Only four councillors didn’t vote on the original ban. Two (Sarkis and Farouqi) had a leave of absence and Rahme was unable to attend and had sent his apologies.
Hamed left the room during the vote (apparently due to threats she’d received for voting on similar matters on the past).
The more significant point is that of the six who voted for the ban, five also ended up voting to repeal it (even two from Christou’s own party).
And a week later Cumberland Council has voted to repeal the book ban 13-2. Even two of the OLC councillors crossed the floor in the end, leaving Sarkis and Christou alone in defeat.
So it seems the petitions and protesting seems to have helped - as well as pressure from both sides of state government.
Plenty of people addressed council, and many of them did live or work in the area (a few did not, which Christou is predictably trying to turn into a “people from outside our community pushing their values on you” talking point - but he’s exaggerating here).
New information from the latest meeting that deserves to be added here.
Hamed’s reason for leaving the chamber was due to threats to her family.
Understandable, but disturbing that the safety of a councillors family is being threatened over this.
Also worth noting - whilst the Labor councillors were the only ones who voted against this and most of them did - one did cross the floor (Hussein) to vote for it and another (Hamed) didn’t stay in the room for the vote.
Its worth noting that if they’re councillors for your ward.
The relevant council minutes can be found here in case you’re in the Cumberland LGA and wanted to know how your local councillors voted: https://cumberland.infocouncil.biz/Open/2024/05/C_01052024_MIN_3134_WEB.htm
The relevant item is: Min.729 - C05/24-506 Adoption of Library Strategy 2024 - 2027 - Post Exhibition
Whilst this coming from Christou is entirely unsurprising (it seems my days of putting him and the rest of his OLC chums at the bottom of my ballot are certainly coming to a middle), I was disappointed to see that Cummings voted in favour as well.
He had seemed to be a solid independent candidate, but this has tarnished him and I won’t be voting for him in future.
That wouldn’t be out of character, but according to the article he did get bail:
"Mr Mucibabic appeared at Parramatta Local Court today and was granted bail on conditions including that he stay away from the suburbs of Darlinghurst, Paddington and Kings Cross, and that he not own paint cans.
He is due back in court on September 6."
Though I’m definitely in agreement that this one is hijinks at best, given that the article ends on
“She was able to remove the paint with WD-40”
Edit - NVM, it seems the article was updated and a prior version had him being refused bail - though not sure how it counts as “refused” when the bail hearing hadn’t apparently happened yet.