Carol Altmann – The Terrier

As the count goes on to decide who will sit alongside frontrunner Vicki Jellie on the new Warrnambool City Council, we must remember that there is important, unfinished business from the last go round.

The first is whether the WCC has referred a crime to the police – the abuse and misuse of a council corporate credit card.

It is now almost four weeks since the Ombudsman recommended it consider doing so: we still don’t know if it has.

The latest statement from Acting CEO Vikki King is “at this stage there is no update in relation to the referral of the credit card findings to the Warrnambool Police”.

A former senior council manager lied and covered up his spending on a council credit card and yet, four weeks on from this confirmation, the council is apparently no further forward on pursuing any criminal charges.

For a council that allegedly couldn’t wait to throw a CEO out the door for pressing pause on a fishing pontoon, this is disturbing.

And for our local paper to argue that the stolen money was “paid back”…if only such justice was served to the poor bastards thrown into court for pinching a packet of chops.

Just as disturbing is the second item of unfinished business: the leaking of highly sensitive, highly personal documents from within council to at least two councillors, in the mail.

Three sworn affidavits from Tony Herbert, Sue Cassidy and Kylie Gaston all revealed that psychometric test results for those who applied for the position of CEO were leaked.

Senior council staff have known about this leak since at least April this year, when Robert Anderson asked for an investigation.

Has it been investigated? Did it turn the joint upside down? Did it run a full IT audit to see who had access to these highly personal documents? (I would guess, not many people.)

Has it contacted the Inspectorate or the anti-corruption body IBAC?

We don’t know, because the Acting CEO – as of today – has declined to comment.

“It would be inappropriate to comment on matters currently before the Supreme Court,” is the statement.

But this leak is not being challenged in the Supreme Court. It happened. And nothing, it seems, has been done to track down the person/s responsible.

As it happens, IBAC just today issued a newsletter on this very topic of misuse of private and personal information held by councils.

IBAC warns that such misuse “may constitute corrupt conduct”.

There is that c word again.

I am as invigorated as you are by the wave of change that is poised to roll through our council and the above just underscores – yet again – why such a change can’t come soon enough.

Carol Altmann – The Terrier

Former Warrnambool City Council CEO Peter Schneider failed to perform in his job almost from day one, according to sworn evidence by former councillor Kylie Gaston.

Ms Gaston submitted a 10-page affidavit to the Supreme Court late Monday, setting out her defence as to why she was one of four councillors who voted to sack Mr Schneider on 13 July – 18 months after he replaced CEO Bruce Anson.

(The affidavit was released by the Supreme Court today, after the Melbourne Cup holiday).

Ms Gaston was the last of the four councillors to lodge an affidavit, but the evidence reiterates and reflects many of the justifications made by former councillors David Owen, Sue Cassidy and Michael Neoh, which have already been reported here. Acting CEO Vikki King was the fifth affidavit.

In particular, Ms Gaston refers to Mr Schneider intervening with the now infamous Queens Rd fishing pontoon that was built opposite the then-home of former Cr Peter Hulin, and the results of the council staff survey that showed poor staff morale and concerns of bullying.

Ms Gaston claims councillors also raised concerns with Mr Schneider “multiple times” about key staff not being replaced, governance issues and about staff well-being, but “he did not respond to many of our requests”.

Ms Gaston also raises fresh allegations, including that former CEO was under performing virtually from day one and, a month after he started, both she and the former Mayor were checking the fine print of his contract.

“In March 2019…I had a meeting with the Mayor for a general catch up. I asked him how Mr Schneider was going and he told me he was worried that Mr Schneider might be out of his depth.

“Together, we decided to check if Mr Schneider had a probationary clause in his employment contract, as the Mayor did not recall.

“We did not find a probationary clause and just left it at that, figuring that Mr Schneider would start to improve with time”.

But, according to Ms Gaston’s evidence, the CEO did not improve and in early February 2020 – 12 months after he began – she asked for a copy of his employment contract, which Mr Schneider provided.

All councillors (except Cr Hulin, who had by then resigned) then attended a meeting with Mr Schneider on 21 February to raise their concerns.

“During Mr Schneider’s time as the CEO, he was never proactive in requesting feedback, whether from the councillors at meetings, or with me personally. He did not seek feedback even after the meeting on 21 February,” the statement says.

Ms Gaston also alleges Mr Schneider held up progress on the new joint WCC/TAFE library project by several months, by failing to follow up and confirm philanthropic funding.

