Labor V Labor: Left V Left

More heat from the hard Left over Town Hall spoils. Today's SMH...

Candidates step up for city's top job

Wendy Frew Urban Affairs EditorMarch 13, 2008
THE former NSW upper house president Meredith Burgmann's tilt at Town Hall's top job has met its first hurdle, with her Labor Party colleague and former mayor of South Sydney Tony Pooley also considering running for lord mayor of Sydney. The two ALP members, who between them have years of state and local government experience, are both courting preselection support before Labor's NSW conference on the first weekend in May, to challenge the incumbent, Clover Moore.
"I am very seriously considering putting my hat in the ring for the mayor's job," said
Cr Pooley, who is the City of Sydney's Deputy Mayor. He said his focus had been squarely on the local area for many years compared with Dr Burgmann's statewide view. Both played down potential damage to their campaigns by the Wollongong
council scandal and the problem-plagued State Government.
Dr Burgmann said she was probably the least likely person to be tainted by developer donations because of her long history of opposing inappropriate development in parts of the city, such as Kings Cross.
"My early political activity was all about opposing development in the Cross, I was involved in the Green Bans … I have been the person in the party fighting against [developer donations]," she said, adding that she would not accept developer donations that were funnelled to her campaign from Labor's head office.
In 2006-07, the NSW branch of the Labor Party accepted $8 million in donations and nearly $3 million of that was from developers and hoteliers, said the Sydney councillor and Greens member Chris Harris, who will also run for the mayor's job.
"Therefore, accepting money from Labor headquarters would put Ms Burgmann in a position where she is accepting developer donations and inducements from the hotel industry, something that she says that she abhors," he said.
"If Ms Burgmann was successful in her campaign for the lord mayoral role, corporate donors would be beating a path to her door expecting the kind of access that only money can buy. We have seen this from what happened in Wollongong."
Cr Pooley said he had never accepted development donations in the two campaigns he had been involved in but acknowledged the ALP state campaign accepted donations from developers.
"You have to raise money so let's understand what we recognise as donations … less is better," he said.
"Should I run, should I be selected as a candidate, it will be a grassroots campaign."
The ALP councillors Michael Lee and Verity Firth (Ms Firth is also the state's Environment Minister) are not expected to stand again. Cr Moore, who now heads a registered political party of independents, will run for the mayor's job again in September, as will Liberal councillor Shayne Mallard.
In 2004, 14 people put their hands up for Town Hall's top job. So far this year there are six contenders, including the former Sydney Theatre Company and Australia Council chief Michael Lynch. Mr Lynch masterminded the revitalisation of Southbank Centre, one of London's top art and music venues. His 10-point plan for Sydney included increasing the lord mayor's patch to include areas such as Bondi, and giving the council more control over public and private transport.