Devil’s advocate at large in Cygnet

Huon Valley Guessing Games OMG! Greg Barker, the papal rep in the Huon, is putting himself at risk of being run out of the valley. In probably the most deft — perhaps only — piece of satire ever to appear in the Huon Valley News (HVN), Father Greg has taunted Mayor Robert Armstrong and his team by writing that it would be “shocking” if the behaviour of the Cygnet Township Committee “led to a local government that not only believed it represents the voters/rate payers but acts in a way that shows it does”.

Father Barker’s letter in the HVN’s March 13 issue reads in full:

There is much chatter around Cygnet in response to a Cygnet Township Committee meeting held on February 13 [the meeting was, in fact, on February 12].

The usual chairperson apparently was absent and a member of the committee was asked to fill temporarily the vacancy.

The acting chair clearly has a misconception of what consultation means here in the Huon Valley. Fancy thinking that it was acceptable in a consultative process to welcome comment from the residents and the gallery, which, by all accounts, he did, even encouraging comment!

Who’d have thought, too, that consultation actually required input, listening, respect and reflection to and from local people?

Amazing to think that such a scandalous process would also cover much ground as one comment I’ve heard suggested; can’t be true, surely! Really, a consultative process with . . . outcomes? I’m shocked to think that we have had to put up with a consultative process that reflects a belief that the people who live and work in the Huon Valley actually know something about what is wanted and needed here. OMG that they might even begin to think they are able to make a constructive contribution, even when it is contrary to what council or the committee might actually want themselves, and be listened to.

Where will this kind of subversive behaviour end, I ask?

It would be ‘shocking’ if it led to a local government that not only believed it represents the voters/rate payers but acts in a way that shows it does. Or a State Government! Or a . . . I digress.

If Mr [Trent] Cowen nominated for the next Huon Valley Council election, I for one would have to vote for him.

Here’s to more subversive behaviour, I say!!! — Fr Greg Barker, Catholic Parish of the Huon Valley, Cygnet

News of the Cygnet Township Committee “revolution” began to spread after the February 20 issue of the HVN, when it ran a letter from this writer about the amazing events he had witnessed at the previous week’s meeting of the committee. Extracts from my letter:

It was like watching a small revolution in the making. There they were, on February 12, all chatting animatedly, and generally making good sense. Watching on in the public gallery were five electors, some of whom probably thought they were witnessing a radically new modus operandi for Cygnet Township Committee. It felt like we were on the brink of a new, enlightened era? . . .

[Trent Cowen] conducted proceedings with flair, even-handedness and courtesy, even inviting from time to time the public gallery to contribute to what turned out to be the most free-flowing and constructive debates I have witnessed in more than four years of watching largely fruitless . . . exchanges.

The difference this time was that . . . it was a councillor-free event. No local government politician was there to warn members — directly or by innuendo — that it was not the committee’s role to go here, there, or wherever; and no one was there to stifle members’ imaginings, or hopes, or out-of-the square thinking . . .

This CTC meeting was a credit to all concerned . . . Cowen’s chairmanship allowed an air of freedom and frankness that I’ve never seen . . . [at] meetings chaired formerly by Mayor Robert Armstrong and more recently by Cr [Bruce] Heron.

More meetings like this might even encourage hitherto apathetic valley electors to take an interest in the workings of local government. Mayor Armstrong and his controlling bloc need not fear such freedom of expression. They will still be able to stifle it should they choose when they consider township committee recommendations at subsequent council meetings . . .

News of the CTC’s new-look meeting style was later published in the Huon Crier, a one-year-old Cygnet news-sheet that is willing to tackle contentious issues. Such issues rarely, if ever, get aired in Cygnet’s other publication, The Cygnet and Channel Classifieds, which rents space in the council-owned Cygnet Town Hall.

Clearly, if the Huon’s chief Catholic priest is to be believed — and who would doubt him? — Cygnet really is abuzz with talk about the “subversive” CTC. But we mustn’t get too excited: the CTC’s regular chair, Cr Heron, could be back for its next meeting.

Heron has been missing, without explanation, from council meetings this year, minutes recording that he has been granted “leave of absence”. (And no mention at all is being made by council about the continued absence of General Manager Glenn Doyle and Community Services Manager Marcia Waller, each having been stood down, on full pay, since last October as a consequence of an action by Waller against Doyle.)

Heron, a former deputy mayor (he lost that job, to the now-late Gary Doyle, at the 2011 council elections), is very much around. In HVN’s March 13 issue is a story telling us that Heron is moving on from Clennett’s Mitre 10 at Huonville, where he has been in charge, to become manager of plumbing business at Clennett’s Kingston store. Ken Pierce, CEO of Clennett’s Mitre 10 stores, says: “Bruce will be located at the Kitchen and Bathroom Centre at the Fork in the Road Mitre 10 store.”

It’s too silly to ponder kitchen and bathroom cabinet jokes. But it might not be so silly to hope that news of Trent Cowen’s welcome and courageous chairing of the February 12 Cygnet Township Committee meeting will strike a chord with a council that, far too often — although Father Greg, bless him, does not say it — treats the electors with contempt. — Bob Hawkins