This was later done by TAFE CEO Mark Fidge.

Ms Gaston also reveals that she received a leaked copy of Mr Schneider’s psychometric test in the mail, which she showed Mr Herbert.

“When the Mayor saw the results of the psychometric tests, he put his head in his hands and said words to the effect of “Oh God, now this all makes sense,” the statement says.

Ms Gaston then goes on to say that Community Services Manager Vikki King was appointed Acting CEO after Mr Schneider’s sacking because she had already proven herself in the Acting CEO position (Ms King was acting CEO between Mr Anson and Mr Schneider).

Ms King was also the only one of the four directors available, as Scott Cavanagh had resigned, and Peter Utri and Andrew Paton were “conflicted” by the Ombudsman’s investigation, the statement says.

Ms Gaston denied allegations by Mr Schneider and Mr Herbert that she had a close relationship with Ms King and had not socialised with any council staff outside of council events.

The civil case launched by Mr Schneider arguing a lack of natural justice is due to go before the Supreme Court on 1 February.

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Carol Altmann – The Terrier

Former Warrnambool City councillor Michael Neoh claims sacked CEO Peter Schneider showed councillors a dog video as a progress report, and that it was hard to “pinpoint any strengths” in his performance.

Mr Neoh is the third of the four councillors who voted to sack Mr Schneider on 13 July to submit a sworn affidavit to the Supreme Court defending his actions in the face of a civil claim by Mr Schneider that he was denied natural justice.

In his eight-page affidavit lodged today – two days after the revised 3o October deadline – Mr Neoh denied claims by Mr Schneider that the responses of four councillors to a “360 survey” of his performance had been vindictive and spiteful.

Instead, Mr Neoh claims, “…it was difficult to identify areas in which Mr Schneider came close to exceeding average and it was difficult to pinpoint any strengths he had demonstrated.”

“This was my honest assessment and was consistent with the general view of the Councillors that they were unable to identify a single area in which Mr Schneider excelled.”

The affidavit then gives a specific example of what Mr Neoh claims were Mr Schneider’s inadequacies, involving – of all things – a dog video.

“…during Mr Schneider’s review, after six months at the Council, he was asked to report on progress to-date to the full Council. He presented a dog video and said his partner provided afternoon tea for some volunteers.

“I waited for the rest of his presentation but there was nothing else. I found it very disappointing that such a presentation would be deemed, by a CEO of a regional city, to be adequate,” the statement says.

Mr Neoh said, as with most new staff, “I allowed Mr Schneider some leeway so that he could adjust and become familiar with the organisation” but alleged Mr Schneider’s performance did not improve.

“As such, I accepted some business as usual, but I did not expect that settling-in period to prevent Mr Schneider from demonstrating leadership, vision, energy, networking and engagement with key stakeholders.”

In line with the affidavits of former Crs David Owen and Sue Cassidy, which I have published earlier today, Mr Neoh alleges Mr Schneider failed to resource the Warrnambool 2040 plan, despite it being a clear priority.

Staff survey results and community satisfaction survey results were also extremely poor.

“…the staff surveys disclosed that the bullying (being experienced by some staff) and a lack of direction by management were the main issues which concerned the staff.

“Contrary to the assertion by the Mayor (Tony Herbert), these were not restricted to legacy issues, in particular, the concern about the lack of direction”.

As with Ms Cassidy, Mr Neoh said he signed off on Mr Schneider’s pay rise in March, as it was linked to CPI, “rather than performance”.

The evidence also, for the first time, sets out Mr Neoh’s involvement in seeking legal advice on Mr Schneider’s dismissal.

This advice included a series of emails between Mr Neoh and the council’s lawyers, Maddocks, between 12 June and 28 June.

Mr Neoh said he sought advice from Maddocks, following verbal advice from Alison Lyon, General Counsel of the Municipal Association of Victoria.

He then “either forwarded the emails from, or the wording of the resolutions drafted by, Maddocks to Cr Gaston” as she was submitting the draft motions to Mr Schneider to be accepted on the notice paper.

Mr Neoh then discussed that advice with Crs Gaston, Cassidy and Owen in the lead up to the meeting on 13 July 2020.

The evidence also claims Mr Schneider did not meet “expectations” when he failed to report David McMahon’s credit card abuse to the council’s Audit and Risk Committee – of which he and Ms Cassidy were members –  although Mr Neoh concedes there was no obligation for a CEO to do so.

