Kingborough Council has an annual budget of approximately $54 million. Around 60 per cent of that is spent managing, upgrading, building, and repairing our assets. That is ratepayer money. It deserves to be spent wisely, planned carefully, and accounted for honestly.
The record is not good enough. Council has run operating deficits in 19 of the past 22 years. Rates have been raised at more than double the rate of inflation in the past two years. Two major infrastructure projects were delivered over budget and behind schedule. This is not a funding problem. It is a discipline problem.
Under the Local Government Act, Council is required to maintain both a Long Term Financial Plan and a Strategic Asset Management Plan. In Kingborough, the link between these two documents has been tenuous. The result is poor forward planning, inadequate intelligence on what our assets need and when, and a council that continues to run deficits, not because we lack the income, but because we have lacked the discipline, the processes, and the professional rigour to manage what we already have.
Every small business owner understands the basics. On time, on budget, clear decision making. Those principles must apply to how council manages ratepayer money. We have the income. What has been missing is the leadership to deploy it wisely.
A line in the sand: the June 2026 budget vote
I want us to manage our budgets, stay in surplus, and stop raising rates beyond inflation. Wouldn’t it be amazing if one year we actually stayed in surplus and didn’t raise rates at all — a zero per cent rate rise? Why is that not possible, given that we have an expenditure problem rather than an income problem?
On 15 June 2026 I voted against Kingborough Council’s budget: a $2.6 million deficit paired with a 6 per cent rate rise, when inflation sits at just 5.1 per cent. I was flooded with messages of support while I was speaking, afterwards, and again the next morning. What I had to say resonated with the beleaguered ratepayers of Kingborough. That same night, Clarence Council delivered a budget with a rate rise under inflation. We did not.
I told the chamber this will be our 19th deficit in 22 years. That is not bad luck. It is a failure of leadership. We keep asking the community to fund our failures. I balanced my criticism by acknowledging some great initiatives in the budget, and I want to deliver great initiatives with budgets that are not in deficit. We have been lulled into accepting mediocrity for the past 22 years, and enough is enough.
I have committed to putting forward a motion next year requiring Council to deliver a positive P&L budget. No more record-breaking deficits propped up by rate rises above inflation. Other councils facing the same demographic and financial pressures are consistently delivering surpluses. The difference is discipline and leadership. This will be one of the defining issues of the October election, and I am the only mayoral candidate who has actually run a business. In fact, I have run several. I made that point in the chamber that night.
A wholesale review of Kingborough Council’s engineering services function has already begun, and early gains are being made in how we manage projects, the discipline we apply to capital delivery, and the quality of data we hold on our assets and their remaining life span. This is exactly the right direction. But starting is not the same as finishing. We need to maximise this work. We need to profit from it operationally. We need to benefit from it financially. And we need ratepayers to see the results in the confidence that their money is being looked after properly.
As Mayor, I will actively support this reform and lead council in providing the oversight it needs to succeed, including:
- Bring forward a motion requiring Council to adopt and deliver a positive P&L budget, ending record-breaking deficits propped up by rate rises above inflation
- Ensure the Long Term Financial Plan and the Strategic Asset Management Plan are developed and maintained in genuine alignment, as the Act requires
- Engage the right expertise to manage this process professionally and continuously
- Ensure our Audit Panel has the intelligence it needs to provide effective oversight
- Ensure the annual budget process is informed by accurate, forward looking asset data, not guesswork
- Avoid large or sudden rate increases caused by poor planning. Council must live within its means
- Address long term deficits through better planning and smarter spending, not by reaching deeper into ratepayers’ pockets