PAULINES COMMENTS – Council Elections

2016 Council Elections;

Pauline Rowe

Pauline Rowe

My name is Pauline Rowe and I am the President of LCIT. I have been with LCIT for 8 years and most of our members who are all residents or have business concerns in Liverpool have been with us for nearly 22 years. I am a candidate on the North Ward (albeit near the bottom of the ticket – my choice).

We at LCIT are not people who just turn up at election time every 4 or so years. As a collective group we have been around for 22 years and have had 8 elected Councillors, 1 Mayor and 2 Deputy Mayor’s during our tenure. We are made up of residents spanning all the way from Holsworthy in the South to Wallacia in the North of Liverpool Area. We are a very diverse group of people with many different careers, opinions and beliefs and we believe we represent the mainstream Liverpool.

I have personally known Peter Harle (and now his family) for nearly 8 years, and a more honest, truthful, hard-working family man that compares to him I am yet to meet. He is a man of honour and integrity and has a very rare true passion of actually enjoying helping people. I am therefore saddened that this election has descended into character assassinations, mudslinging and political point scoring at the expense of not just the candidates but their families as well.

Peter is a quiet achiever and without over the top fanfare or huge media exposure and just gets on and does the job – he listens to both sides of the argument and makes his decisions based on what is best for Liverpool and its residents, he is not swayed by political party politics or biased media coverage, he is influenced by what is the right thing to do for Liverpool and its residents of which over 30 are his immediate family. Peter really does have a personal vested interest in what happens in Liverpool as do all of our LCIT members. For us it is not about political advancement or self-serving interests it is about being part of a group that advances Liverpool and its residents.

Whilst on the surface it appears that all the parties and candidates contesting the local election for Mayor and Councillors are political opponents, many of them are are friends and on many occasions socialise with each other and their respective families and have done so for the past 8 or so years. I also know many of the candidates and like and respect several of them, so it saddens and disheartens me that this campaign has become so underhanded, untruthful and at times down right dirty that many friendships will be lost forever at the conclusion of all this, but worse still if and when elected how this group of candidates will be able to work together as a cohesive and harmonious Council on behalf of the residents’ concerns me.

This campaign started off with racial overtones and certain parties calling us all racists, clearly they have not had a look at our candidates on the South Ward and the ethnic diversity we have running as candidates, they also do not know how many different cultures we have in our group. We have healthy debates on many topics ranging from political issues to religious issues and not all of us agree with each other’s viewpoints but that is what is called DEMOCRACY.

The campaign has now progressed into a lot of untruths and almost slanderous accusations about our group and its candidates supporting drug rooms – cutting budgets – costing staff their jobs and so on, far too many to list. If you would like to read the actual facts and events relating to these accusations just go to our website www.lcit.com.au

We do not need to, nor wish to slander our opponents in this Council Election as that is not what our group is about, it is about getting the right people elected to Local Government for the betterment of the City and its residents, so we will leave all that political posturing to the major parties and we will just get on with it.

I do, however, urge all of you to become familiar with what is going on in your Council and look at the facts versus the political propaganda that is being spread all over the community and now the State. First and foremost, we are all either residents or business owners and the last thing Liverpool as a growing regional city needs is more bad publicity.

I also urge you to think about where your vote goes this Saturday and what sort of Liverpool you want. Do you want Councillors in there representing you or do you want career politicians in Council using it as a stepping stone to higher levels of government and feathering their own nests?

As a long-time resident I know what I want, and it is someone in Council representing me and the very best interests of Liverpool who is in there for the right reasons and that group is the  Liverpool Community Independents Team and Peter Harle as the Mayor.

Pauline Rowe,
President LCIT
7th September 2016

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