The affidavit also reveals that an external audit of the council’s credit card policies was never endorsed by the Audit and Risk Committee (and therefore not the council), as it failed to address when Mr Schneider was first told about the credit card abuse.

Mr Neoh tried to raise this with the Ombudsman as part of her investigation into the abuse, but was told by the Ombudsman’s office on 28 September that his submission was too late and too close to the council election.

As with former Crs Owen and Cassidy, Mr Neoh denied that his actions in sacking the CEO “have resulted in any damage to Mr Schneider’s reputation as alleged or at all”.

Former Cr Gaston has, to date, not submitted sworn evidence in the case, which is due to be heard on 1 February next year.

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Carol Altmann – The Terrier

Former Warrnambool City Councillor Sue Cassidy has lodged an affidavit defending her decision to sack CEO Peter Schneider, including – at one point – asking the Mayor what the former CEO “did all day”.

Ms Cassidy’s 10-page affidavit was lodged in the Supreme Court earlier today in response to Mr Schneider’s civil action against the council, in which he claims he was denied natural justice when he was sacked on the vote of four councillors on 13 July this year.

Ms Cassidy’s evidence reaffirms many of the claims made by former Cr David Owen in his affidavit which I wrote about earlier today, but contains detail of other allegations, including that all councillors (other than Cr Peter Hulin who had resigned) met with Mr Schneider on 21 February and raised a number of concerns about his performance.

These included:

complaints made by staff about bullying;

concerns of staff about the lack of action in filling vacancies;

lack of positive engagement with the media;

stopping work on the Queens Rd fishing pontoon without a Council resolution;

a failure to fill staff vacancies including the Governance Manager; and

the overly close relationship between Mr Schneider and the then Mayor Tony Herbert.

Ms Cassidy said after Mr Schneider left the meeting, the Mayor was told to inform the former CEO that he had one month to improve.

Ms Cassidy alleges that two days after this meeting, on 23 February, she attended a meeting at Mr Schneider’s private home organised by Mr Herbert and “we informed Mr Schneider that he had a month to address the concerns. Mr Schneider assured us that he would take steps to address those problems”.

It was because of this assurance, Ms Cassidy says, that she agreed to the recommendation (from an independent member of the CEO employment committee) that Mr Schneider receive his CPI pay rise in March.

Ms Cassidy says the councillors continued to raise their concerns regularly with Mr Schneider during briefings, but her evidence suggests he continued to fail to meet their expectations.

“Whenever I asked the Mayor, ‘what does he do all day’ he replied that he did not know what Mr Schneider did,” the affidavit says.

“It was not until the last week of Mr Schneider’s employment that the Mayor attempted to explain to the councillors what Mr Schneider did.”

Ms Cassidy also claims that the former CEO failed to act on claims of bullying, despite showing an early willingness to do so, including allowing staff who had been subject to bullying to contact him on his private mobile.

When Ms Cassidy followed up these claims with Mr Schneider in May, he allegedly told her that “there were no bullies at the council and that it was just their personalities and staff had to learn how to deal with these personalities”.

“It was then I realised that Mr Schneider was not capable of improving the culture at the Council,” the affidavit says.

Ms Cassidy’s affidavit also raised concerns about the uncertainty around the outcome of the staff review and fears that staff would continue to leave,  jeopardising the future of projects including the Reid Oval redevelopment.

Intriguingly, Ms Cassidy’s evidence also provides more detail of Mr Schneider’s psychometric test that was leaked to her in the mail. 

According to Ms Cassidy, she received an anonymous envelope in her letterbox on 23 December last year which contained a sheet of paper with the names of all the applicants who had applied for the position of CEO, together with their psychometric test results.

Ms Cassidy said she was surprised to receive the document and didn’t know what to do with it, but as it was Christmas, she put the information aside.

It was only in the new year that Ms Cassidy showed the information to the chair of the Audit and Risk Committee, Rob Wallis, who advised her not to do anything with it, then Mr Schneider, who was “shocked” that she had the information, and also to Cr Peter Hulin at a breakfast meeting in January.

In April, former Cr Robert Anderson asked for an investigation into the leak: “At the time of swearing this affidavit, I had not been informed of the outcome of that investigation”.

Ms Cassidy’s evidence gives further insight into the mood of the 13 July meeting where Mr Schneider was sacked and where, allegedly on legal advice, the four councillors behind the sacking declined to answer questions from the other three councillors.

Ms Cassidy claims former Cr Peter Sycopoulis used language that “was intended to bully and intimidate” the four councillors including words to the effect of:

“we would lose our houses and anything else we had because of what we were going to do” and “he would not want to be in our shoes” and “we were going to fuck the city he loved”.

