Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "Grace Marsh Said:":
Rightly or wrongly the council of the day approved the legal action and the expenses they incurred. The new council turned off the tap on any further expense, but unless they abide by the last council's decisions how can we expect them to make their own decisions on anything this term.
Now if the lawsuit unfolds and it appears the town can recoup those expenses from the former Mayor I am sure that avenue will be taken.
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It doesn't matter how many times we go over it. It seems to be hard for the reality to sink in.
The last Council did not authorise litigation against three members of the community.
Council were in recess. We were in the midst of an election campaign. Those members who voted to seek a legal opinion about whether the critical blog comment brought to an in camera meeting without notice and without an opportunity for a staff report was defamatory, learned about the legal action in the media as did the rest of the community.
The comment was brought to the table by the former Mayor. Despite the decision being contemplated involved a pecuniary advantage , she participated in the discussion and urged the decision.
The law firm which advised the comment was defamatory, accepted the contract to pursue litigation. Without a Council resolution.
I do not believe a majority of the Council members who agreed to seek an opinion would have agreed as well to pursue litigation against three members of the community, who were not even identified as publishers of the comment.
Two members of council did not attend the in camera meeting because the item was not town business and had no right being discussed by councillors t a session of council.
A third member, who did attend the meeting, repudiated the decision to seek an opinion when it was publicly reported out.
Candidates on the hustings challenged, by voters, denied knowledge of the litigation .They did have no knowledge the action had been taken. There had been no meeting held to inform them or seek authorisation for litigation .
I've been asked how the numbers went from $41 K to $68K. I will provide the answer when I receive it. Hopefully some time this afternoon.
Monday 4 April 2011
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2 comments:
Evelyn, I am a supporter of yours, but I think that you are wrong on this. By any logical definition, "any and all" includes litigation, and, "ANY and ALL" other courses of action that anyone can contemplate.
Litigation was not explicitly sanctioned, that is clear enough, but it is simplistic to think that means litigation could not be launched, given the VERY BROAD and ALL-ENCOMPASSING directive that was given. ANY and ALL means ANY and ALL, including litigaiton. Period.
Any of the former councillors who were in the closed meeting and claim now that they did not know what that meant were either naiive then or are disingenuous now.
To Anonymous
"Any of the former councillors who were in the closed meeting and claim now that they did not know what that meant were either naiive then or are disingenuous now."
Naive is an understatement. Irresponsible is what I call it for voting for something they did not understand. Where was the common sense to probe what the motion meant or what the ramifications could be?
Or... perhaps you are right about them just being ingenuous now. It would not be the politically savvy thing to do, at the time of an election, to admit that you knew exactly what you were doing.
Much easier to deny that you did not know about it until the rest of the town did.
Remember, we are talking about politicians who wanted to be elected to this term.
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