Local Government

The Greens (WA) acknowledge the valuable role of Local Governments as the tier of government closest to their communities.Their obligations to provide community services and advocate for residents should be better recognised and funded by State and Federal Governments.

Aims

The Greens (WA) want Local Governments that are:

  • representative of their community, democratic and diverse
  • empowered and proactive
  • accessible and participatory
  • transparent and accountable
  • adequately resourced and more collaborative

Measures

The Greens (WA) will initiate and support legislation and actions that:

Representative, Democratic and Diverse

  • ensure the rights of communities to self-determination as expressed through the poll provisions contained in schedule 2.1 of the Local Government Act 1995
  • allow only one vote per person in Local Government elections with no proxies or voting rights to companies
  • call for voting in Local Government elections to be made compulsory, operating in line with the provision for State and Federal elections
  • make the West Australian Electoral Commission (WAEC) responsible for setting boundaries for local government electoral areas and wards, with a view to retain communities and to adhere to geographic common sense where practical
  • require candidates, Councillors and executive staff to disclose all donations in real time (within 7 days)
  • mandate the flying of the First Nations flags across all Local Government authorities
  • banning all corporate donations to Councillors and candidates
  • the introduction of election expenditure caps and a requirement to document expenditure

Empowered and Proactive

  • end the use Development Assessment Panels (DAPS)1 and maximise decision making by elected Local Government representatives
  • provides comprehensive, continuous training for Councillors that includes understanding of the Local Government Act and governance processes including consensus decision-making, strategic, legal, statutory and financial planning matters, communications, and environmental sustainability and climate adaptation and mitigation
  • councils not to adopt meeting procedures that have the intent of silencing dissent
  • support the introduction into the State Administrative Tribunal (SAT) of third party appeal rights against development approvals and/or the conditions or absence of conditions of an approval, subdivision and rezoning decisions

Accessibility, Diversity and Accountability

  • maintain the powers of the WA Auditor General to oversee Local Governments in order to provide independent oversight of financial and performance audits
  • encourage communities to be more involved in local governance and urge Councils to:
    • adopt the precinct concept2 of direct community participation in Local Government
    • hold public forums prior to an election to inform candidates of the role, requirements and legal processes of Council
    • maintain a regular open dialogues with the community via a range of media, to give equal voice to a range of ideas and to encourage community involvement
  • a higher level of financial support for those elected to Council, in recognition of the responsibility they hold for representative decision-making, to increase accountability, and to increase the diversity of people seeking election
  • the Local Government Standards Panel be strongly supported in order to promote ethical behaviour of Councillors and that a two year enforcement period apply to any decision of a Councillor made under a declaration of pecuniary interest
  • ensure that any monies allocated to Local Governments for infrastructure are only granted subject to a full business plan for continued operation being provided by the Local Government

Resourcing

  • support reform of the federal/state tax and Commonwealth Grants operation in order to appropriately resource community services and to increase equity across the spheres of government (see also The Greens (WA) Economics policy)
  • value the services provided by Local Governments, particularly community based environmental and social services
  • increase Local Governments’ ability to raise revenue via its own endeavours and local enterprise
  • provide Councils funding the regulatory levers to be responsive to achieve community needs; particularly housing affordability such as differential rates associated with unoccupied developed land and premises
  • require the State Government and religious organisation to pay rates to the relevant Local Government. Other rate exemptions to be the responsibility of Local Governments

Regional Collaboration

  • support a move away from forced Local Government amalgamations and deletions and towards models of regional collaboration and sustainability

Sustainability
(See also the The Greens (WA) Beyond Waste policy)

  • require principles of ecological, social and economic sustainability  be the basis of all Local Government policy and practice
  • ensure that State Governments do not hinder Local Governments’ ability to achieve sustainability
  • Reinstate the  well-resourced program to support cooperation among local governments to respond to climate disruption
  • increased funding for the implementation of Food Organic Garden Organic (FOGO) collection and processing and similar waste recycling and GHG emissions reduction infrastructure and market development for the outputs from the system

Glossary

  1. DAPS - Development Assessment Panels (DAPS) are panels consisting of five members, comprising three specialist members and two Local Government Councillors. Specialist member are appointed by the Minister for Planning. DAP regulations state that applications considered by a panel cannot be determined by Local Government or the Western Australian Planning Commission (WAPC).
  2. Precinct concept - Independent community precinct committees directly participate in council business with an opportunity to comment on council agendas, policies, local laws and development applications before these are considered by council.

Local Government policy ratified by The Greens (WA) in 2024