Council’s glass wall symbol of a great divide
RATEPAYERS, take a quick tour around the council chamber. Watch the video your columnist has posted online. It shows what really divides residents and our councillors.
This is about the flaws of having a full glass wall which fronts the public gallery at the Evandale chamber at Bundall. A wall which can easily be removed.
A “super majority” of councillors arriving for full council meetings use an allocated car parking space below the chamber. Southport’s Dawn Crichlow parks outside.
You will see in your columnist’s video that the veteran councillor is talking to protesting residents outside, most of them supporters of Black Swan Lake.
The bigger picture from heated community debate about something like “the borrow pit” is it shines a light on the inner workings of this city’s democracy.
Now, back to our video. The councillors have caught a lift from the car park, exited on the ground floor and walk just a few metres to the chamber door.
Some will have taken the lift to offices on the first floor. They must return to the ground floor but you have to be quick to catch them and any chat will be short.
Elderly residents need a seat in the public gallery where there are strict behaviour rules.
Wildlife Queensland Gold Coast and Hinterland president Sally Spain told your columnist: “There is very little way the public can get its message across in the chamber. There’s no signage (allowed). We tried to turn our backs to the Mayor because we couldn’t bring in signs.”
The rules are so strict, she says, that residents cannot wear a paper badge with a small safety pin showing a black swan.
“An occasional cheer or ruffled noise is all that can be heard through the glass,” she adds.
This is true, because from the media room, when listening to the councillors debate, sometimes a weird background muffle can be heard.
So take the Black Swan Lake debate. What type of contact have residents had with councillors?
“It’s been very sparse,” Ms Spain replies.
What about emails and social media? Some older residents do not use Facebook. When an email is sent off, the response from the offices of some councillors is just a confirmation of it being received and “noted”.
“I don’t think anyone, even the federal parliament, meets behind glass,” Ms Spain says.
Southport resident Jonathan Gregor, who has begun attending council meetings, agrees the glass is a metaphor for the divide between residents and councillors.
“It’s the attitude of they’re the lords and masters. The truth is meant to be the opposite,” he says.
“(Councillor) Peter Young comes along to community gatherings. (Councillor) Daphne McDonald came to the Greenmount rally. They (some of the others) have this insular attitude because they’ve been elected. They can rule almost as if this is their personal fiefdom.”
Your columnist remembers the late Tom Burns, the former Deputy Premier, who began his political career before Facebook, emails and mobile telephones. Each Friday night pollies with enough backbone met with residents on street corners and copped a spray.
At the former council chamber, known at the Beehive, which was destroyed for the cultural precinct, the press would sit in the gallery next to residents breathing down the back of the neck of councillors.
It was not perfect, the roof of the building leaked, security had a tougher job but in terms of democracy all voices could be heard. Please remove the flaw that is the glass at Evandale.