The case is due to go before the Supreme Court on 1 February.

Carol Altmann – The Terrier

Just in: Sworn evidence by former Warrnambool City Councillor David Owen sheds some light on why he was one of the four councillors who voted to sack CEO Peter Schneider.

The five-page affidavit was received by the Supreme Court at 6.30pm last Friday 30 October, which was the revised deadline for the Warrnambool City Council to lodge any affidavits in defence of Mr Schneider’s claim that he was denied natural justice when he was sacked on 13 July.

Mr Owen claims in his affidavit that, among other things, Mr Schneider:

was slow to act on decisions of the council;

had failed to replace a key staff member who had resigned in September last year (former Manager Community Policy and Planning Lisa McLeod);

had stalled the building of a fishing pontoon on the Merri River after unfounded complaints from former councillor Peter Hulin;

and that Mr Schneider was “sidelining” the Warrnambool 2040 plan.

The affidavit also claims that a staff survey had revealed “poor morale amongst staff due to a lack of direction from the CEO” and that “workplace bullying was also an issue”.  Mr Owen also alleges that, after the credit card scandal, staff felt nervous to use their credit cards “around Mr Schneider because he repeatedly told them that he was going to investigate them all”.

Mr Owen rejected claims by Mr Schneider that his responses  to a “360 review” of Mr Schneider’s performance had been “vindictive” and “spiteful”, but instead “accurately indicated my perception of his level of performance”.

“I have worked with many CEOs in the photographic industry. I scored Mr Schneider on his merits in the 360 degree survey as I had previously done when assessing the performance of these other CEOs.

“Someone who is earning $1000 a day must deliver a level of performance that justifies that level of public expenditure,” the statement says.

Mr Owen said he also participated in the six and 12 month reviews of Mr Schneider’s performance on the basis that they were “intended to help Mr Schneider, who was new to the role of CEO, to find his feet”.

Mr Owen claims that he had approached Mr Schneider over a number of months asking that he replace Ms McLeod, who was a key driver of the Warrnambool 2040 plan which aimed to “address the effects of climate change and other challenges”, but Mr Schneider failed to do so.

“…it became clear to me that he (Mr Schneider) was sidelining the Warrnambool 2040 Plan,” the statement says.

“…Mr Schneider was very slow to act on anything and, consequently, a number of important projects like the Warrnambool 2040 Plan did not proceed as they should have or just stalled”.

Mr Owen said he considered that “Mr Schneider’s performance had been of  a standard which warranted the termination of his employment” and the four councillors acted upon the advice of the council lawyers, Maddocks, to terminate his contract without providing a reason.

“(I) deny that my actions have resulted in any damage to Mr Schneider’s reputation, alleged or at all,” the affidavit says.

Mr Owen also responds to claims made under oath by former Mayor Tony Herbert that the four councillors refused to mediate or negotiate with Mr Schneider just prior to his dismissal, and refused to answer questions from the other three councillors on the night of the sacking.

Mr Owen says that by 14 June, a month before the sacking, “Crs Gaston, Neoh, Cassidy and I were beyond discussion or mediation with Mr Schneider”.

He then goes on to say that all four councillors were “acting on legal advice, received from Maddocks, including the advice conveyed to us by Cr Neoh, that we should avoid discussing Mr Schneider’s performance.

“Accordingly, I did not respond to any of the questions put to us at the meeting on 13 July 2020, regarding Mr Schneider’s performance.

“During the meeting, I said “let’s get this done Tony, so we can all go home”. I did not say “when will the meeting be finished as I want to go home.”

Mr Owen also denied that at any time he spoke to Community Services Manager Vikki King about her becoming the Acting CEO.

The affidavit also claims the recruitment process for the CEO was flawed, as nine applications were later found to have gone missing. Access to Mr Schneider’s psychometric test – which was later leaked to Cr Sue Cassidy in the mail – would have also changed Mr Owen’s mind about Mr Schneider’s suitability for the job.

“…had the psychometric test results been submitted to councillors during the recruitment process, I would not have supported the appointment of Mr Schneider…the decision to employ Mr Schneider may not have been made”.

Mr Owen is, to date, the only councillor of the four who voted to dismiss Mr Schneider to submit sworn evidence. Acting CEO Vikki King also submitted an affidavit.

The case, in which Mr Schneider is seeking reinstatement, is due to be heard on 1 February next year.