Is Council ‘barking up the wrong tree’ – again?   It appears that Paul Burke has entered the fray once more, in an obvious attempt to derail or undermine what is supposed to be an independent and objective consultation process.

Today’s Caulfield Leader has a page 3 article with the screaming headline ‘Rise in Glen Eira Dog Attacks – Latest figures prompt council to urge for more vigilance and safety in parks’.

More spin from Burke, this time an invented ‘dog crisis’. As ‘director of community relations’ and hence, media releases, this is probably another beat-up from his department.

Nothing would be wrong with the story if the facts were objective, and fully explained. It sure would make a difference if the public had been told that Glen Eira has close to 20,000 dogs, so that 65 ‘attacks’ given this population is 0.003% ; that the incidence of ‘attacks’ is lower than any surrounding municipality, especially when compared with Bayside which has approximately the same number of dogs. It also would have been ethical to inform readers that two years ago council claimed that it had 70 attacks. And the most honest approach would have been to fess up to their own report that many so called dog ‘attacks’ were in fact nothing more than ‘scuffles’ between two dogs. Now if they were really forthcoming with information we would have been told: how many of these 65 incidents resulted in fines? How many resulted in prosecutions? How many resulted in dogs being declared ‘menacing’ or dangerous’? how many of these reported ‘attacks’ were in fact even substantiated?

Most important however, is the TIMING of this article. We doubt very much that coincidence has any role in its appearance. Strange, that such a story should appear at precisely the same time that Harlock & Jackson are conducting a review of ‘off leash areas’. Coincidence? Serendipity? No way!!! Deploying typical Glen Eira tactics, the objective is to foment fear, dissent, to divide and conquer, in short, to polarise the community. When all else fails, pull out the ‘fear tactic’. Forget that even according to council’s own Recreation Needs Study, dog owners constitute the largest group of park users. Forget that the objective according to council’s own MSS is for ‘equitable’ sharing of open space. Forget that a ‘discussion paper’ has been disseminated that highlights only the negatives and is devoid of all supporting statistics and data. Forget that the very tone of this paper is more in the style of Burke, than previous papers written by Harlock and Jackson. In short forget that dog owners make up over 50% of the Glen Eira population. And totally forget to mention that the consultant has spoken with ‘sporting groups’, but has denied the same rights to a local dog owners lobby group – after it seems there had been agreement to such a meeting 24 hours previously.

From what we’ve been told, one could even go back in history to the Princes Park ’dog poo’ incidents, where agreement between sporting clubs and dog owners were reached only to have the sporting groups renege on a 14 point signed and sealed ‘treaty’ within 38 hours. Strange how all these things just seem to happen isn’t it? But stranger still is the fact that not ONE dog owner was fined last year for failing to pick up after his/her dog!!

We of course can only deal in speculation. We have to ask ourselves, who else would be in contact with the Leader? Who else would supply such slanted figures? Who else could possibly have the power to lean on sporting associations in order to sabotage any inconvenient community agreement? Who else is the doyen of ‘public relations’?

Councillors need to wake up and realise what is being done in their name! They need to question the fundamental issue of governance and whether Burke is usurping their role. They need to question how an unelected official is capable of undermining council decisions and processes. At the heart of all this is again the role of the administration and the need for its correct and proper governance practices. And of course, like any good little lap dog, there is Tang in the Leader article, echoing his master’s voice! He too, needs to be kept on a tight leash or definitely ‘retrained’ as per the Municipal Inspector’s recommendations!