Tara Murray
The Broadmeadows Progress Association has raised concerns about how online council meetings are run by Hume council.
The group wrote to Hume chief executive Domenic Isola after the last council meeting, with concerns about the mayor’s ability to mute councillors.
The residents association’s Sonja Rutherford said they believed that councillors not being able to unmute themselves was against council meeting procedures.
Mrs Rutherford said the issue came to the fore at the last council meeting when Cr Jodi Jackson was prevented from raising a point of order during a notice of motion, due to being muted.
“For two or three meetings we had been observing something unusual and we couldn’t put our finger on it,” she said.
“The muting and unmuting is purely to run the technology of the online meeting.
“Some way or another they got confused and the chair is using the muting and unmuting as part of council procedures, which is completely out of order.”
Mrs Rutherford said resident wanted the muting issue fixed by the next council meeting.
“By muting the councillor and her unable to unmute herself you are excluding her from the meeting,” she said.
“Everyone has the right to unmute themselves or they are excluded from the meeting and that mimics what happens in the normal meeting.”
Cr Jackson said she believes that councillors should have the right to be unmuted at all times.
“What unfolded at the meeting on the 7th September was not in the best interest of our community,” she said. “They deserve much better from their elected representatives.
“Since councillors’ attendance can only be recorded as present where a member can be heard, the mayor effectively ejected me from the meeting without grounds and without a council resolution as is required under section 46.1 of Hume City Council’s Governance Rules.
“The mayor should not have the ability to sensor councillors by overriding their microphone and muting them. It is completely unacceptable because it can lead to undemocratic behaviour.
“If I’d been able to unmute myself to state my point of order, I would have been able to alert the mayor that the motion hadn’t been seconded and was ineligible to be deferred at that point.
“I would have saved council the embarrassment of the item being invalidated.
Mr Isola said the council meetings were being conducted in accordance with the COVID-19 Omnibus (Emergency Measures) Act 2020 and Council’s Code of Meeting Procedures.
“The mayor, as the chairperson of a council meeting, requires the ability to mute a councillor or other individual who is speaking at an online meeting.
“This is the equivalent of the mayor having the ability to turn off the microphone of a person speaking at a council meeting where councillors are physically present.”
