I see from the front page of last week’s Chronicle that Cr David Kingham used the fact that three existing councillors are all members of the Rotary Club of Blayney as a lightning rod to garner opposition to them and support for his election as deputy mayor.
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That support came from all three of the new members on Council.
I wonder if those three councillors know that, in the last couple of years alone, the Rotary Club of Blayney has led the fundraising efforts to raise over $100,000 to buy the Blayney Community Bus, currently garaged at Blayney Hospital, and over $180,000 for the new Palliative Care suite at Blayney Hospital.
There is an irony here as Cr Denton’s campaign was built on a policy of further strengthening Blayney Hospital with the employment of an accident and emergency doctor.
As a councillor, he should be aware that the existing hospital was built on the tireless efforts of local GPs Bruce Jones, Chip Redhead and Ranjit Barui, all inspirational leaders and long-time members and former presidents of the Rotary Club of Blayney.
It is also worth noting that the past three mayors of Blayney Shire Council (Bruce Kingham, Ted Wilson and John Davis) all had a close and constructive relationship with Rotary for the betterment of our shire, the Heritage Park project being just one illustration.
The Rotary Club of Blayney was chartered in 1955. In all that time, Rotary has always been totally non-political.
Rotary is not some sort of secret society; it is open to all and does not discriminate on the basis of gender, colour, race, religion or sexuality.
For the record, Clr Ewin performed a really crucial role in the raising of funds for the Palliative Care project.
When the then Minister for Health visited Blayney in July 2016, Cr Ewin (in his role as Deputy Mayor) got a commitment from the Minister to provide an additional grant of $25,000 towards the project.
The Minister had already committed to provide the sum of $30,000 but that was contingent on further funds of $120,000 being raised.
Just like councillors, Rotary members are committed to serving their communities.
It is not surprising that the three “Rotary fellows” (Scott Ferguson, Allan Ewin and David Somervaille) polled in aggregate well over 50% of the first preference votes.
It is also worth noting that Cr Ewin received some 35% more first preference votes than Cr Kingham at the recent poll.
It is curious that, in Cr Kingham’s mind, there is something wrong with three Rotarians, with a long history of service to the community, working together to be re-elected to continue that work.
The implication is that alliances of this nature are an unsatisfactory state of affairs.
It is odd that Cr Kingham’s response was to match this with his own unholy alliance of strange bedfellows.
