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- Author:
- Ani Lamont
- Posted:
- Thursday, 26 June 2008
Meredith Burgmann will stand as Labor’s mayoral candidate in the City of Sydney Council elections in September.
Known for holding the record as the longest-standing President of the NSW Legislative Council, Burgmann’s history of community involvement and activism extends even further back, right back to the first Mardi Gras.
Inspired by a comment made by Clover Moore two years ago that she saw no conflict of interest in acting as the Lord Mayor and representative for the State seat of Sydney, Burgmann said she decided to take on the challenge of running for Mayor.
Clover made it very clear that she thought she could do the two jobs. I had been a member of parliament for 16 years and President of the Legislative Council for eight and I knew that just being an MP was a 24/7 job, and the Lord Mayor’s job is even bigger than that, she told Sydney Star Observer.
I just thought she was being really arrogant in saying she could do both, so I decided to start thinking seriously about running.
With such a long background in politics and humanitarian organisations like Amnesty International, the National Pay Equity Coalition and the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, Burgmann is considered one of the strongest contenders to come up against Moore.
Burgmann said as the race gets closer she will be looking to further push for issues of better childcare, higher environmental standards and improved community consultation procedures, particularly in relation to finding a solution for Oxford Street’s violence.
We need to look at why the cycle of violence is recurring, and it is because of the way in which the Oxford St area has stopped being a friendly area to gay and lesbian businesses and has become much more a space where people from outside the area turn up to drink themselves silly, she said.
There needs to be proper community consultation, and by community consultation I mean actually meeting with the stakeholders in the area and really working out what the problem is and how to fix it.
The people in the area best know how to control the situation and how we can go about generating more suitable business.
July 10th, 2008 @ 3:39 pm
The state Labor govt is on the nose and Meredith Burgmann is closely aligned with this govt. It was this state govt which arrogantly amalgamated south sydney and city of sydney councils in order to grab control of the council area. This backfired on them when independents gained control of the council. To my knowledge, Burgmann has never done anything for the gay community. Her colleagues at a federal level are still denying us the right to marry. Burgmann is in Iemma’s back pocket. Think what a mess they would make of the City of Sydney if they gained control of it!!!
August 15th, 2008 @ 12:30 pm
Yes , we are so lucky Clover stopped NSW state labor getting their grubby developer friendly hands on town Hall. What a nightmare it would have been with Frank Sartor pulling the strings . Bergmann is in the pocket of the Sussex street labor machine,her vision for Sydney is no better than her hero Fidel Castro’s vision for Havana ! We might all get a free microwave if we are lucky !!!! Go back to your lazy retirement Meredith with your generous taxpayer funded pension and benefits. We don’t want or need you.