In June’s 2021 Moreland Council meeting Councillor Oscar Yildiz triggered a debate that divided councillors. The issue revolved around the deputy mayor’s allowance during the time which Mayor Annalivia Carli-Hannan will be on maternity leave.
The night before the meeting, Yildiz had taken to social media to question Carli-Hannan taking just enough time off to trigger a clause within the Local Government Act 2020 (Vic) that allows the deputy mayor, Councillor Mark Riley, to be paid the mayoral allowance for the time that he will be acting as mayor. Yildiz suggested that this was an orchestrated attempt to cheat rate-payers in Moreland during a time in which residents are struggling to pay their rates. Yildiz wrote: “The sense of entitlement and arrogance makes me sick and it’s no wonder the average person has no confidence in politics and politicians”.
As it stands, if a mayor takes more than 50 continuous days of leave for whatever reason, then the deputy mayor will be entitled to claim the mayoral allowance for the period they are acting as mayor. This rule no longer forms part of the current legislation, however the repealed law still operates until the new Wage Inspectorate issues a determination on Mayoral allowances. This has yet to happen, however one would expect that it is only a matter of time before the rule no longer operates.
The rule is thankfully being phased out, as it is uncontroversial that performing extra duties should be compensated accordingly. In Victoria, the mayoral position role is seen as a full-time job. The role of the councillor, on the other hand, is seen as a part-time position. There is a significant difference in the annual allowance for the two roles; councillors get roughly $31k per annum and mayors get roughly $100k.
It is worth noting here that the mayor and the councillors are not employees; they are democratically elected representatives. This means that they are not entitled to ‘wages’ or ‘leave’ in the same way that employees generally are. They are instead given ‘allowances’ and can seek approval from the other councillors to be uncontactable when they want to go on ‘leave’.
Regardless, parental leave is acknowledged as something to which councillors and the mayor are entitled to (without literally being entitled to it).
In the aforementioned Council meeting, Yildiz asked for clarification on the rules around the mayor taking an extended leave of absence, and whether a new election technically needed to be conducted. This provided an opportunity for the councillors to raise the controversial social media posts that Yildiz had published before the meeting.
However, councillors were appalled when Yildiz started reiterating the content of his facebook posts – Yildiz adamantly repeated that he did not have an issue with maternity leave, but that he felt it was suspect that the Mayor would be taking 52 days instead of 49 days. He wanted an explanation.
Yildiz claimed that he was mainly frustrated by the fact that Deputy Mayor Riley will end up receiving roughly $10k extra for acting as mayor for 52 days (and potentially longer). Yildiz stated that he believed it was immoral for ratepayers to be forced to pay for another person’s mayoral wage over this period of maternity leave during a pandemic.
People may be surprised, given Yildiz’ supposed concerns, that he mounted an attack on the Mayor rather than focusing on Riley’s acceptance of the increased allowance. It is well-known that all councillors have the freedom to waive their right to the allowance.
The explanation for this baffling approach may be explained, in part, by Yildiz’ long standing gripe against Carli-Hannan.
In November 2020, the recently sworn in councillors were tasked with voting for a mayor and deputy mayor. According to Yildiz, he had secured the mayoral position with five councillors (including Carli-Hannan) promising to vote for him. Minutes before the councillors were to vote, Carli-Hannan sent Yildiz a message letting him know that she was withdrawing her support as she had been able to secure herself the requisite votes to become Mayor.
Yildiz mounted a scathing attack on Carli-Hannan over social media. He claimed that Carli-Hannan had lied, deceived and stabbed him in the back. Yildiz used the event as an example of the moral turpitude of Carli-Hannan. Paradoxically, Yildiz then claimed that “politics should not be a dirty game”.
In the context of Yildiz’ own political aspirations, his response to losing the mayorship makes more sense. In his eagerness to cast a shadow over Carli-Hannan, Yildiz adopted a scatter-shot approach. There were multiple arguments fired, paying little regard to who was injured (it’s starting to seem like a party at Milad El-Halabi’s house – see photo).
As a consequence, Carli-Hannan was forced to engage in an archaic defense of her maternity leave, explaining in careful detail her expected delivery and recovery dates. Because of this, Yildiz has been accused of being anti-maternity leave. Which he isn’t. Yildiz has laboured the point that he supports a person’s right to maternity leave. However, because of his grudge, Yildiz decided to question the specific amount of days taken instead of criticising Riley for taking the extra allowance. If he was more principled and careful instead of interested in smearing the character of Carli-Hannan, who he vehemently claimed had backstabbed him, this might have been avoided.
By SAS & BB
The Coburg Meddler 