By David Gill*
HAVING one person in charge of boundaries and names for wards on the Mornington Peninsula leads to the possibility of the first political gerrymander in Australian history.
The electoral structure review panel which is about to announce details of 11 wards on the peninsula was appointed by and is accountable only to the Local Government Minister, Melissa Horne.
The new wards will replace the six existing wards and be in place for the October council elections.
There is no apparent way of splitting the shire into 11 wards that improves the existing boundaries in the best interests of the general community, including small businesses and farmers.
The naming of wards should be put on hold until properly investigated.
I object to the process but understand that the minister moved the independent powers away from the Victorian Electoral Commission (VEC) onto an appointed panel and that the minister will make all final decisions without the usual early or acceptable community consultation. The panel is answerable only to the minister not to the community.
Feedback is basically limited to several choices made by the panel on important shire ward boundary and naming decisions in a regional municipality unsuited to the newly mandated (with no consultation) one councillor wards.
The lack of thought put into naming the 11 wards disrespects the communities of the peninsula’s 42 towns and villages.
The VEC has previously stated that single councillor wards are unsuitable for council’s like Mornington Peninsula.
The panel is also contemplating splitting areas to have large population centres join with sparsely populated rural areas. This would create a disaster for these mainly farming areas – 70 per cent of the shire is in the green wedge zone – as the likelihood of a rural representative being elected in such a population imbalance would prove too difficult for most candidates, leaving the rural sector unrepresented.
A councillor elected by large town populations would find it difficult to represent a small minority when prioritising services and projects, and in understanding rural issues.
The panel has clearly not understood the peninsula and the cultural, demographic and geographical issues when naming wards in this forced and rushed exercise.
The recommendations are crude and lack careful consideration and ignore democratic traditions and laws of fair distribution including the plus or minus 10 per cent “maximum” average variation in the number of voters in each ward.
The naming of wards, which are likely to remain for many years, received little consideration and the government should be ashamed that consultation was non-existent. The panel recognises that proper examination was not possible.
Consideration of First Nations language names has been shelved, apart from several off-handed suggestions with no evidence provided of the historic or other meanings of the words, except if they were used by European pioneers.
Altogether this is a cheap and nasty outcome based on political engineering to do with metropolitan councils in which Mornington Peninsula Shire is unfortunately caught up, as we are designated metro not rural by the state government.
None of the choices for one councillor ward boundaries should be used but, as they are the options in the 11 ward scenario, then the option with least change keeps some integrity of mutual interest for our segmented communities.
There is no apparent way of splitting the shire into 11 wards that improves the existing boundaries in the best interests of the general community, including small businesses and farmers.
The naming of wards should be put on hold until properly investigated.
* David Gill represents Red Hill Ward on Mornington Peninsula Shire Council, one of three single-councillor wards.
First published in the Mornington News – 16 January 2024