WAKOOL Shire Council has criticised the auditing process which led to alleged factual errors in the proposal to merge the council with the neighbouring Murray Shire.
Wakool Shire Mayor Neil Gorey said an original analysis of the Wakool and Murray shires’ finances, by national auditing service KPMG, was revised in a subsequent proposal, however the state government hadn’t accounted for this.
In the original KPMG proposal, Cr Gorey said the merger had the potential to generate a net savings of around $5 million over 20 years, however in the revised proposal the $5 million dropped by 40 per cent to $3 million.
Cr Gorey questioned why the Office of Local Government continued to use the rhetoric that the merger would generate savings of around $5 million.
“With the state government only contributing $5 million to the proposed new council to go towards the costs of merging, it has already been recognised that the costs are likely to exceed this amount,” Cr Gorey said.
“These additional costs will be borne by the newly merged council, further eroding the financial viability of this new entity.”
According to Cr Gorey, KPMG was pressured into performing the analysis in a short time frame, resulting in imperfections in their reporting initially.
“They’ve based a lot of their reports on false assumptions. My concern is the state government is trying to pressure them to deliver an outcome that they’re trying to justify,” he said.
Cr Gorey encouraged residents to take part in a short poll which would allow council to gauge community response in relation to the proposed merger, and provide guidance for council’s submission.
Meanwhile, Wakool Shire will be holding several community gatherings in towns across the region over the next week, to inform community members about the merger proposal ahead of a public inquiry with an Office of Local Government delegate in Barham on Tuesday, February 9.
The meetings, all starting at 7pm, will be held at the Murray Downs Golf Club next Monday (February 1), Tooleybuc Sporting Club on Tuesday, cluBarham on Wednesday and Moulamein Bowling Club on Thursday.
For more on this story, grab a copy of Friday’s Guardian (January 29).
