There has been a lot of criticism of Commissioner Linton Reynolds for his management of the City of Canning over the past few years, but one thing no one can doubt has been his sincerity in respect of reflecting the Canning Community's opposition to the forced merger process. As reported here in an earlier post on 6th March (http://ianrker-vincent.blogspot.com.au/2014/03/canning-community-cares.html), reporting on a community meeting held the previous evening:"I was very impressed at the way in which the Commissioner for the City of Canning, Linton Reynolds, acknowledged his personal view that some local government reform through amalgamation was desirable but said this had to be subservient to the oath he swore when taking office, which was to faithfully serve the people of the district."
Now his 'reward' is to be sacked along with the remnants of the City of Canning Council.In case anyone is in any doubt that Simpson's decision is payback for Linton Reynolds' opposition, just read the last paragraph of the article which is a direct quote attributed to him:
"When Linton came into the job, it [the City of Canning] was in disarray…he has taken the City of Canning from where it was to a fantastic organisation but it's now time to move on to a new era to make sure we have a local government ready to embrace the reform process."
'A local government ready to embrace the reform process' is not very inventive code for 'will do what I want rather than standing up for the views of the residents and ratepayers of the City of Canning'.
Look at it on the bright side, somebody else has got a whopping damning report card so it should not be too long now
ReplyDeleteOh there's doubt alright. Nobody paid any attention to Linton Reynolds outside of local papers, and he only complained about things after he found Canning was to be abolished. Prior to that, Mr Reynolds did not listen to the community or represent their wish to remain whole and instead chose to submit a proposal to merge it with Gosnells (which Gosnells did not agree with, and instead submitted a bid to take over Canning!). You'd be hard pressed to find any major media having taken up anything Mr Reynolds said, re criticizing the govt, so there's no evidence he was "outspoken" in any particularly relevant way. Labor, who didn't care about what was happening to Canning for the last 2 years, have simply landed a lucky punch.
ReplyDeleteAny comment on the Commisssioner's last hurrah, the Monday submission to LGAB: 1) Melville's proposal not valid under the Act. 2) Lack of natural justice 3) Adequate notice period required under Act not provided.
ReplyDelete