An inquiry into the Norfolk Island Regional Council is underway this week.
In December 2020 the Australian Government suspended the five person regional council after an independent audit into the council s financial viability.
The assistant minister for Regional Development and Territories, Nola Marino, put a manager in place to run the council s services, stressing activities would continue as they had done.
Norfolk Island
Photo: Wikipedia
In February Ms Marino appointed an expert in corporate governance, Carolyn McNally, to undertake an inquiry into the council.
She is on the island this week and her inquiry team says they will examine critical challenges facing the council and whether it and the councillors were meeting their responsibilities, particularly with regard to finance and asset management.
Norfolk Island Council s election delayed for a year
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Norfolk Island Council s suspension extended by a year
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Key organisations in Norfolk Island have written to Australian Prime Minister, Scott Morrison, pleading with him to restore good governance and representative democracy.
The Council of Elders, the Chamber of Commerce and the People for Democracy Movement say the removal of the island s autonomy in 2015 was ill-considered, hasty and poorly planned.
The island is attached to the suburban Canberra seat of Bean in the federal parliament, has no state government representation and late last year its local council was suspended.
Council of Elders president, David Buffett, said something similar to what existed in 2015 needed to be brought back. There needs to be a Norfolk Island democratic process. In other words an elected representative in, say, both what are presently federal matters, and in the range of state matters, as well as obviously in local matters. And that was the system in play obviously before the five year ago change in governance.