The Northern Advocate has provided an update on a Code of Conduct complaint against councillor Jayne Golightly. (see article HERE >>>)
The Code of Conduct complaint was made by Whangarei activist Terry Burkhardt. The Advocate says,
“Burkhardt alleged Golightly breached council confidentiality by including information from confidential council meeting discussions in her on-air Sean Plunket interview [on The Platform].”
The on-air discussion was about the as-yet unresolved dispute between contractor Jimmy Daisley and the WDC. The Advocate reported Daisley,
“won judgement against WDC over a wrongly-filed resource consent the council used to pursue him over his quarry, leading to an epic 18-year fight for justice…WDC-appointed independent investigator James Chrichton, concluded the councillor’s code of conduct breach was material.”
So what did that independent investigator find?
The Advocate says [emphasis added],
“Chrichton found the central allegation made against Golightly by Burkhardt was substantiated, on the balance of probabilities.
“Chrichton said Golightly’s code breach was at the lower end of the scale.
“He said Golightly had breached the code on a single occasion by disclosing which way she voted on the WDC appeal against the Whangārei High Court ruling the council had to pay Daisley money.
“That was because the information about the way councillors voted on the appeal should have remained confidential, as council discussions on this topic were in the public excluded session.
“Burkhardt questioned in his complaint whether Golightly had been authorised to make comments about Daisley on behalf of the council, or whether she was speaking in her personal capacity and said that this had not been made clear.
“Chrichton did not uphold that part of the complaint. He found Golightly did neither when speaking to Plunket, because what she did was no more or less than to tell the radio host she had voted.”
So the “breach” here is that Cr Golightly disclosed that SHE had voted on a matter that the Council heard behind closed doors!
Really? Surely a councillor should be free to say if THEY voted and how THEY voted on an issue, even if that matter is heard behind closed doors! Cr Golightly did not disclose the content of the discussion or how other councillors voted on the issue.
It is absurd that this matter is even being considered by councillors. How much has this nonsense cost ratepayers? And surely councillors have better things to do – like talk about how they are going to reduce costs to avoid the 10.9% rate increase they are now proposing.
Frank Newman is a former Whangarei District councillor
