Local Government Minister Hannah Beazley looks to four-year election cycle amid voter fatigue concerns

Concerns about voter fatigue has forced Local Government Minister Hannah Beazley to start talks on overhauling biennial council polling to once every four years. Admitting her patience is wearing “thin” with obstinate and overly political local governments, the second term MP and minister has opened up to The West about a plague of issues in the sector. Ahead of local government elections scheduled for October, Ms Beazley said she was concerned about voter turnout — which has stagnated at a third of enrolled West Aussies for the past decade of elections — after State and Federal polls already this year. In a bid to drive up local democratic participation, she said she was in early talks about changing council elections to be every four years, rather than every two. Currently, council elections are split, with half of positions up for voting every two years, with every four years lining up with a State election. Instead, Ms Beazley said a model could see elections held every four years for all council positions, in the year which does not clash with a Statewide poll, halving the costs for local governments. The next such date would be 2027. “Voter fatigue is something I’m really aware of, it’s brought up with me by both local councils, but also residents all the time,” she told The West. “If we look at this year, West Australians voting in a State election, a Federal election and a local government election, so I am worried about the turnout in October, because people have already voted twice this year. “In order to particularly deal with voter fatigue, I’m at the very earliest stages of the conversation about looking at four-year fixed terms for local council elections rather than two- year rolling terms. “That gives a lot more opportunity for potential elected members to really to pursue the plans they may have.” Ms Beazley’s time at the helm has been defined with souring relationships between some councils and the State Government, including Nedlands — where she said behaviour amongst councillors improved once the council had been called out. Last term, the Government instituted a new round of council reforms, including the creation of a new inspector of local government, to monitor and intervene in administrations losing track of what was important. “Their mandate is to provide benefit to their community (it) is not self aggrandising or their own personal pursuit,” she said. “What they’re supposed to be doing there is providing benefit and positive outcomes for their community. That’s their mandate.” Ms Beazley said poor performing local councillors often put off potential candidates, and called for nominees to be focused on creating community good, rather than be drive by single issues. “My concern is that when an elected member goes in and behaves badly, it puts off community members who would be really good additions to that council from nominating themselves,” she said “I’ve spoken to WALGA and the Department as well about how we encourage a greater diversity of people putting their hand up for the greater good, not not a single issue, or a single purpose, but actually wanting to create community good. “It’s one of the reasons why my patience is does run thin now with with repeated warnings and not improved behaviour in some circumstances, is because they are affecting the reputation of the rest of the sector who are behaving really well and achieving really great outcomes for their communities.” The Victoria Park MP also spoke about growing concerns over the operations of smaller local governments, including last week’s comments where she called upon the Shire of Coolgardie to merge with Kalgoorlie, amid budget pressers. But, after a “badly handled” amalgamation process under the Barnett Government, Ms Beazley ruled out pursuing any further forced merged, instead preferring councils to come up with their own solutions. “I am concerned about the viability of some of our smaller local governments. I mean, some of our local governments in the regions have a ratepayer base of three or 400 people,” she said. “That size of local government is really of deep it is of concern to me in terms of our reform agenda. “I’m always open to local councils working together and coming to me with their own local solutions, whatever that might look like.”