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).
@StryderNotavi which raises the obvious question, what were all the other Councillors doing instead of attending the previous Council meeting?
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).
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.
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.
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.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
The state government is threatening to pull funding from some Western Sydney libraries following a council vote to remove same-sex parenting books from shelves.
A slim majority of Cumberland City councillors voted for the book ban in a heated council meeting last week.
“We are examining the consequences this decision may have for the council continuing to receive library funding from the NSW government,” he said.
Speaking against the motion, Cr Diane Colman condemned the move as “book burning” and said all types of families should be cherished.
Equality Australia legal director Ghassan Kassisieh said providing the children of same-sex couples with books that reflected their lives helped to ensure public libraries were inclusive spaces for everyone.
Cumberland resident Caroline Staples launched a petition on Wednesday calling on the council to rescind the motion.
The original article contains 470 words, the summary contains 134 words. Saved 71%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
