February 6th, 2023Councils subject to electoral structure review this year

Throughout 2023–24, 39 Victorian local councils will undergo electoral structure reviews, with round one reviews for 12 rural shire councils, including Hepburn, Moorabool, Central Goldfields and Mt Alexander shire councils, beginning in recent days.

A total of 39 local councils must have their electoral structure reviewed, and residents can have their say. The reviews will be conducted via 3 rounds within the next 18 months.

Public information sessions will be held today, February 6 from noon and tomorrow, February 7 from 6pm. Preliminary submissions open on February 8 at 9am and close on March 1 at 5pm with more information is available via vec.vic.gov.au online.

The Local Government Act 2020 introduced several changes, including that all small and large rural shire councils must now have electoral structures that are either unsubdivided, subdivided with single-councillor wards, or multi-councillor wards with an equal number of councillors per ward.

Currently, the structure of 39 local councils does not meet the requirements of the Act and must be compliant for the October 2024 council elections.

To ensure all councils meet these requirements, the Minister for Local Government has formed two panels to conduct electoral structure reviews of the 39 non-compliant local councils over the next 18 months.

The panels will make a recommendation to the Minister for Local Government when they complete each review.

If the Minister accepts the recommendations, the changes will apply at the next general council election in October 2024.