Northern Midlands Council Watch

21/06/2026

19/06/2026

Today in The Examiner. 📰

They call me the council "agitator." I'll wear that — someone had to ask the hard questions, and an independent court agreed: $135,000 came back to ratepayers.

But here's the thing. That job is nearly done. The clean-up is almost finished — and cleaning up was never the goal. It was the groundwork.

Now it's time to lead.

I'm running for Mayor because I want us to build what comes next: heritage tourism that creates real jobs, a budget that respects your money line by line , and a council that genuinely listens — to every town in the Midlands, from Longford to Campbell Town to Perth and Poatina.

Born here. This is home. I'd be honoured to have your number 1 vote.

The clean-up's done. Now it's time to lead. 🟦

17/06/2026

Rates are the current hot topic at the Table. Transcript of email below.

Dear Maree

Re: [2026–27] Budget and the Recommended Rate Increase

I am writing to formally advise that I will not be supporting the recommended rate increase as placed to us.

I request that Council instead give serious consideration to a rate increase of 4.9%.

Please note that I intend to publish this letter publicly.

Ratepayers are entitled to understand why I cannot support the figure put forward, and my reasons are set out below.

First, Council continues to pay a General Manager who has not been present at Council for more than nine months, at a cost of over $5,000 per week — this is on top of the other financial liabilities and burdens his tenure has placed on this organisation ongoing, and continues to do so.

I do not accept that ratepayers should be asked to absorb a rate rise while that expenditure continues unaddressed.

Second, it would be grossly hypocritical for any councillor who voted to retain this General Manager — when the opportunity to remove him existed and was not taken — to now ask ratepayers to carry the cost of that decision. Ratepayers should not be made to foot the bill for the failures of their Council and the Decisions it makes during its term.

As I understand it $250k per annum equates to 2.5% in Rates. Please confirm.

Councillors seem selective in their support and non-support of certain matters, which can even change from motion to motion in the same meeting, but it is only at Rate time do these decisions come home to roost.

Third, the $250,000 allocated to the Avoca public toilets is not supported when we have perfectly good operational toilets standing today, and worse given the ongoing vandalism to our newly installed toilets ongoing.

This should be reduced to $50,000 for a welcome upgrade, with the balance redirected to the Perth football oval reparation, as I have repeatedly requested.

Perth, now the largest town in our Municipality is continually denied oval funding, despite the fact it take sport overflows from Longford, which are now placing the ground under more duress. I am unsure what it will take for Council to understand that the Perth recreation Oval is not only the worst of all our towns, but continually gets ignored, when literally millions are spent elsewhere.

Finally, all funding allocated to the NMBA should be stripped in light of the findings of last week's of an independent audit I had conducted at my expense.

That audit identified 81 businesses missing from its records, and the organisation's website remains substandard, having not been updated in two years.

NM businesses DESERVE FAR BETTER THAN THIS, and I suggest are entitled to ask: what are we paying for?

Prior to my election to Council, this organisation was receiving $200,000 per annum, and I am yet to see one definitive advantage it has delivered to justify that expenditure.

I ask that this submission be formally recorded and that each of these matters be considered before the budget and rate are set.

Regards

AM

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Andrew McCullagh
CEO & Founder
Red Panda Collective

[email protected]

0418 122 333

collective.red

12/06/2026

Heres the election info

Here is everything you need to know before this year's elections.

11/06/2026

Hey Guys

Snippet from the new "News Of the Midlands" Local newspaper.

And while we take those announcements in our stride, behind the scenes the gloves are off.

The Ratepayers of the NMC are being scammed 101, and they don't even know it.

Running early has smoked out the tough and rugged campaign this will turn into.

Tomorrow i will provide you an insight into corruption 101 , how far it runs and WHY YOU WILL NEED A TOUGH MAYOR to lead you through the next four years.

Everything i told you before the last election was true and has been exposed, and love me or hate me, i have demonstrated the waste and exploitation of Ratepayers, time and time again.

You are getting a Council that is starting to show transparency.

I will also give you the reasons the Mayor and another Select Councillor are still sitting on their hands "considering their position" and not being candid to the Public with their intentions for October.

Thats how much respect they have for you.... its not what on the outside occurring, its what is behind the scenes.

Remember, in Councils gone past, its what they can take from you, not what they can do for you.

Its all whats happening in the background.

And I have it on good Authority, another long term Councillor has raised the white flag for October. Our job continues to do what we were elected for.

And when the Supreme Court have been busy in the past two weeks with the "Powers to be trying to shut me up", ask yourself WHY?

Do you really think yesterdays News Article in the Mercury arounds your truly, on a matter that has been going on for 2 years, was "co-incidence".... think again.... it was political.... tomorrow i will join the dots for you.

We have a job to complete folks ... I need your help.

And be assured ... I will never take a step backwards from cleaning up the evident corruption that exists through the system, THAT ULTIMATELY YOU, AS A RATEPAYER , are paying for.

Watch this space.

07/06/2026

Formal campaign launch

02/06/2026

28/05/2026

Another day, another Councillor moving on.

Councillor Richard Goss has stated he will not be recontesting in October.

Thank you Councillor Goss for your service to the NMC.

Two Councillors have now fallen on their sword, and done the decent thing, and walked away from the NMC after October, in a considered, dignified and respectful manner.

Ironically, it is the two Councillors that at least have a moral compass when push comes to shove.

Both Councillor's Goss and Councillor Lambert could at least be objective on occasions, but nevertheless their overall support for a General Manager and Mayor who have taken the NMC to the lowest depths it has ever endured, is something that cannot be denied.

In my opinion, this is another Councillor that was perhaps misled in part or full when supporting and voting for many of the Jennings / Knowles "regime" ideas and actions that occurred in the last 6-8 years.

This ultimately led to the waste of millions of dollars of Ratepayers monies around Defamation, the Airport and many other things.

I have known Richard from way back. Back in the days when we caught the bus together to Launceston for schooling purposes.

If my memory serves me correctly, he held centre back seat on the bus daily, as he was always one of the first to board at Cressy. So getting in the bus each morning, the first face was bus driver John Loone, the second on the back seat,Richard.

Richard was a local that cared about the community, and to the greater part had a good moral compass that built a better community, albeit parochially Cressy!!! 🤣

It is my belief, he like many others around the table, were totally blindsided and mislead by an Agenda and information that was designed for anything but the best interests of the Community.

So, as such the buck stops there. As a voted member, the onus is to investigate the information that Council Officers are provided.

If there is one thing Richard and i are joined at the hip on, ITS LOW RATES.

He gets my utmost respect there.

Again while there were many things we were not aligned on, but at our time around the table, the endeavours by Council to raise Rates to horrifying levels have been THWARTED to the greater part by Goss and McCullagh working in tandem to reduce them.

I am hoping that as a parting gift this Monday, he again joins the charge to keep rates well below that to which officers have been trying to raise them.

As the great Kerry Packer once said about Government back in the 90s around taxes. Why would anyone pay extra when they havent been doing a very good job of spending them.

To Richard, all the best and thank you for your service. You have certainly served your community extremely well to the greater part. Community service can be a tough gig, and your resilience has been admirable.

Spend your retirement at all levels well.

The dignified exits of Goss and Lambert are a saving grace for the NMC, and open the door for fresh enthusiastic, and perhaps YOUNGER faces .

The question on my, and perhaps the rest of the Community, is who else wants to exit on a high?

The Community judgment for others is the October election, and i am sure the Community will be happy to provide their judgment to others, if they wish to test the waters.

27/05/2026

https://www.facebook.com/share/r/18NHNRjcjd/?mibextid=wwXIfr