that the “council had done nothing wrong”, and you yourself were quoted in the Sentinel Times as saying that there was no “trigger” to dismiss the Council such as malfeasance, or corruption etc, how do you justify your seeming zealous approach to seeking Council’s dismissal at the time?

Mr O’Brien responded by saying “I was never zealous about sacking the council.  As I stated in my contribution on the dismissal Bill in Parliament, I supported it with a heavy heart”.

Ms Kairouz was the Local Government Minister when, in June 2018, she sent the municipal monitor to South Gippsland after a request from the then Mayor Lorraine Brunt. This monitor was Peter Stephenson who had worked as her colleague at Darebin Council from 1998-2008. This was detailed in the Commission of Inquiry report into South Gippsland Council authorised by Somyurek when he was the Minister for Local Government. A position he took over from Ms Kairouz late 2018. During this time, Phillip Shanahan was appointed to the Council CEO review committee in late 2018.

In 1997, the year before Stephenson and Kairouz became Councillors at Darebin, the then Government sacked Darebin Council. In 2012, 4 years after Kairouz and Stephenson ceased being Councillors at Darebin, the ombudsman released a damning investigative report into serious governance matters existing at Darebin Council. Newspaper reports over this period suggest the Council might be sacked but this did not occur.

So we have lots of links between all the Government “players” in the removal of the Local Council, and at every stage of the process in the “investigation” of the Council it appears that people close to Somyurek were involved leading to his decision to dismiss Council.

The two local National Party members, Danny O’Brien and Ms Melina Bath were both asked why they voted to dismiss the Council in Parliament without seeing the Councillors submission or the “other side to Somyurek’s story”, and neither justified their position with any factual basis.