Reef Resort Owners Association Incorporated
PO Box 6 Port Douglas, Queensland 4877
Digital Newsletter - 13 August 2024
***Please do not confuse this newsletter with the Body Corporate for Reef Terraces CTS 888 Committee.***
PO Box 6 Port Douglas, Queensland 4877
Digital Newsletter - 13 August 2024
***Please do not confuse this newsletter with the Body Corporate for Reef Terraces CTS 888 Committee.***
As an owner you are welcome to join the Reef Resort Owners Association. Please enquire at anytime.
Look Up Strata National Webinar - 8 August 2024
The webinar was presented by Chris Irons of Strata Solve and a former Queensland BCCM Commissioner of more than 5 years.
By registering for the webinar I was allowed to submit a question and I asked something that has been bugging owners for a long time:
"Before a body corporate AGM can an existing committee send to lot owners "Voting Guidance (Vote for us)" and pre-filled voting papers to influence the Committee election in the Commercial Module?"
The answer from Chris Irons was:
"Look, the short answer is yes, they can. The longer answer is they need to be awfully careful about how they're doing that, though. What the committee needs to avoid is, it needs to avoid the impression that there is only one way to vote, number one. Number two, they want to avoid being seen to be misleading people. A really quick example, I had a client recently who provided me a copy of the AGM materials. In the AGM materials were the voting papers, so that was fine. I looked at the voting papers and all the yeses were bolded in that voting paper. Nothing else was bolded or underlined or italicised, only the yeses. My client thought, Is that fair? I have to say, I'm not sure that it is, to tell you the truth, because What that is essentially saying to... It could be argued, this has certainly been the subject of applications to adjudicators in the past. It could be argued that it's being suggested to owners, there's only one way that you can vote here. There's only one legitimate way that you can vote. So be really careful, committee, about how you can absolutely recommend people vote for something. It's just how you do it. It's always about how you do it. Don't mislead and don't be seen to be depriving people of a choice, because that's what it is at the end of the day. This is a democracy. You're going out there, you're trying to get people to do what you want. You've got to accept that you might fail. That's the reality. "
Note:
Since 2016 body corporate committee elections in stage 1 have been flawed. The closest we have ever got to a valid committee election was the 2023 committee election (9 Feburary 2024) and now after looking at the Chris Irons answer, above it appears this was also flawed.
I think as an association we should act make sure this "Voting guidance" is issued fairly and pre-filled voting slips are not allowed. This type of thing could be called into question by applying the Code of conduct for committee voting members?
(BCCM Act Schedule 1A 2 (1) A committee voting member must act honestly and fairly inperforming the member's duties as a committee votingmember.)
The webinar was presented by Chris Irons of Strata Solve and a former Queensland BCCM Commissioner of more than 5 years.
By registering for the webinar I was allowed to submit a question and I asked something that has been bugging owners for a long time:
"Before a body corporate AGM can an existing committee send to lot owners "Voting Guidance (Vote for us)" and pre-filled voting papers to influence the Committee election in the Commercial Module?"
The answer from Chris Irons was:
"Look, the short answer is yes, they can. The longer answer is they need to be awfully careful about how they're doing that, though. What the committee needs to avoid is, it needs to avoid the impression that there is only one way to vote, number one. Number two, they want to avoid being seen to be misleading people. A really quick example, I had a client recently who provided me a copy of the AGM materials. In the AGM materials were the voting papers, so that was fine. I looked at the voting papers and all the yeses were bolded in that voting paper. Nothing else was bolded or underlined or italicised, only the yeses. My client thought, Is that fair? I have to say, I'm not sure that it is, to tell you the truth, because What that is essentially saying to... It could be argued, this has certainly been the subject of applications to adjudicators in the past. It could be argued that it's being suggested to owners, there's only one way that you can vote here. There's only one legitimate way that you can vote. So be really careful, committee, about how you can absolutely recommend people vote for something. It's just how you do it. It's always about how you do it. Don't mislead and don't be seen to be depriving people of a choice, because that's what it is at the end of the day. This is a democracy. You're going out there, you're trying to get people to do what you want. You've got to accept that you might fail. That's the reality. "
Note:
Since 2016 body corporate committee elections in stage 1 have been flawed. The closest we have ever got to a valid committee election was the 2023 committee election (9 Feburary 2024) and now after looking at the Chris Irons answer, above it appears this was also flawed.
I think as an association we should act make sure this "Voting guidance" is issued fairly and pre-filled voting slips are not allowed. This type of thing could be called into question by applying the Code of conduct for committee voting members?
(BCCM Act Schedule 1A 2 (1) A committee voting member must act honestly and fairly inperforming the member's duties as a committee votingmember.)
Reef Resort owners have a website: Reef Resort Owners Website just Google "reef resort owners". Thank you.