More scrutiny over council Unity Team

ANOTHER belated conflict of interest declaration could spell trouble for Cairns regional councillors elected on the Unity Team ticket.

All Unity members declared the “historical” conflicts yesterday except Division 5 councillor and Unity apostate Richie Bates, who requested information about how the mistake was made.

The declarations related to a donation of $1000 and a $400 in-kind donation from FGF Developments from 2012, $1000 from the company’s director Murray Moule in 2016, and a 2012 contribution of $1000 from Flanagan Group.

They involve 39 items between 2012 and 2017.

All six declaring councillors made the same statement yesterday, saying the conflicts had only recently been brought to their attention and were the product of incorrect advice from a senior council officer.

“In the interests of transparency and consistent with local government principles, we are dealing with this promptly by correcting the record,” they said.

Cr Bates asked for further information before he made the blanket statement.

“I think, prior to making this statement, it should contain all the facts, and it doesn’t do so,” he said. “I was first approached a month ago about this matter and we’ve received this statement yesterday afternoon.”

Only once were council officer recommendations rejected – the council in 2012 granted a four-year extension to Flanagan Group’s approval to develop land on Colonel Cummings Dr in Palm Cove.

In that case, only former councillors Julia Leu, Rob Pyne and incumbent Richie Bates opposed the approval while independent Cr Linda Cooper excluded herself as Flanagan was “a major contributor to her campaign”, according to minutes.

Mayor Bob Manning said the matter would be submitted to the Office of the Independent Assessor to respond.

The Unity Team was called out by the state Ombudsman in 2017 for failures to properly deal with conflicts of interest.