By ANTHONY RADFORD

ONE of the organisers of the anti-tram around the lake plan has hailed the auditor general’s report as a victory for ordinary residents.

No Tram Around the Lake Action Group spokesman Ted Coleman said the report confirmed everything his group was telling councillors and council staff at the time.

“Every councillor was told this. Every council officer was told this. Most of the current council directors were told this, but they didn’t listen to us,” he said.

“Senior council officers and the majority of councillors failed to check the community’s claims. Council simply did not have processes in place. Council chose to ignore the people.

“In 2004, the then chief executive officer ignored the facts, and convinced council to plough on claiming council would otherwise lose face in the state.”

Mr Coleman denied claims from the City of Greater Bendigo mayor Julie Rivendell that the council had learnt from the mistakes of the tram project.

“This project is the tip of an iceberg. The current council is making the same mistakes,” he said.

“It has been less than transparent or accountable about projects like the Epsom supermarket, the tip, parking, Bendigo West stadium and the Marketplace, just to name a few.

“The least the present council should do is conduct an independent investigation of all council tourism activities.”

Mr Coleman praised the auditor general for listening to all parties in the process.

“We are particularly impressed that the AG has identified that ‘the council was not transparent and that transparency was important with such an arrangement’ and ‘council had not taken reasonable steps to ensure information contained in its grant applications was accurate and complete’,” he said.

“This was stage one of a $50 million, three-stage project, that would have ruined the lake and put the city into debt.”

anthony@bendigoweekly.com.au