REMEMBER WHEN

GOLD COAST BULLETIN Thursday April 1, 2004

GOLD Coast Mayor-elect Ron Clarke told councillors to ‘take an ice bath’ after a day of bickering and back room dealing.

Cr Eddy Sarroff claimed the new council voting bloc, led by Cr David Power, had started to flex its muscle and place its councillors in key positions.

He claimed Mr Power, who has been identified as the leader of the bloc, had warned his fellow councillors they would be ‘starved of funds’ unless they voted with him.

Central to the fight were the chairmanships of the council’s most powerful committees which also added $12,000 a year to that councillor’s salary.

One of the key changes being proposed by Mr Power was the merging of the council’s two existing north and south planning committees.

It was expected the power bloc would put Ted Shepherd in as chairman, ahead of more experienced councillors such as Dawn Crichlow.

It was understood Beenleigh councillor Ray Hackwood had already been told by Mr Power that he will have to face a secret ballot to hang on to his chairmanship of the engineering services committee against a key member of the voting bloc, Cr Sue Robbins.

It was also understood two key changes proposed by the bloc were a new code of conduct for councillors and plans to lock the media out of more meetings.

Mr Sarroff said it was a ‘return to the old days’ when bitter infighting dominated the council landscape.

“This council won’t last 100 days unless this is sorted out,” said Mr Sarroff.